(c) Children. — The duty of obedience to parents is insisted on by St. Paul in Eph &^-*, Col S'-"'-, where the two-edged injunction of the Fifth Com- mandment is referred to as involving duties of parents to children as well as of children to parents. The relation of tiie younger to the elder in the family must have been greatly simplified by the spread of monogamy in the OT (see MARRIAGE), and in Christian times there would have been very few complications in this respect. Yet it was often the case, as it still is in Eastern lands, that several families in the narrower sense made up a ' family ' in the wider sense, and lived under one roof : thus a son would ordinarily bring his bride to his father's house, as Tobias brought Sarah to that of Tobit, so that his parents became her parents, and the Fifth Commandment applied to her relationship with them (To lO''"'-). So we note in Mt lO^sf-, Lk \2P-^- that the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law are of one family or household {olKiaKoL Mt., 'in one house' Lk.). The brethren of our Lord (whatever their exact relationship to Jesus) appear during His ministry to have formed one household with Mary (Jn 2'-, Mt 12«f- IS^^'-, Mk &^ ; Joseph was probably dead), notwithstand- ing that they themselves, or some of them, were married (1 Co 9'). It is because of this custom that jnn {hathdn, 'bridegroom') and n^3 {Jcalldh, ' bride ') and their equivalents in cognate languages represent the relationship of a married man and woman to all their near relations by affinity'. In the case of a composite 'family' of this nature, the father still retained some authority over his married sons.
{d) Slaves and dependents. — These formed a large portion of the more important families ; the ' de- pendents ' would be chiefly freedmen. On the other hand, it appears that hired servants were not reckoned as part of the family {HDB iv. 461). Among the Israelites the slaves were comparatively fcAv, while in Greek and Roman families they were extremely numerous. In Athens the slaves were reckoned as numbering four times the free citizens, and elsewhere the proportion was even greater. Some Roman landowners had ten or twenty thou- sand slaves, or more (Lightfoot, Colossians, 1900 ed., p. 317 fl".). Theseslaveswereentirelyattheirmaster's disposal, and under a bad master their condition must have been terrible (see Lightfoot, p. 319, for details). Yet their inclusion in the ' family ' some- what mitigated the rigours of slavery even among the heathen in NT times ; and this mitigation was much greater in Christian households. The Church accepted existing institutions, and did not proclaim a revolutionary slave-war, which would only have
FAMILY
FAMILY
399
produced untold misery ; but it set to Avork gradually to ameliorate the condition of slaves. On the one hand, slaves are enjoined by St. Paul to obey and be honest to their masters, whether Chris- tian or not, as in Eph 6^■^ Col 3^-^- (where the great detail was doubtless suggested by the Onesimus incident), 1 Ti 6'*-, Tit 2«'- ; cf. 1 P 2'^': These exhortations were probably intended to take away any misapprehension that might have arisen from such passages as Gal 3^^, 1 Co 7^"*, which assert that in Christ there is neither bond nor free. Chris- tianity did not at once liberate slaves, and St. Paul does not claim Onesimus' freedom, though he in- directly suggests it (Philem ^^'O- On the contrary, it taught those 'under the yoke' to render true service. At the same time, St. Paul points out that the Fifth Commandment lays a duty on masters as well as on slaves (Eph 6^, where the double duty is referred to just after the application of this Com- mandment to fathers as well as to children). The Christian head of the house must provide for his own household, or be worse than an unbeliever (1 Ti 5**). By Christianity masters and slaves become brethren (1 Ti 6-). In Philem ^^ Onesimus is said to be ' no longer a slave, but more than a slave, a brother beloved.' We cannot doubt that we have here a reminiscence of such words of our Lord, orallyhandeddown,as 'nolongerslavesbut friends' ( Jn 15" ; cf. He 2" ' not ashamed to call them brethren '). It was owing to the good example set by Christian slaves to their heathen masters that Christianity, which at first took root in the lower social circles of society (1 Co P®), spread rapidly upwards.
The domestic servants of the family are called ' they of the house' — oiKirai, Ac 10' ; or ohdoi, 1 Ti 58 (cf. Eph 2i» fig.) ; or otKiaKoL, INIt lO^^- ^e (this in- cludes near relations) ; or ' the household,' oUiTeia, Mt 24'«5 RV ( = eepaveia, Lk 12^2)_ They included in their number, in the case of great families, many who would now be of the prof essional classes, but who then were upper slaves, such as stewards or agents, librarians, doctors, surgeons, oculists, tutors, etc, (for a long list, see Lightfoot, Philippians, p. 172). Thus in the NT we find (1) the steward, oIkov6hos, Lk 12'*- (cf. Mt 24^^) ; such were the unjust steward of the parable (Lk 16'^* ; the word otVoi'O/ueri/ is used for ' to be a steward ' in v.^), and the stewards of 1 Co 42, Gal 42. The ' steward ' of a child was the guardian of his property (Ramsay, Gal. p, 392), Metaphorically oIkovo/xos is used of Christian minis- ters (1 Co 41 ; of 'bishops,' Tit 1''), of Christians generally (1 P 4^°) — the idea is doubtless taken from our Lord's words about the 'wise slave whom his lord had set over his household to give them their food in due season ' (Mt 24^5). (2) The guardian of a child, iirlTpoiros, was concerned with his education (Gal 4^) ; perhaps this is the same as the following. (3) The pedagogue or tutor (iraida- ytiiybi. Gal 3^'"', 1 Co 4") was a slave deputed to take the child to school (not a teacher or school- master, as the AV) ; this was a Greek institution adopted by the Romans, for in education Greece led the way. (4) The physician (larpos. Col 4") was also regarded as an upper slave. It has been pointed out by Ramsay (5^. Paul the Traveller, p. 316) that a prisoner of distinction, such as St, Paul un- doubtedly was {ib. p. 310 f.), would be allowed slaves, but not friends or relations, to accompany him, and that St, Luke, who (as the prbnoun ' we ' shows) accompanied him on his voyage to Italy, as also did Aristarchus (Ac 27^ Col 4^"), must have done so in the capacity of a slave, taking this office on himself in order to follow his master.