Vindicating Spirit, Deceiving Spirits

Abstract

The first letter to Timothy includes a reference to a primitive hymnic formula that grants a central role to the Holy Spirit in Jesus’s resurrection. This reference coheres with other primitive (pre-Pauline) references such as Rom 1:3–4 and with Paul’s earlier teaching on the Spirit (as in Rom 8:11). In a letter that seems otherwise sparse in its pneumatology, 1 Tim 3:16 is important for understanding the relationship between the Holy Spirit and Jesus’s identity, and I suggest that the mention of the Spirit here informs the way that the statements in 4:1–5 should be read, and the way that the letter’s overall portrayal of truth and falsehood should be understood. I will discuss the interpretation of 1 Tim 3:16—4:5, proposing a pentecostal reading of this section of the letter, one that takes seriously the vindicating role of the Spirit in Jesus’s resurrection as a model for believer’s future resurrection, one that coheres with the pneumatology of earlier Pauline epistles, and one that coheres with the treatment of false teachers and demonic spirits in other New Testament texts.