Introduction

In 2 Thessalonians 2:1-12, Paul is correcting a serious problem. False teachers have come

to the church in Thessalonica and were instructing the people that the day of the Lord, or the

second coming of Christ, had arrived. In response to their error, Paul states that two specific

events will take place before the day of the Lord comes. “Let no one deceive you in any way. For

that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed,

the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of

worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God” (2

Thessalonians 2:3-4, emphasis added).1 The question that this paper will answer is what Paul

meant by the statement “the temple of God.” It will focus solely on the location and meaning of

the “temple of God,” and will conclude that Paul has a literal temple with a metaphoric

application in mind.

This will be done by looking at the word “temple” and its meaning in Pauline New

Testament usages, exploring the Jewish origin of Paul’s eschatological thought process, looking

at both the literal and metaphorical views of the “temple of God,” setting out a proposal for a

literal-metaphoric view of the “temple of God,” and examining objections and their following

refutations in favor of a literal-metaphoric interpretation. This paper will only go outside the

context of 2 Thessalonians as needed to assist the thesis, and will analyze this single aspect of

eschatology in Pauline thought alone. The four Gospel accounts and the Revelation of John will

not be referenced.

                                                        
1
All Scripture quotations are from the English Standard Version.

  1 
 A Pauline Eschatology of the “Temple of God” in 2 Thessalonians 2:4

Exegetical Summarization

In the New Testament, two different words are used to denote the temple. Naos

specifically indicates the temple sanctuary (or the dwelling place of the deity), while to hieron

refers to the grouping of buildings that made up the temple in Jerusalem.2 Because naos is the

word that Paul utilizes in 2 Thessalonians 2:4, only the Pauline usage of naos will be explored in

the following paragraph.

Paul uses naos in his writings only eight times, and 2:4 is the singular occurrence of naos

in 2 Thessalonians.3 He also uses it four times in his first letter to the Corinthians, one of which

being his famous statement, “do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit

dwells in you?” (emphasis added). In almost every occurrence of naos, Paul uses it explicitly to

refer to believers as the temples of God.4 However, just because Paul uses naos in a spiritual

sense in Corinthians and other writings does not mean that it is used in the same way in 2

Thessalonians. This will be spoken of later on in this paper.

Jewish Eschatological Background

In Paul’s eschatological thought process in 2 Thessalonians 2, he is mostly reliant on the

Old Testament book of Daniel.5 Daniel contains the original Jewish concept of a prominent evil

                                                        
2
W. Von Meding, “Temple,” vol. 3 of the New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, ed.
Colin Brown (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1978), 781.
3
Udo Borse, “ναός,” vol. 2 of the Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament, ed. Horst Balz and Gerhard
Schneider (Edinburgh: T&T Clark Ltd., 1990), 457.
4
Von Meding, 784.
5
Geerhardus Vos, The Pauline Eschatology (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1952), 111.

  2 
figure rising up against God in rebellion and oppression.6 In heavily symbolic language, Daniel

describes this figure as, “…the horn that had eyes and a mouth that spoke great things…this horn

made war with the saints and prevailed over them,” and “…the abomination that makes desolate”

(Daniel 7:20-21, 11:31c). In language very similar to what Paul wrote in 2 Thes. 2, Daniel also

writes, “He shall exalt himself and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak astonishing

things against the God of gods” (Dan. 11:36b). Paul also may have used the symbolism of the

“Lucifer passage” from Isaiah 14 for his foretelling of the evil man sitting “in the temple of

God”: “You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my

throne on high…’” (Isaiah 14:13ff).7 As seen here, Paul’s eschatological thought process of the

man of lawlessness taking his place in the temple of God is firmly rooted in Jewish eschatology.

The Literal View of the “Temple of God”

Those who hold this view believe that Paul intends to be strictly literal in his usage of the

“temple of God.” There is evidence that supports their claims. In the context of this passage,

naos is possibly referring to the most inward sanctuary of a temple where the god dwelled.8 This

“inner sanctuary” in question most definitely points to the place in which the God of the Jews

resided, the Holy of Holies in the temple of Jerusalem. The small phrase, “of God,” that Paul

adds to “temple” signifies that “a specific building” is in Paul’s intentions here.9 Also, naos

                                                        
6
George Eldon Ladd, The Last Things (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1978), 58.
7
J. Julius Scott, “Paul and Late-Jewish Eschatology: A Case Study,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological
Society 15, no. 3 (Summer 1972): 140.
8
Charles A. Wanamaker, The Epistles to the Thessalonians: A Commentary on the Greek Text, The New
International Greek Testament Commentary, ed. I. Howard Marshall and W. Ward Gasque (Grand Rapids, MI:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1990), 246.
9
Ibid.

