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Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and our brother Timothy, to Philemon, our beloved and fellow worker, and to Appia, the sister, and to Archippus, our fellow soldier, and to the church that is in your house: grace be to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

I give thanks to my God, always making remembrance of you in my prayers, as I hear of your charity and of the faith that you have in our Lord Jesus and towards all the saints. May the sharing of your faith be made evident in full knowledge of all the good that is in you, in Christ Jesus. For I had great joy and consolation in your charity, because through you, brother, the hearts of the saints have found rest.

For this reason, though I am very confident that I might charge you in Christ Jesus to do, what is fitting, yet for the sake of charity I prefer to plead, since you are such as you are; as Paul, an old man — and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ — I plead with you for my own son, whom I have begotten in prison, for Onesimus. He once was useless to you, but now is useful both to me and to you. I am sending him back to you, and do you welcome him as though he were my very heart. I had wanted to keep him here with me that in your stead he might wait on me in my imprisonment for the Gospel; but I did not want to do anything without your counsel, in order that your kindness might not be as it were of necessity, but voluntary.

Perhaps, indeed, he departed from you for a short while so that you might receive him for ever, no longer as a slave, but instead of a slave as a brother most dear, especially to me, and how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord! If therefore you does count me as a partner, welcome him as you would me. And if he did you any injury or owes anything, charge it to me. I, Paul, write it with my own hand: I will repay it — not to say to you that you owe me your very self. Yes, indeed, brother! May I too make use of you in the Lord! Console my heart in the Lord!

Trusting in your compliance, I am writing to you, knowing that you wilt do even beyond what I say. At the same time make ready a lodging for me too, for I hope that through your prayers I shall be restored to you. Epaphras, my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus, Mark, Aristarchus, Demas and Luke, my fellow workers send you greetings. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen.

Preface

‘If you have a faithful servant, let him be to you as your own soul’ (Sirach 33:31). The wise man shows three things concerning master and slave, namely, what is required on the side of the servant; what ought to be the feeling of the master towards the servant; and what is the use of the servant. From the servant fidelity is asked, for in this he is a good servant, because what he is and all that he has he ought to give to the master. Matthew 24-45: ‘Who, do you think, is the faithful and prudent servant...’ And he says, ‘if he is faithful’, because fidelity is found in few. Proverbs 20:6: ‘But who shall find a faithful man?’ The master ought to feel towards his servant as a friend, hence it is said, ‘as his own soul’. For this is proper to friends, that they are of one mind in what they will and what they do not will. Acts 4.32: ‘Now the multitude of the believers were of one heart and one soul.’ By which we are given to understand that there is a consensus of master and servant, when the faithful servant becomes a friend. As for his use, he should be treated like a brother, for he is a brother, both with respect to generation of nature, because they have the same author —Job 31.13: ‘If I have despised to abide judgement with my man-servant’; Malachi 2:10: ‘Have we not all one father? Did not one God created us?’ —and with respect to the generation of grace, which is the same for both. Galatians 3:27: ‘For all you who have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither slave nor freeman; there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.’ Matthew 23:8: ‘And all you are brothers.’ These words are relevant to the matter of this epistle. For as it was shown above how spiritual prelates should relate to their subjects, so here he shows how temporal masters should relate to their temporal servants, and how the faithful servant to his master.

The occasion of the epistle is this. At Colossae an important Christian had a servant who secretly fled to Rome where he was baptized by the Apostle who now writes on his behalf. First he gives a greeting, followed by the narrative of the epistle. In the greeting he mentions persons who send their greeting and then the recipients and finally the good hoped for.