ONESIPHORUS. - A figure of the Church of Ephesus, mentioned in II Tim. 1:16 ff. and 4:19 (the "house of O."). From the whole context it appears that he was already dead when the letter was written (ca. 67 A.D.). In this case, the words of II Tim. 1:18, "may the Lord (ὁ Κύριος = Christ) grant him to find mercy with the Lord (Κύριος, without the article = God) on that day," would be an example of a prayer of suffrage, by which divine mercy is implored for the deceased on the day of Judgment. While Paul was a prisoner for the second time in Rome - note (ibid. 1:17) the difficulty of reaching him - O. was not ashamed of his chains, and wished to render him, as he had already done another time, his own services (ἀνέψυξεν [ibid. 1:16], which the Vulgate rendered as refrigeravit, may indicate either the comfort of sympathy and solidarity or material assistance).
At Ephesus O. worked for the benefit of the community, perhaps in the capacity of deacon: the mihi of several codices of the Vulgate has against it the majority of the witnesses of the original text. The detail that Timothy knows even better than Paul (βέλτιον, however, may not have the force of a comparative) the work of O. suggests that this was later than the Apostle's departure, when Timothy was governing that community (I Tim. 1:3).
The Acta Theclae (mid-2nd century?) make O. a householder at Iconium, who would have hosted Paul during the first missionary journey (M. R. James, The apocryphal New Test., Oxford 1924, reprint 1950, p. 272 f.). The Greek menologia call him one of the 72 disciples and commemorate him on various dates as bishop now of Colophon, now of Caesarea, now of Corone in Messenia. The Roman Martyrology (Sept. 6) has him suffer martyrdom in the Hellespont, at Patrium, of which he would have been bishop.