Julius Caesar Authorship

Background Paper
On
Date, Authorship, and Context of Philippians

Submitted to

Dr. Scott Moody of the
Luther Rice College & Seminary

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Course
Be 7404 Preparing an Expository Message
By
Carlton Phillips
February 23, 2017
Table Of Contents:
Page 1: Context

Page 2: Authorship

Page 3: Date and Place of Writing

Page 5: Purpose

Context
Any tenth grade English student has probably heard the story of Julius Caesar. The story ends with the betrayal of Caesar by his best friend Brutus, and ultimately Caesar’s death. In retaliation to Caesar’s death, Mark Antony and Octavian set out to defeat Cassius and Brutus, the men who had killed Julius. This lone event has given Philippi whatever little

However, the question of which imprisonment is Paul writing Philippians still remains. Most biblical historians have narrowed it down to one of three places: Rome, Ephesus, or Caesarea. Once this question gets answered, it will provide such a better frame of reference for the reader.
Traditionally, it has been accepted that Paul wrote Philippians during his imprisonment in Rome (Acts 28:30). There are many factors that lead people to believe that this answer is the most logical and, subsequently, most likely to be accurate. However, this theory also has its challenges. One of which is the length of time that Paul was in Rome. This period is roughly two years. The amount of visits that took place to and from Philippi during that time would have difficult to take place in such a relatively short span of time.
For example, there has to have been time accounted for someone to have been sent from Paul to make the Philippians aware of his imprisonment. Also, there has to be an account for the time that it would have taken the Philippians to send Epaphroditus to Paul with a gift that they wanted to give him (2:25). Lastly, there had to have been time for someone to go to Philippi and tell the Philippians about the status of Epaphroditus’s

It appears that the Philippian church had aided Paul financially around 49 CE (Phil 4:15-16). If the letter had indeed been written from Rome, that would mean that over a decade had passed since he had been helped again, which is essentially a long time, especially considering how good of a relationship the church had with him. However, just because Paul makes mention of the Philippians’ “renewed” interest in giving (~4:10) doesn’t necessarily mean that they had not helped him before then as