1 Thessalonians 1:2

אcCDKP &c., latt cop syrr, add to μνειαν the complement υμων, which is wanting in א*AB 17 67**—a Western and Syrian insertion. Cf. Ephesians 1:16, where D* is against the addition, and א shows no variation. In each of these instances the pronoun has just previously occurred. Versions are of little or no weight where points of grammatical usage are involved.

2. εὐχαριστοῦμεν τῷ θεῷ. Except in writing to “the churches of Galatia,” the Apostle always begins with thanksgiving (cf. 1 Thessalonians 5:18); here expressed with warmth and emphasis: see Introd. pp. xxxiii., lxii. Εὐχαριστέω (classical χάριν ἔχω, 1 Timothy 1:12, &c.)—with its cognates in -τος, -τία, confined to St Paul’s amongst the Epistles—is infrequent in the N.T. elsewhere; the compound first occurs in Demosthenes, de Corona p. 257, with an earlier sense, ‘to do a good turn to’ (Lightfoot).

μνείαν ποιούμενοι, making mention rather than remembering; mentionem (Beza), not memoriam (Vulg.), facientes—the latter the sense of μνημονεύω in 1 Thessalonians 1:3 cf. Plato, Protag. 317 e and Phaedrus 254 a (Lightf.); also Romans 1:9; Ephesians 1:16; Philemon 1:4. Μνείαν ἔχω, in 1 Thessalonians 3:6, is different (see note). ἐπὶ τῶν προσευχῶν ἡμῶν, on occasion of our prayers; so ἐπʼ ἐμοῦ, in my time (Herodotus); ἐπʼ ἐμῆς νεότητος (Aristophanes); ἐπὶ δείπνου (Lucian): ‘recalling your name when we bend before God in prayer’; observe the union of prayer and thanksgiving in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 f.