What Is an Epistle? New Testament Letters

An epistle is a formal letter, from the Greek epistolē, meaning "message" sent to someone. In Christian usage, it refers to the twenty one letters that make up most of the New Testament after the four Gospels and Acts: thirteen traditionally credited to the apostle Paul, and eight more, called the General or Catholic Epistles, written by other apostles and early church leaders to churches and individuals.

At a Glance

• Epistle comes from the Greek epistolē, "message" or "letter," by way of the Latin epistola.
• The New Testament contains 21 epistles: 13 traditionally attributed to Paul and 8 General, or Catholic, epistles.
• Three of Paul's letters, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus, are called the Pastoral Epistles because they address church leadership and order.
• Scholars have long debated the authorship of several epistles, including Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians, the Pastorals, Hebrews, James, and 2 Peter.
• The letters remain central to Christian teaching because they take the gospel and apply it directly to how believers are meant to live, worship, and treat one another.

What Does "Epistle" Mean?

The word comes from the Greek epistolē, built from epi ("upon") and a root meaning "to send." It simply means a letter, something sent. It traveled through Latin as epistola before settling into English, where it is now mostly reserved for a formal or significant piece of correspondence, which is exactly what these New Testament letters were. They were not written as abstract theology textbooks. They were real letters, sent to real congregations, answering real problems.

That origin as genuine correspondence shows up inside the letters themselves. Paul closes his letter to the Colossians by telling them: "And when this letter has been read among you, have it also read in the church of the Laodiceans, and see that you also read the letter from Laodicea" (Colossians 4:16, ESV). Churches shared these letters, read them aloud in worship, and passed them to neighboring congregations. For a shorter definition of the term, see our glossary entry on epistle.

The 13 Letters of Paul

Paul's letters are arranged in the New Testament by length, not by the order he wrote them, which is why Romans leads even though shorter letters came earlier.

• Romans. Paul's longest and most systematic letter, written to a church he had not yet visited, laying out how both Jews and Gentiles are made right with God through faith. Its authorship is not seriously disputed.
• 1 Corinthians. Written to a divided, morally troubled congregation, addressing quarrels, lawsuits, worship disorder, and the resurrection. Undisputed.
• 2 Corinthians. A personal letter in which Paul defends his ministry and appeals for generosity toward the suffering church in Jerusalem.
• Galatians. An urgent letter insisting that people are justified by faith in Christ, not by keeping the Jewish law.
• Ephesians. On the unity of the church as Christ's body and the Christian household. Since the early 1800s, many scholars have questioned whether Paul wrote it himself, pointing to its distinct vocabulary and style compared with his other letters. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' introduction to Ephesians notes it is traditionally attributed to Paul, while scholars have proposed a secretary writing under his direction, or a later follower developing his thought.
• Philippians. A warm letter of joy and partnership, written from prison, containing the early hymn to Christ's humility in chapter 2.
• Colossians. Written to counter a false teaching that diminished Christ's supremacy. Its authorship is debated on grounds similar to Ephesians, to which it is closely related in style.
• 1 Thessalonians. Likely Paul's earliest surviving letter, comforting a young church anxious about believers who had already died before Christ's return.
• 2 Thessalonians. Corrects a rumor that the day of the Lord had already arrived. Pauline authorship here is genuinely split among scholars.
• 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus. Known together as the Pastoral Epistles, these address church order, the qualifications of overseers and deacons, and defending sound teaching against false doctrine. Most modern critical scholars regard them as written later in Paul's name by a close associate, though some continue to defend direct Pauline authorship, and 2 Timothy is often considered the strongest candidate of the three.
• Philemon. Paul's shortest and most personal letter, a direct appeal to a Christian slave owner to welcome back the runaway Onesimus as a brother rather than punish him. Read it in full in the book of Philemon.

The 8 General Epistles

Alongside Paul's letters, the New Testament includes eight more epistles written to a broader audience rather than a single congregation, which is why tradition called them "general" or "catholic," meaning universal.

• Hebrews. Its author never signs the letter, and the question has never been settled. Early tradition sometimes credited Paul, but the letter's polished Greek differs sharply from Paul's undisputed writings, and other names, including Barnabas, Apollos, and Luke, have been proposed without consensus. It argues for the supremacy of Christ as a priest greater than Israel's priesthood, written to encourage persecuted Jewish Christians not to abandon their faith.
• James. Traditionally attributed to James, the brother of Jesus and a leader of the Jerusalem church, this intensely practical letter insists that genuine faith shows itself in action toward the poor, the tempted, and the quarrelsome. Some scholars question the traditional attribution, since the author never identifies himself as Jesus' brother.
• 1 Peter. Written to encourage believers scattered across the Roman provinces who were facing suffering and social pressure for their faith.
• 2 Peter. A warning against false teachers, written in Peter's name. It is the most widely disputed letter in the New Testament; many scholars date it to the early second century, after Peter had already died.
• 1 John. Written to counter an early false teaching that denied Christ had truly come in the flesh, and to reassure genuine believers of their relationship with God. Tradition credits the apostle John, though many modern scholars doubt it and have not settled on an alternative.
• 2 John and 3 John. Two brief, personal letters from an author who calls himself "the Elder." One warns a congregation against false teachers; the other commends a believer named Gaius for his hospitality to traveling missionaries.
• Jude. A short, urgent letter from a writer who identifies himself as "a brother of James," calling believers to contend for the faith against teachers twisting God's grace into an excuse for immorality.

Why Do Scholars Debate Who Wrote Some Epistles?

This debate did not start as a modern attack on the Bible. It began among scholars studying vocabulary, writing style, and historical detail across the letters. Wikipedia's overview of the Pastoral Epistles notes that questions about 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus go back to the German theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher in 1807, and that some respected scholars still defend Paul's authorship today. The same kind of debate surrounds the Epistle to the Hebrews, where modern scholarship considers the author unknown, and the General Epistles more broadly, where questions remain open about James, 2 Peter, and the Johannine letters.

None of these questions have threatened the letters' place in the New Testament canon. Every major Christian tradition, across two thousand years of disagreement on plenty of other matters, has received all twenty one epistles as Scripture. The debate is about which human hand held the pen, not about whether God's word is in the text.

Why the Letters Still Matter for Christian Life

The Gospels show who Jesus is and what he did. The epistles show what that means for Tuesday morning: how to forgive, how to lead a church, how to handle conflict, how to wait for a promise that has not yet arrived. That is the claim the letters make about themselves. "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work" (2 Timothy 3:16-17, ESV).

Even within the New Testament, the letters recognized each other as carrying real authority. Peter calls Paul's writings Scripture in their own right, while admitting plainly they are not always easy: "Our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand" (2 Peter 3:15-16, ESV). That honesty is part of why these letters have held up for two thousand years. They do not promise easy reading. They promise a faith applied to real life, which is why you can read more about Scripture speaking into everyday American life in our companion guide to verses every American should know.