Paul introduces here, at the end of the first section, a theme which he will discuss in greater detail in 4.13–5.11, and which will be one of the two main subjects of his Second Letter to the Thessalonians. Paul is always anxious that the Thessalonian Christian should maintain a balance between the present and future dimensions of Christian experience. The link between the two is Jesus, whose name here (as in Hebrews 12.2) is in an emphatic position at the climax of a long sentence. Good News Translation reproduces the emphasis by repeating his Son (cf. Bible en français courant).
Son is one of the most important titles of Jesus in the New Testament. It expresses his uniquely close but dependent relationship with God, whom he was probably the first to address in prayer as “Abba.” Like most, if not all, human language about God and most titles of Christ, it involves a figurative extension of the central meaning of the word “son.” Because of its theological importance, the metaphor should, if possible, be maintained in translation. And since the concept of sonship is common to all cultures, it usually can be retained. However, connotations of youth and physical generation should be avoided.
In rendering to come from heaven, it is important to use a word which clearly indicates “the abode of God” rather than merely “sky.” In this context an appropriate equivalent in some languages is “to come from where God is.”
From death is literally “from the dead.” In Greek, as in English, raised is a common word used here with an uncommon meaning. In some languages, this meaning is normally translated by a different and more literary word. Bible en français courant maintains a common language level by translating “whom he has brought back from death to life” (cf. Barclay). It is important to be specific and clear in rendering whom he raised from death. It is “God” who “raised Jesus from death,” but only rarely can one render the phrase “raised from death” literally. An expression such as “caused to live again” may be necessary.
Rescues is a synonym of “saves,” but one which places greater emphasis on the negative aspect of liberation from some danger. There is no contradiction between the present rescues and the future reference of that is coming. In Greek rescues is a present participle which implies a process having duration, something which has begun but is still incomplete. In many languages rescues is best translated as “causes us to escape,” “releases us from,” or “causes us not to suffer because of.”
For the first time in this letter, us includes both senders and readers, as the context shows (see comments on v. 4).
It is important to note that it is his Son Jesus who is raised from death (that is, he is the object of God’s activity), but it is this same one who rescues us from God’s anger. The shift in agent must be clearly indicated in the receptor language.
God’s anger that is coming rightly expands a Greek phrase which literally means “the anger (or wrath) which is coming.” Jews reading Hebrew aloud refrained from pronouncing the name of God, and although Paul is writing Greek, he seems to be influenced here by Jewish usage. The use of the article “the” shows that Paul assumes his readers know to whose anger he is referring.
The problem in translating anger is that of expressing the idea of God’s permanent, total, and personal opposition to evil, without suggesting an outburst of bad temper. It is a particularly acute example of the difficulty of using human language about God (technically called “anthropomorphism”). The Greek word which Good News Translation translates anger is a common word, and it is also used to refer to human anger (for example in Ephesians 4.31). It corresponds to the even more “human” Old Testament metaphor of someone’s nose being inflamed against someone else an expression which is used freely in speaking both of God (Exodus 4.14) and of men (Genesis 30.2). The addition of that is coming shows that Paul is thinking of a final manifestation of God’s opposition to evil which is very close to the meaning of “judgment,” the term used here by New English Bible Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch Phillips. Other, less satisfactory, translations are “vengeance” (Knox) and “punishment” (Biblia Dios Habla Hoy). The Greek word for anger does not in isolation have a future reference, but New English Bible interestingly takes the whole phrase closely together and translates “the terrors of judgment to come.”
It is difficult in some languages to find adequate terms to translate the expression God’s anger. The focus of meaning in this context is judgment, but it would be wrong simply to translate “rescues us from God’s judgment that is coming,” even though the Greek term does imply a measure of God’s opposition to sin and his anger because of it. In some languages the best equivalent seems to be “angry judgment.” Some persons would prefer a translation such as “who rescues us from God’s stern judgment.” Some recasting of this last clause may result in “who rescues us from the judgment that is going to come because God is so angry because of men’s sins,” or “… because God is so angrily opposed to men’s sins.” Yet there are other languages in which it is impossible to speak about a “judgment that is going to come,” because “judgment” is not thought of as something that can “come.” One can, however, speak about “judgment which is going to take place,” or “a will-be judging.” This fact may require a recasting of the last clause to read “who will rescue us when God is about to judge people, for he is angry because of their sins.”
Quoted with permission from Ellingworth, Paul and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1976. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .