u/Limp-Confidence7079

In Romans 13:1 Paul writes "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. 2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment." Most researchers think it's written 55 AD while Nero was the ruler of Rome. Why should a Christian missionary legitimize the political authorities which killed Jesus? Like Thessalonians 2:14–16 which could anticipate the fall of the temple 20 years earlier, it could be an Interpolation like J.C. O’Neill says. But with both there is no evidence because there is no single writing without those phrases which sound not fitting for the time and the biography of the person, who claims to be a radical missionary. So was it an Interpolation, is it a reason to question the early dating (we know that Pseudepigraphy often used the right historical facts to make it plausible and some Paul Epistles and other writings are known to be forgery) and the authenticity of the author? Like Thessalonians it would fit perfectly in a time where Christians had a big need to claim to obey the leadership and many years after the murdering of Jesus. I think it's not plausible that a missionary which obeys a religious leader who was killed by Romans would tell to obey the roman leadership. Or was the early Christian movement lead by Paul just an antijudaistic and pro-rome sect?

1 Thessalonians 2:15–16. There it says of the Jews: “They killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and persecuted us... They hinder us from preaching to the Gentiles for their salvation, so as to fill up the measure of their sins at all times. But wrath has come upon them to the end [or: to the utmost / finally].” That part would make much more sense if the Person who wrote it knew about the fall of the temple. I know that authors like Daryl Schmidt or Birger Pearson think it's a later Interpolation. And others came to the conclusion it's about the decrete of Claudius and the Hunger in his time. But the text sounds like a way more traumatic event.

What do you think? I think the whole Paul corpus would make much more sense after the fall of the temple, because it's very anti-judaic and pro-rome.

I had happenings in my life that made me question if there were signs. I don't want to describe everything, because it doesn't belong here. But it brings me to the question: How can a person understand if something is a sign according to the Bible?