  3 
needs to be understood literally if Paul’s point is to show “an observable, symbolic event” that

Christians can use to conclude that the day of the Lord is fast approaching.10

Most people connect the self-deification here to the Roman emperor Caligula, who tried

to place an image of himself in the Jerusalem temple in AD 40, but died before it could happen.

Paul may have had this incident in mind at the time of his writing about ten years later, sometime

in AD 50.11 However, what this man of lawlessness will do will go far beyond Caligula’s petty

attempt to set up an image of himself in the temple. Instead, this man will physically sit in the

place reserved for the deity’s presence. The language that Paul uses points to the “single act of

taking the seat.”12 For this literal prediction to come to pass, a physical temple must be rebuilt in

Jerusalem.

The Metaphorical View of the “Temple of God”

Adherents to this view believe that because the man of lawlessness exalts only himself,

he will sit in the sanctuary (naos) of God, which is the church.13 To see this, one must go outside

of 2 Thessalonians to the Corinthian and Ephesian epistles where naos is also clearly used as a

metaphor. This man will take authority over the people of God in the church, even though they

                                                        
10
D. Michael Martin, 1, 2 Thessalonians, vol. 33 of the New American Commentary, ed. E. Ray Clendenen
(Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 236.
11
Gordon D. Fee, The First and Second Letters to the Thessalonians, The New International Commentary
on the New Testament, ed. Gordon D. Fee (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2009), 241.
12
Leon Morris, The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians, The New International Commentary on
the New Testament, rev. ed., ed. F. F. Bruce (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1991), 223.
13
William Hendriksen, New Testament Commentary: Thessalonians, Timothy, & Titus (Grand Rapids, MI:
Baker Book House, 1983), 178.

  4 
will not adhere to his command. Additionally, this Jewish temple metaphor that Paul uses is a

way of communicating this man’s “defiance” and outright rejection of God.14

Another key reason that Paul uses this metaphor for the church is that the church is now

“indwelt” by the Holy Spirit,15 taking the place of the Jewish temple as the location of the

presence of God.16

A Proposal for a Literal-Metaphoric Interpretation of the “Temple of God”

Most interpreters of the “temple of God” fall into two extremes; on the one side, it is a

strictly literal interpretation that points to a future construction of a new temple in Jerusalem, and

on the other it is a loose metaphorical picture that says the church will spawn the man of

lawlessness who will then commandeer them. This section will propose a midpoint of sorts, a

“literal-metaphoric”17 view.

This view does not go as far as to say that a literal temple must be built in Jerusalem for

Paul’s prediction to be satisfied, nor does it say that the man of lawlessness will come out of the

church and take complete authority of it. Instead, it holds a balance of the two extremes. It

affirms that Paul is indeed speaking of the literal temple in Jerusalem, but does so with a specific

                                                        
14
George Eldon Ladd, A Theology of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans
Publishing Co., 1993), 605.
15
Kim Riddlebarger, The Man of Sin: Uncovering the Truth About the Antichrist (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker
Books, 2006), 125.
16
Kim Riddlebarger is a contemporary Reformed theologian who draws heavily from G. K. Beale’s
commentary on 1 and 2 Thessalonians in his book on the Man of Sin. However, Beale gives the foundation of his
argument by going outside of the immediate context of Pauline thought, straight to the Gospel accounts and
Revelation. Even though it may seem he is attempting to do a systematic study, he concludes by saying that all his
research in the Gospels and Revelation point to fact that Paul is referencing the church in 2 Thes. 2:4. Both Beale
and Riddlebarger also hold to replacement theology in terms of Israel and the Church, which raises another red flag.
17
This term is the author’s original term. It was coined while reading Gordon Fee’s New International
Commentary and F. F. Bruce’s Word Biblical Commentary, both on 2 Thessalonians 2.

  5 
purpose in mind. According to Gordon Fee, Paul was referencing notable defacements of the

Jewish temple, the latest one being the failed attempt from the Roman emperor Caligula ten

years before he wrote the letter, to figuratively depict the evil man’s “self-deification.”18 F. F.

