Verses 14-15 and most of verse 16 (down to always committed) form a single sentence in Greek. Such long sentences in Paul’s letters often indicate high emotive content. Different but equivalent ways of doing this should be found in translating. Other formal indications of emotive content in this sentence include (1) the emphatic you which begins the sentence and is repeated later in verse 14; (2) the use of the word brothers; (3) the rhetorical repetition of and in verse 15 (more prominent in the Greek than in Good News Translation); (4) the piling-up of participles in verses 15-16a; (5) the abruptly contrasting short sentence in 16b. It is also significant, though not a formal feature, that Paul refers here to the Jews as if he were not a Jew. Formal features in Good News Translation which go some way toward conveying the emotive content include (1) the exclamation How displeasing…! and (2) the insertion of even before tried to stop us.
The first words of verse 14 are literally “for you became imitators” (Revised Standard Version). There are two objections, however, to the English word “imitators” in this context. First, it carries the suggestion, foreign to the text, of something not genuine or authentic (see the notes on 1.6). Second, it suggests that the Thessalonians took the initiative, “began to copy” (Moffatt) the churches in Judea. The context makes this meaning most unlikely. The idea is rather that, just as the Thessalonians have listened eagerly to Paul’s message (v. 13), so (Revised Standard Version‘s “for” makes the connection with v. 13 clear) the churches in Thessalonica have become like those in Judea. The point of comparison is not subjective: the courage or faith of Judeans and Thessalonians under pressure, but objective: the fact of undergoing persecution from their fellow countrymen. Their situation is similar: the same things happened to them, as Good News Translation (cf. New English Bible) puts it; they became “companions-in-distress” (Bijbel in Gewone Taal). The kind of suffering they have endured has given them the honorable status of disciples, close followers of the mother churches in Judea.
The order of the expressions the same things happened to you and happened to the churches … in Judea will need to be inverted in many languages so that the prior happening will be mentioned first and the latter happening afterwards, for example, “what happened to the churches of God in Judea also happened to you,” or “what the churches of God in Judea already experienced, you yourselves have also experienced.” In both cases, that of the churches in Judea and the Christians of Thessalonica, these persons were the objects of the persecution. Therefore it may be necessary, in some cases, to place the reference to them in the predicate of a verbal expression, for example, “The way people persecuted the churches of God in Judea is the same way in which people have persecuted you” (“people” referring to an indefinite subject). It is possible, however, to make the churches in Judea and the people in Thessalonica the subject if one uses a verb such as “suffer,” for example, “In the same way that people in the churches of God in Judea suffered, so you have also suffered.”
“The churches of God in Judea which are in Christ Jesus” (Revised Standard Version; cf. Galatians 1.22) illustrates the fact at this early date the word translated “church” had not yet narrowed its meaning to the local Christian community (still less to the meaning of the whole body of Christians, which is not in question here). The word still has many of its secular associations, like the ordinary English word “assembly.” Paul feels the need to specify, first that these communities belong to God, and secondly that, in contrast to Jewish synagogues, they belong to Christ Jesus. Since churches is sometimes translated as “groups of believers” or even “groups of believers in Christ,” churches of God may be rendered as “groups of believers in Christ who belong to God.”
Despite the order Christ Jesus, it is probable that Paul is here, as usual, is thinking of Christ as a name rather than a title. The translation “the Messiah Jesus” should be avoided.
The phrase in Judea is often related directly to an expression for “groups of believers,” for example, “groups in Judea who believe in Christ and belong to God.” The name Judea commonly included the neighboring areas of Galilee and Samaria.
A complication is involved in translating churches of God and the people there who belong to Christ Jesus, since churches of God would indicate some kind of possessive relation and the believers would be spoken of as people who … belong to Christ Jesus. Both possessive relations are true, but stylistically it would be important to express them in different ways, even as is done in Good News Translation.
Countrymen means primarily those belonging to the same ethnic group, rather than those living in the same area. At Thessalonica (cf. Acts 17.5, 13) the Jews had been the first to stir up trouble for the Christians, many if not most of whom were no doubt of Jewish origin themselves. Your own countrymen reflects an accidental similarity in form between Greek and English. In New Testament Greek, own is not emphatic. Some French translations, for example, have simply “your compatriots” (Bible de Jérusalem Bible en français courant), while others have “your own compatriots” (La Sainte Bible: Nouvelle version Segond révisée Le Nouveau Testament. Version Synodale), which is too emphatic. In English, expressions like your own countrymen tend to become set phrases in which own loses much of its usual emphasis. (The reason for this is probably the need to distinguish between “countrymen” in the sense of “compatriots,” and “countrymen” in the sense of “inhabitants of rural areas.”) Perhaps for that reason, New English Bible‘s “your countrymen” seems too weak.
Since the countrymen are really agents who cause the suffering, it is often necessary to shift the relation, for example, “your own countrymen have caused you to suffer in the same way that the Jews caused those in Judea to suffer.” The equivalent of countrymen in many areas of the world is “fellow tribesmen,” “people who are one with you,” or even “people who talk as you do.”
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 .