2 Thessalonians 1:5

ἔνδειγμα, in apposition to the general thought of the preceding clause; it does not matter to the sense whether the word is taken as an elliptic nominative or an appositional accusative. “All this is really a clear proof of (or points to) the equity of God's judgment,” which will right the present inequalities of life (Dante, Purg., x. 109 f.). Δικαία κρίσις is the future and final judgment of 6 10, whose principle is recompense (Luke 16:25); there is a divine law of compensation which will operate. This throws back light upon the present sufferings of the righteous. These trials, it is assumed, are due to loyalty and innocence of life; hence, in their divine aspect (2 Thessalonians 1:5), they are the necessary qualification or discipline for securing entrance into the realm of God. They are significant, not casual. Paul begins by arguing that their very infliction or permission proves that God must be contemplating a suitable reward and destiny for those who endured them in the right spirit. εἰς τὸ κ. τ. λ., is thus a loose expansion (from the common rabbinic phrase, cf. Dalman's Worte Jesu, 97 f.; E. Tr., 119) of one side of the δικ. κρίσις. The other side, the human aspect of θλῖψις, then emerges in 2 Thessalonians 1:6. Since the Thessalonians were suffering at the hands of men (τοὺς θλίβοντας, Isaiah 19:20), the two-handed engine of retribution (so Lamentations 3:64 f.; Obadiah 1:15; Isaiah 59:18, for ἀνταποδ.) must in all fairness punish the persecutors (cf. Sap. 11:9, 10). This is the only passage in which Paul welcomes God's vengeance on the enemies of the church as an element in the recompense of Christians. ὑπὲρ ἧς καὶ πάσχετε : to see an intelligible purpose in suffering, or to connect it with some larger movement and hope, is always a moral stay. “God gave three choice gifts to Israel the Torah, the Land of Promise, and Eternal Life, and each was won by suffering” (Berachoth, 5 a).