Bruce affirms this view, saying that Paul is speaking of the literal temple in Jerusalem. However,

the separating factor from the strictly literal viewpoint is the reality that the listeners would have

thought of Paul’s illustration as “a graphic way of saying that [the man of lawlessness] plans to

usurp the authority of God.”19 Like a modern-day sermon illustration, Paul references a literal

place to communicate a metaphorical meaning.

Major Objections and Subsequent Refutations

The main point of debate for the metaphorical view is that the “temple of God” stands for

the church. This would mean that the man of lawlessness would make the church his “base of

operations,” and will set himself up there with the claim of self-deification.20 However, at the

moment this happens, the church’s status as the church of Christ will be terminated. This abrupt

falling-away of the church as a whole is nowhere to be found in either the Jewish or Christian

Scriptures. The strikingly expressive language that Paul uses is too explicit to think it refers to

anything but taking a seat “in a formal way” in the sanctuary of God. Because no physical temple

in Jerusalem currently exists, it is assumed that the best conclusion of the passage is to assume

                                                        
18
Fee, 284.
19
F. F. Bruce, 1 & 2 Thessalonians, vol. 45 of the Word Biblical Commentary, ed. Bruce M. Metzger
(Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1982), 169.
20
Morris, 223.

  6 
that it will be some sort of “material building” that the man of lawlessness will use to make his

self-deifying statements.21

Even though Paul uses naos in other places to refer to Christians as spiritual temples,

using the same interpretation in this passage is extremely difficult to warrant.22 Gentile and

Jewish Christians alike would have immediately realized that this reference is pointing to the

majestic Jewish temple in Jerusalem, and even more so because of the hint of Jewish eschatology

from Daniel and Isaiah that Paul is utilizing. The spiritual, or “figurative,” meaning of naos does

not measure up to the literal weight that this passage demands. The man of lawlessness, a human

being, cannot physically sit down in either the church as a whole or any “heavenly temple”

where God dwells.23 Also, it is impossible that Paul is thinking of the church as the temple he is

describing, because during his day the churches did not occupy magnificent and grandiose

buildings for the man of lawlessness to sit in.24 Finally, if some want to say that the man of

lawlessness will rule the church, the whole picture of this man’s evil deeds will be much larger

than just the church. While the view that this man will come from and sit on the throne of the

church is being refuted, he will still make an incredulous demand of “absolute preeminence”

over every deity that is worshipped on the earth and the complete devotion of every living

person.25

                                                        
21
Morris, 224.
22
Wanamaker, 246.
23
Robert L. Thomas, “2 Thessalonians,” in Ephesians–Philemon, vol. 12 of the Expositor’s Bible
Commentary, ed. Tremper Longman III & David E. Garland, 441-486 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2006), 468.
24
I. Howard Marshall, “Church and Temple in the New Testament,” Tyndale Bulletin 40, no. 2 (1989): 212.
25
Martin, 236.

  7 
 The literal view holds that a literal temple must be rebuilt in Jerusalem in order for the

final process of the last things to begin. In response, this whole line of argument is built on pure

speculation. If this man of lawlessness has to sit in a literal temple, and if a temple has not been

in Jerusalem for almost two thousand years, than it must be rebuilt.26 The hypothesis and logic

seem simple.27 However, Scripture does not ever foretell this. Some state that this is the correct

interpretation of Daniel 9:24, which says, “Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and

your holy city…to anoint a most holy place” (emphasis added). Even though it seems to be

saying this at face value, it is only one interpretation in a large group of possible options.28

From the Jewish perspective, a temple has not been in Jerusalem for almost two thousand

years. While some organizations of Judaism pray three times a day for their temple to be restored

to Jerusalem, Reform Judaism “has no interest” in rebuilding a temple there and does not foresee

one ever being built again.29 Also, the Dome of the Rock, the second most important mosque in

Islam, currently takes up the very place in Jerusalem that God originally set aside for the temple.

Interestingly enough, Teddy Kolleck, the late former mayor of Jerusalem, recorded in his

autobiography that he received almost thirty letters per year from “fundamentalist” Christians

asking him to rebuild the Temple, “because they regard this as a prerequisite for the return of

Christ.”30

                                                        
26
Gary S. Shogren, 1 & 2 Thessalonians, vol. 13 of the Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New
Testament, ed. Clinton E. Arnold (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2012), 284.
27
“It is this sort of apocalyptic calculus that the NT discourages and certainly has no place in this or other
Pauline letters.” Shogren, 283.
28
Ibid.
29
David H. Stern, Jewish New Testament Commentary. Clarksville, MD: Jewish New Testament
Publications, Inc., 1992), 628.
30
Ibid., 629.

