1 Thessalonians 2:1

Αὐτοὶ γὰρ οἴδατε, ἀδελφοί, τὴν εἴσοδον ἡμῶν τὴν πρὸς ὑμᾶς. For yourselves know, brothers, that entrance of ours unto you—resuming the thread of 1 Thessalonians 1:9. This αὐτοὶ γάρ is antithetical to that of 1 Thessalonians 1:9—“you know on your own part” what “they report upon theirs”; the indefinite εἴσοδον of the former sentence is now recalled to be defined, τὴν … τὴν πρὸς ὑμᾶς; and the historical (aorist) ἔσχομεν becomes the perfect γέγονεν, of the abiding effect. For the sense of εἴσοδος, see the previous note; for the ordo verborum, cf. τὴν πίστιν ὑμῶν τὴν πρὸς τὸν θεόν of 1 Thessalonians 1:8. Here πρός has its primary local meaning; there it carried an ethical sense.

οἴδατε … τὴν εἴσοδον … ὅτι οὐ κενὴ γέγονεν. You know … our entrance … that it has proved no vain (entrance)—i.e. far from vain. Οὐ negatives the whole predicate κενὴ γέγονεν, making it synonymous with ἐν δυνάμει ἐγενήθη (1 Thessalonians 1:5) or ἐνεργουμένη (-εῖται) of 1 Thessalonians 2:13; cf. 1 Corinthians 15:10; 1 Corinthians 15:58; Philippians 2:16. Κενός (empty, hollow) signifies in this context “void” of reality and power, as the entry of the Apostles would have proved had they “come in word” (1 Thessalonians 1:5), with hollow assumptions and κενοφωνία (1 Timothy 6:20; 2 Timothy 2:16), like “wind-bags” (cf. 1 Corinthians 2:1; 1 Corinthians 2:4; 1 Corinthians 4:19 f.).

Οἴδατε claims beforehand the subject of γέγονεν for its object, according to the Greek idiom which extends to all dependent sentences, but prevails with verbs of knowing: see Winer-Moulton, p. 781, Rutherford’s Syntax, § 244; and cf. 2 Thessalonians 2:4, ἀποδεικνύντα ἑαυτόν, κ.τ.λ.; 1 Corinthians 3:20; 2 Corinthians 12:3 f.; Luke 4:34.