5. Testimony to the Epistle. — Against depred- ators, in the 4th cent., of the Epistle as trifling and unedifying, Jerome, the mo.st learned, and Chrysostom, the most eloquent, of the Fathers, vindicate, as we have seen, its apostolic worthiness and religious helpfulness. In the Reformation epoch, Luther (in his German Bible) eulogizes it as showing a 'right noble and lovely example of
* 5rpe(r^vTij5. Lightfoot (Colosaians and PkiUmoni, p. 33S) translates 'ambassador,' and gives some philological authority for this translation ; but the usual meaning of the word, ' old man," suits the appeal better. St. Paul might very well have been about sixty at thia time, and prematurely aged through prolonged hardship.
Christian love ' ; and Calvin [Com. in loc. ) discerned in it a ' life-like portrayal of the gentleness ' of the a|)ostolic spirit. Among modern writers, Sabatier (The Apostle Paul, Kng. tr., IS'Jl, p. 226) describes it as 'full of grace and wit, of earnest, trustful all'ection,' gleaming ' among the rich treasures of the NT as a pearl of exipiisite fineness.' 'No- where,' writes liwald (Com. in lor.), 'shall we find the .sensibility and warmtli of delicate friendship more beautifully blended with the higher feelin" of a superior intellect, of a teacher and an Apostle. Lightfoot compttrcs it with the younger Pliny's similar letter (Ep. ix. 21) to a friend on behalf of an ofi'cnding Ijut penitent freednian, and .'iwards the palm to the Apostle's Epistle, which ' sttinds unrivalled as an exjiression of simple dignity, of refined courtesy, of large sjniiiathy, and of warm personal ati'ection' (op. cit. p. 319). 'A veritable little masterpiece of the art of letter- writing,' exclaims Renan {L'Antechrist, 1873, p. !I6). ' Those sweet utterances of an author deeply imbued with the Christian spirit,' writes Baur, even while re- jecting the authenticity of the Epistle (Paul, ii. 83). Hackett (in Lange's Com. on Holy Scriptures, ' Philemon,' p. 7) notes the Apostle's delicacy anti skill in 'harmonizing contrarieties.' 'He must conciliate a man who supposed that he had good reason to be ott'ended. He must commend the ott'ender, and yet neither deny nor aggravate the imputed fault. He must assert the new ideas of Christian equality in the face of a system which hardly recognized the humanity of the enslaved. . . . His success must be a triumph of love, and nothing be demanded for the sake of the justice which could have claimed everything. He limits his request to a forgiveness of the alleged wrong, and a restoration to favor and the enjoj'inent of future sympathy and all'ection, and yet would so guard his words as to leave scope for all the generosity which benevolence might prompt' (in- cluding emancipation).
6. Incidental instruction. — (I) Chi-istianity and slavery. — We have in this letter an illustration of the two-fold relation of primitive Christianity to slavery. On the one hand, slaves are instructed to recognize the obligation of faithful and obedient service, along with careful avoidance of any teach- ing which might seem to identify the Church with the social revolution, rapine, and murder by which slave-insurrections were tlien characterized. On the other hand, there is fearless proclamation of the grand truth of universal Christian brotlierhood, through which eventually slavery was to be ex- pelled from Christendom ; along with emphatic encouragement of Christian masters, like Philemon, to treat their slaves with humane consideration, and their Christian slaves as brethren in the Lord. The outcome of this policy was the immediate lietterment of the condition of slaves, their more frequent liberation, and their ultimate emancipa- tion by all Christian nations, t^hristianity, more- over, "lias delivered from moral as well as from material bondage ; from the bondage of spiritual ignorance and from subjection to sinful tastes and habits. ' Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free' (Gal 5').
(2) This Epistle illustrates the rcfninrf influence of Christianity. St. Paul, while honest from the outset even amid anti-Christian prejudice, h;id yet a rough element in his original nature. He not only persecuted but 'outraged' (Aii/iaiVero) the Church, dragging (aipuiv) even women to prison, and breathing out slaughter (.\c 8^ 9'). Christian faith not only reformed but refined him, made him (as this Epistle emphatically indicates) a true gentleman, throitgh the development in him of a fine spirit of Christian courtesy and consideration.
(3) The Epistle, while manifestly describing a
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PHILETUS
PHILIP THE EVANGELIST
real incident, is none the less incidentally, what Weizsiicker regards it as essentially, an allcqory. ' We are all by nature Onesimi,' as Luther said ; we liave revolted from the service of our rightful Master and Lord ; we have sought again and again to be fugitives from His presence, and to live in a ' far country,' 'without God in the world.' In Christ, whom the Apostle here represents, we liave at once a Friend in need, a Kedeemer from sin and misery more effective than St. Paul, an Intercessor at the throne of grace, more sympathetic and more persevering even than him wlio mediated with Philemon for the runaway Onesimus.
Literature. — Commentaries (.amnnj; others) of Jerome, Chrysostom, and Theodore of Mopsuestia; of Calvin, Bengel. and Rollock ; of H. Ewald (lsj7), H. Alford ((ir. Test.s iii. [1371]), H. A. W. Meyer (Eng. tr., 1880), C. J. Ellicott (31865), J. B. Lightfoot (31879), H. B. Hackett (in Lansre's Com. on Uolil Scripturi'.^, 'Philemon,' Enp. tr., 1869), A. H. Drysdale.P/i/^em.. 19l)l>, H. von Soden (in IIoltznmnn'9 Hamlkom. zum NT, 1893), M. R. Vincent {ICC. 1897), A. Maclaren(£j:/Jost(or'«£t/jfc.l8S7); F. W. Farrar, The Messages of the Books, 1884 ; A. L. Williams. Col. and Philem., 1907 ; A. Schumann, Philem., 190S. For Christianity and slavery, see W. A. Becker, Gatlus, tr. F. Metcalfe, =1849, and W. E. H. Lecky, History of European Morale ^ 1888, chs. ii. and iv.