Introduction to Philemon
Title and authorship
No letter of Paul's is more plainly his. He names himself three times Philemon 1:1 Philemon 1:9 Philemon 1:19, and the third time is a signature — I, Paul, write this with my own hand — set exactly where the letter takes on a debt. Timothy stands beside him in the greeting; the letter goes to Philemon, to Apphia, to Archippus, and to the assembly in Philemon's house.
The letter's world is fixed by its companions. Onesimus travels to Colossae as one of you in the letter to that church Colossians 4:9; Archippus is charged there too Colossians 4:17; and the men who send greetings here — Epaphras, Mark, Aristarchus, Demas, Luke — are the same circle greeting the Colossians Colossians 4:10–14. The two letters traveled together, and Philemon's house stood in or near Colossae .
Date
Paul writes from custody — a prisoner of Christ Jesus at the letter's head Philemon 1:1 and its close Philemon 1:23 — but Scripture never names the prison. The letter is dated by its company: it went with Colossians, and the traditional setting for both is the Roman imprisonment, in the early sixties. What is certain is relative, not absolute — one dispatch, one messenger circle, one moment.
Backgrounds
Onesimus was Philemon's slave, separated from him — the letter's own gentle word Philemon 1:15 — and apparently in his master's debt, whether by theft or by the loss his absence cost Philemon 1:18. Somewhere in Paul's confinement their paths met, and Paul became his father in the faith: begotten in my chains Philemon 1:10. Under Roman law a returned runaway had everything to fear; this letter is the shield Onesimus carries home.
It is also a public document. Addressed past Philemon to the assembly in his house Philemon 1:2, it will be read with the congregation listening — a request made before witnesses, from an apostle who has just declined to make it an order.
Theology and purpose
Three things happen in twenty-five verses. First, authority chooses appeal: Paul claims the boldness to command and sets it down for love's sake Philemon 1:8–9, because goodness extracted by necessity is not goodness Philemon 1:14 — grace can be requested, never requisitioned. Second, brotherhood dissolves status from the inside: Onesimus returns no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother Philemon 1:16, the household arithmetic of one Lord over slave and free Galatians 3:28 applied to one actual house. Third, imputation is enacted rather than explained: receive him as me; if he owes anything, put it to my account Philemon 1:17–18. The verb there is the bookkeeper's, and the New Testament uses it exactly twice — here, and of sin reckoned to the account in Romans 5:13. What Paul preaches about Christ he performs for Onesimus, at his own cost, over his own signature.
Additional notes
Note — the letter and the institution. The letter frees one man and says nothing against slavery as such, and readers have always asked why. The answer is in its method. Verse 16 does not regulate the master-slave relation; it abolishes the ground it stood on, for this house, by making the slave a brother — and a commandment received as a brother cannot be owned as before. Elsewhere Paul tells the slave to take freedom when it can be had 1 Corinthians 7:21 and lists slave traders with the lawless 1 Timothy 1:10. The letter works as leaven rather than decree Matthew 13:33; what it started, verse 21 knows it cannot cap — you will do even beyond what I say.
Outline
| Passage | Comment |
|---|---|
| 1:1-3 | To the Assembly in Your House |
| 1:4-7 | The Hearts Refreshed |
| 1:8-14 | An Appeal for a Son |
| 1:15-16 | No Longer a Slave |
| 1:17-21 | Put That to My Account |
| 1:22-25 | Prepare a Guest Room |
How the book is built
Refresh my heart inclusio 1:7-20
- A 1:7 The hearts of the saints have been refreshed through Philemon.
- A′ 1:20 Refresh my heart — and verse 12 has named Onesimus as that heart.
Derived from the letter's own repetition. Verse 7 and verse 20 share the same two words — the verb of refreshing and the word for the heart, the inward parts: the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you; refresh my heart in the Lord. The praise at the start becomes the request at the end, and the appeal for Onesimus sits entirely inside that frame. What locks it is verse 12, at the frame's center, where Paul calls Onesimus my own heart — the same word again. Philemon, refresher of hearts, is asked to refresh one more, and the letter has already told him the heart in question has a name.