Peter T. O'Brien on Colossians 4:16 and the "Epistle from Laodicea"

Commenting on the "Epistle from Laodicea" in Col 4:16, Peter O'Brien wrote: 

Much ink has been spilled, to little purpose, endeavoring to determine what this “letter from Laodicea” (την εκ Λαοδικειας) actually was: (a) several of the early church Fathers (Chrysostom, Theodore of Mopsuestia, and Theodoret) together with many other later writers including Beza supposed this to have been a letter from Laodicea to Paul. But by far the most likely meaning of the Phrase is that the Colossians were to procure the letter from Laodicea (so Robertson, Grammar, 600, BDF, para. 437), an interpretation clearly supported by the context (so Dibelius-Greeven, 52, who considers the expression is from the standpoint of the Colossians and note Abbott’s comments, 304, 305: ινα και υμεις, “that you too,” corresponds to the previous ινα και, “that also,” which refers to the Laodiceans reading the Colossians’ letter; the parallelism implies that the Laodiceans, like the Colossians, will have received a letter, cf. Moule 138, Bruce, 310, Loymeyer, 170, Anderson, JBL 85 [1966] 436, 437, Lohse, 174, 175, Martin, NCB, 138, and Schweizer, 179). (b) Marcion identified this letter with the Epistle to the Ephesians (a connection made in 1707 by John Mill and which received abundant support from Lightfoot, 272-98; note also J. Rutherford, “St Paul’s Epistle to the Laodiceans,” ExpTim 19 [1907-08] 311-14). However, Ephesians was almost certainly written after Colossians, and not simply to one church in the province of Asia. If it was written after Colossians, then it is unlikely to have been mentioned in Colossians, unless 4:6 is a later addition but of this there is no evidence (Marcion’s Apostolic Canon gave the title “To the Laodiceans” to the Epistle to the Ephesians, perhaps because it lacked the words “at Ephesus” in the first verse and he found what appeared to be a pointer to its destination in Col. 4:16, so Bruce, 310, 311, following Souter). (c) The Epistle to Philemon has been identified with the “epistles from Laodicea” (J. Knox, Philemon among the Letters of Paul, 2nd ed. [London: Collins, 1960] 38-47), but this letter was private.  . . and the delicacy of its appeal would be destroyed if Paul directed it to be read in public. Further, Philemon lived at Colossae (according to Col 4:9 Onesimus is a slave of Philemon at Colossae) not Laodicea. (d) No extant Pauline letter seems adequately to fit the description and so we are left with the conclusion that the letter to the Laodiceans has not survived . . . (Peter T. O'Brien, Colossians, Philemon [Word Biblical Commentary 44; Milton Keynes: Word Books, 1987], 257-58)

 Further Reading

Refuting Christina Darlington on Colossians 4:16 and the Epistle from Laodicea and the Meaning of Isaiah 40:8