  8 
 Conclusion

Even though the debate of the correct location and meaning of the “temple of God” in 2

Thessalonians 2:4 has well-respected conservative biblical scholars on both sides and shows no

promising end to the arguments, this paper has made an attempt to put forth evidence for the

third, middle-ground position of the literal-metaphoric interpretation. This was done first by

looking at Paul’s usage of the word “temple” and his Jewish origin of his eschatological thought

process. Then, the literal and metaphorical views of the “temple of God” were examined, and a

third view, a literal-metaphoric one, was proposed. Lastly, major objections and their subsequent

refutations were stated in favor of this literal-metaphoric view. As this is the only location of

Paul’s theology of the “man of lawlessness” and his seat in the “temple of God” in his canonized

writings, this paper’s thesis should be seriously considered as a valid option of Paul’s complete

eschatology of the location and meaning of the “temple of God” in relation to the “man of

lawlessness.”

When I read what Gordon Fee said in regards to Paul writing this second letter to the

believers in this city, that he wrote to them to give them hope and “comfort,” it confused me at

first. How can a detailed and confusing (at some points) description of the future be comforting?

Then, while writing the paper, I understood. Paul was worried about these believers because the

false teachers were deceiving them through their errant teaching of these things. They were being

led astray.

My dream is to be a teacher of Holy Scripture, whether through the mode of preaching on

Sunday mornings or in the classroom setting. I have been realizing over the last few years that

teaching Scripture is much more than simply regurgitating knowledge and facts. It is

communicating the Spirit-inspired texts that ultimately lead to personal relationship with the

  9 
creator God and a transformed life through it. True teaching from Scripture brings hope and

comfort, not evil deception, just like Paul demonstrated in this letter. I want for this hope to be

always increasing in my personal life as God transforms me more and more through my intake of

Scripture, and that others around me would see this hope in me and forsake any evil deceptions

in their lives by turning to God and making Him and His ways their ultimate hope and comfort.

  10 
 Sources Consulted

Borse, Udo. “ναός.” Vol. 2 of the Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament. Edited by Horst
Balz and Gerhard Schneider. Edinburgh: T&T Clark Ltd., 1990.

Bruce, F. F. 1 & 2 Thessalonians. Vol. 45 of the Word Biblical Commentary. Edited by Bruce
M. Metzger. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1982.

Fee, Gordon D. The First and Second Letters to the Thessalonians. The New International
Commentary on the New Testament. Edited by Gordon D. Fee. Grand Rapids, MI:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2009.

Hendriksen, William. New Testament Commentary: Thessalonians, Timothy, & Titus. Grand
Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1983.

Ladd, George Eldon. The Last Things. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.,
1978.

____________. A Theology of the New Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans
Publishing Co., 1993.

Marshall, I. Howard. “Church and Temple in the New Testament.” Tyndale Bulletin 40, no. 2
(1989): 203-222.

Martin, D. Michael. 1, 2 Thessalonians. Vol. 33 of the New American Commentary. Edited by

E. Ray Clendenen. Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995.

Morris, Leon. The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians. The New International
Commentary on the New Testament

Riddlebarger, Kim. The Man of Sin: Uncovering the Truth About the Antichrist. Grand Rapids,
MI: Baker Books, 2006.

Scott, J. Julius. “Paul and Late-Jewish Eschatology: A Case Study.” Journal of the Evangelical
Theological Society 15, no. 3 (Summer 1972): 133-143.

Shogren, Gary S. 1 & 2 Thessalonians. Vol. 13 of the Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the
New Testament. Edited by Clinton E. Arnold. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2012.

Stern, David H. Jewish New Testament Commentary. Clarksville, MD: Jewish New Testament
Publications, Inc., 1992.

Thomas, Robert L. “2 Thessalonians.” In Ephesians–Philemon. Vol. 12 of the Expositor’s Bible

Commentary. Edited by Tremper Longman III & David E. Garland, 441-486. Grand
Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2006.

  11 
Von Meding, W. “Temple.” Vol. 3 of the New International Dictionary of New Testament
Theology. Edited by Colin Brown. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1978.

Vos, Geerhardus. The Pauline Eschatology. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1952.

Wanamaker, Charles A. The Epistles to the Thessalonians: A Commentary on the Greek Text.
The New International Greek Testament Commentary. Edited by I. Howard Marshall and
W. Ward Gasque. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1990.

  12