PHILEMON, EPISTLE TO. - Letter written by St. Paul to the disciple and friend Ph., on behalf of the fugitive slave Onesimus.
This writing, often called a "note," presents all the protocol elements of a true letter: address, wish of grace and peace, praise of the recipient (vv. 1-7), the subject treated at relative length (vv. 8-21), news, final wish (v. 22 ff.). The affectionate and confidential tone brings this letter, which is the shortest of the Pauline letters (longer, however, than II and III John, and than many writings of antiquity that go under the name of letter), particularly close to Philippians: both are proof of Paul's delicacy and nobility, of his ability to cultivate friendships without abdicating his own authority.
Onesimus, a slave of a wealthy Christian of Colossae (v.), converted by Paul probably during the Ephesian ministry (c. 53-56), had fled from his master's house. The name Onesimus ("useful, fruitful"; cf. v. 11) was belied by the fact that he had in various ways, perhaps even by theft, harmed his own master. While in the city where he had taken refuge (Rome, most probably: v. PRIGIONIA, EPISTOLE della) he trembled at the possible searches of the police, he learned that Paul, his master's friend, was there. It is not excluded that Onesimus, in his flight, had deliberately headed where he knew he would find the Apostle. The latter kept him with him, instructing him in that new religion which placed free men and slaves on the same divine level, making them brothers in Christ. The conquest could not have been difficult, given the beauty (especially for a slave) of this ideal, the goodness of the preacher, and the experience Onesimus had already had of the gentleness of his master, a Christian. Nor was a secret hope excluded in Onesimus that embracing the religion of Paul and of Ph. was the good way to escape from his humiliating social condition.
Paul thought, at first, of keeping Onesimus with him (v. 13); but this seemed to him lacking in delicacy toward his friend; to whom, instead, he wanted to offer the opportunity not only to perform an act of clemency, such as even a pagan could perform, but to carry out in the most generous manner the principles of Christian morality in social life, by welcoming Onesimus, no longer as a slave, but as a brother in Christ. Paul then made himself his guarantor and wittily declared himself also ready to pay the damages that the slave had caused, if the fact that Ph. owed him himself, that is, his being a Christian, was not enough (v. 18 f.). He did not ask, in explicit terms, for the emancipation of the slave; but saying that he considered himself sure that Ph. would do much more than what was asked of him, he clearly let it be understood what the goal was toward which Christianity tended in relation to slavery, though without advocating violent and revolutionary means. The abolition of slavery was to be the fruit of a slow but profound transformation of the collective conscience.
The affinity of subject matter has suggested the comparison of the Ph. with two letters addressed by Pliny the Younger to Sabinianus (Opera, ed. A. M. Guillemin, III, Paris 1928, pp. 114 f., 118). In the first Pliny intercedes on behalf of a freedman who had fled from Sabinianus' house; in the second he thanks the latter for having granted his request. The case concerns, therefore, not a slave, but a freedman. Moreover, Pliny lets it be understood that in the event of a relapse the punishment may be applied: this falls outside the perspective of the Ph., which contemplates entirely new relations between master and slave, inspired by mutual love. The distance between servant and master remains intact in Pliny's letters; nor could that fundamental virtue for a Stoic, the cultivation of what is fitting (τὸ πρῶτον; cf. J. Huby, p. 117 f.), allow it to be shortened. Even in the aspect of the skill in treating the subject, of spontaneity and of urgency, the Ph. surpasses the pagan writing, remaining a masterpiece of epistolary art (E. Renan, L'Antéchrist, Paris 1873, p. 96), and is above all a work of Christian dignity and nobility, founded on the most solid motives of participation in the divine life in Christ. The Ph. was to offer future generations a practical example of the application of these principles.
The Pauline authenticity has been called into doubt only by a few followers of the most radical criticism, such as F. C. Baur, C. Weizsäcker, B. Steck; while the others agree in recognizing that the Ph. carries within itself the best guarantees of its own origin (cf. P. Feine-J. Behm, Einleitung in das Neue Testament, 8th ed., Leipzig 1936, p. 195). That it was little cited in antiquity cannot cause surprise, considering its brevity, its destination to a private individual, and the fact that its doctrinal substratum was gathered, even more clearly, from other Pauline letters. St. Jerome speaks in general terms of some doubt about Pauline authenticity, with reflections on the sacred character of the writing: which did not prevent, however, the consensus of the Church on one or another point (In Epist. ad Philen.: PL 26, 635-38). Explicit acknowledgments are found in the Muratorian Fragment (Enchiridion biblicum, Rome 1927, n. 4), in Origen (In Ier., 19, 2: PG 13, 501) and in Tertullian (Contra Marcionem, 5, 21: PL 2, 524 [556]).
Bibliography10 works
Teodorico da Castel San Pietro