Phillips and some other translations change Paul’s rhetorical question, “Do you not remember…?” (Revised Standard Version), into a strong positive statement. Paul is not, in fact, asking his readers for information; he is saying that they either must or should remember (cf. Jerusalem Bible “surely you remember…?”; Barclay “you cannot have forgotten…”; New English Bible “you cannot but remember”; Bible de Jérusalem “you remember, don’t you…?”). Don’t you remember? may be rendered as an emphatic statement, for example, “I am sure you remember,” or “you certainly must remember.” It may then be necessary to follow the verb remember by the statement which immediately follows, for example, “I am sure you remember that I told you all this while I was still with you.” In some instances the reference to all this must be made more specific, for example, “I told you about all that was going to happen.”

For the clause while I was with you it may be important to introduce some spatial specification, for example, “while I was still there with you,” or “while I was still in Thessalonica with you.”

Quoted with permission from Ellingworth, Paul and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Paul’s Second Letter to the Thessalonians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1976. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .