The answer is this: there is one reason for all this. Our teaching is not some error in which we have become entangled, like philosophers. It is not the work of impure powers, nor some malicious intrigue. It has been entrusted to us directly by God.
God's command inspires us to preach, and we are convinced that we preach the truth, just as we are convinced that God is true.
But because this testimony of the holy Apostle about himself and his work could be subjected to doubt by others, he next points to his activity among the Thessalonians. This activity is known to all (verses 5 and 9), and the conclusion from it must be the same.
He says, as it were: if you do not believe the words, believe the works, as the Lord also said to the Jews (Jn 10:38; Jn 14:11).
Exhortation, παρακλησις, means an invitation, a calling, and in general speech addressed to another. According to the content of the speech, παρακλησις may be teaching (Acts 15:31), admonition (1 Tim 1:9), or consolation.
In the present place the Apostle gave this name to the Gospel preaching, and he fittingly named it so, for the Gospel preaching contains all three aspects. It is teaching, because it sets forth pure and unchangeable truths about God, man, and all that exists.
It is also admonition, or entreaty (2 Cor 5:20), because it does not consist only in setting forth the truth. It also persuades one to change the former evil order of life into one that is good and pleasing to God.
It is also consolation, because it promises the highest consolations to suffering humanity in reconciliation with God through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the preparation of the Kingdom of Heaven for believers.
Therefore one may say that St. Paul used this word in place of what he had previously called the good tidings of God.
Not from delusion, ουκ εκ πλανης. Πλανη means the deceiving and seducing of others (Mt 27:64; Eph 4:14), and also one's own error, or self-deception. In both senses, it is opposed to truth (1 Jn 4:6).
It is opposed both as love of truth and truthfulness, and as undoubted knowledge of actual truth. In the present place it stands in the latter meaning.
By this St. Paul says: in preaching the Gospel so insistently, we do not stand in delusion, in an error by which we were carried away ourselves or led away by others, like philosophers and similar people carried away by their own fantasies.
Rather, we tangibly know that we preach the truth, for we personally received the command for this from God Himself (Acts 22:21), who is truth itself.
Our work, says St. Paul according to Chrysostom, is "not a deception into which we had fallen." According to Theodoret, "the teaching offered by us has no likeness to the myths of poets, which are filled with much falsehood."
According to Oecumenius, "our preaching is not something erring, πεπλανημενον, the fruit of rooted self-deception."
Nor from impurity. Some see in this word a denial of impure motives. The Apostle supposedly wishes to say that their preaching is not carried out from vainglory or greed. But since he will speak about this immediately in the fifth verse, it is unnecessary to suppose the same thought here.
Therefore there is no necessity to depart from the meaning that the ancient Fathers and teachers of the Church give this word. Namely, by it St. Paul denies that his work originates from an impure power, like pagan superstitions, magic, and sorceries.
This thought agrees with St. Paul's purpose in these two verses, the third and fourth, where he indicates the source of his preaching and his boldness. In the third verse he denies false opinions about this that may have circulated among the Thessalonians.
In the fourth verse he indicates its true source. The first source of human errors is the short-sighted and proud mind, which considers everything it devises to be necessarily true. St. Paul said that the apostolic preaching is not from this source in the phrase ουκ εκ πλανης.
The other source of human errors is the father of lies, who taught people every dark work and indecency. The Apostle denied this with respect to his preaching: ουδε εξ ακαθαρσιας.
By the word "from impurity," says St. Chrysostom, it is expressed that the work of the Apostles was not of the kind of dark works, such as the works of sorcerers and magicians.
"The apostolic teaching," says Oecumenius, "is not something impure or sorcerous, resembling incantations and magical verses used by certain priests." The same thought is found in blessed Theophylact with blessed Theodoret.
There is nothing astonishing in the possibility that people could think this about the Apostles' work, and that they had need to deny it. The same accusation was made even against the Lord Himself, and He refuted it.
They could have fabricated this slander against the Apostles because their preaching was everywhere accompanied by miracles, and they established mysteries that produced extraordinary effects in those who received them.
Nor with guile, ουδε εν δολω. This is also denied, but with a special shade of meaning that comes from the preposition εν. Nevertheless, this word also must be understood so as not to depart from the Apostle's general purpose in these verses.
His purpose is to deny the sources from which the apostolic work is falsely derived. Δολος means craft, treachery, and malicious scheming that covers intended evil with sweet speech and plausibility.
In ordinary life, this is conscious deception or intrigue, in which the skillful, armed with flattery and man-pleasing, circumvent the simple, as they say.
In a broader form, it is a conspiracy or uprising, when δολος passes from private relations into the political realm and devises schemes destructive of established orders.
It would seem least necessary to bring an accusation of the latter kind against the preachers of the Gospel. Yet this kind of accusation is brought against the Lord, and against the Apostles. The Apostle has it in mind here also.
He recalled the word raised against him and Silas in Thessalonica, that they all act contrary to Caesar's decrees, saying that there is another king, Jesus (Acts 17:7), and he denies it.
Perhaps there were also some in Thessalonica who developed this accusation more extensively, and the Apostle considered it necessary to make this disclaimer. Only with this meaning does εν δολω indicate, in harmony with the flow of speech, a new false source of the apostolic work.
This source is considered from a political point of view, and it too is denied by the holy Apostle, like the others. The holy Fathers and teachers give it this meaning.
According to St. Chrysostom, by this the Apostle says that their work is not malicious, and is not some rebellious work like that of Theudas, δεδολωμενον. According to Oecumenius, it is not wickedly scheming, the fruit of mature intrigue.
According to Theophylact, it is not done from a drive toward uprisings and revolutions. According to Theodoret, it is not something that can cast those who receive it into misfortune.
Some depart here from the holy Fathers. In ουδε εν δολω they see a denial of deception and cunning in the Apostles. Or they see a denial of the opinion that the Apostles supposedly said and did one thing, while intending another.
According to this view, they preached a faith they did not believe, with self-seeking aims, choosing flattery as the instrument for attaining them. But this confuses the flow of the discourse, because after one verse the Apostle will again deny flattering speech in himself.
The obvious order of the discourse here is this: in the third verse the Apostle rejects the false sources of his work. In the fourth verse he indicates its true source in God. Then, in the fifth and sixth verses, he rejects the evil aims and methods falsely attributed to them.
THEOSIS