Philemon 1:3-4

1:3 Grace and peace to you ¹  from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!

Thanks for Philemon’s Love and Faith

1:4 I always thank my God ²  as I remember you in my prayers, ³ 

Philemon 1:8

Paul’s Request for Onesimus

1:8 So, although I have quite a lot of confidence in Christ and could command you to do what is proper,

Philemon 1:10

1:10 I am appealing ⁴  to you concerning my child, whose spiritual father I have become ⁵  during my imprisonment, ⁶  that is, Onesimus,

Philemon 1:12

1:12 I have sent ⁷  him (who is my very heart) ⁸  back to you.

Philemon 1:15

1:15 For perhaps it was for this reason that he was separated from you for a little while, so that you would have him back eternally, ⁹ 

Philemon 1:23

Concluding Greetings

1:23 Epaphras, ¹⁰  my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus, greets you.

Philemon 1:25

1:25 May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be ¹¹  with your spirit. ¹² 

[1:3]  ¹ tn Grk “Grace to you and peace.”

[1:4]  ² sn I always thank my God. An offer of thanksgiving (εὐχαριστῶ, eucaristw) to God is a customary formula for Paul in many of his epistles (cf. Rom 1:8, 1 Cor 1:4, Eph 1:16, Col 1:3, 1 Thess 1:2, 2 Thess 1:3). The content of the thanksgiving typically points to the work of God in the salvation of the believers to whom he [Paul] writes.

[1:4]  ³ tn Grk “making remembrance (or “mention”) of you in my prayers.”

[1:10]  ³ tn Or “I am encouraging…”

[1:10]  ⁴ tn Grk “my child whom I have begotten.” The adjective “spiritual” has been supplied before “father” in the translation to clarify for the modern reader that Paul did not literally father a child during his imprisonment. Paul’s point is that he was instrumental in Onesimus’ conversion while in prison.

[1:10]  ⁵ sn During my imprisonment. Apparently Onesimus became a believer under Paul’s shepherding while he [Paul] was a prisoner in Rome.

[1:12]  ⁴ tc There are several variants at this point in the text, most of them involving the addition of προσλαβοῦ (proslabou, “receive, accept”) at various locations in the verse. But all such variants seem to be motivated by the harsh syntax of the verse without this verb. Without the verb, the meaning is that Onesimus is Paul’s “very heart,” though this is an awkward expression especially because of τουτ᾿ ἔστιν (tout’ estin, “this is, who is”) in the middle cluttering the construction. Nowhere else in the NT is σπλάγχνα (splancna, here translated “heart”) used in apposition to people. It is thus natural that scribes would want to fill out the text here, and they did so apparently with a verb that was ready at hand (borrowed from v. 17). With the verb the sentence is converted into an object-complement construction: “I have sent him back to you; accept him, that is, as my very heart.” But both the fact that some important witnesses (א* A F G 33 pc) lack the verb, and that its location floats in the various constructions that have it, suggest that the original text did not have προσλαβοῦ.

[1:12]  ⁵ tn That is, “who means a great deal to me”; Grk “whom I have sent to you, him, this one is my heart.”

[1:15]  ⁵ sn So that you would have him back eternally. The notion here is not that Onesimus was to be the slave of Philemon eternally, but that their new relationship as brothers in Christ would transcend the societal structures of this age. The occasion of Onesimus’ flight to Rome would ultimately be a catalyst in the formation of a new and stronger bond between these two men.

[1:23]  ⁶ sn Epaphras is probably a shortened form of the name Epaphroditus. This is probably the same individual whom Paul spoke of as “my brother, coworker, and fellow soldier” in Phil 2:25 (see also Phil 4:18). He is also mentioned in Col 1:7 and 4:12, where he is a founder of the church in Colossae (BDAG 360 s.v. ᾿Επαφρᾶς).

[1:25]  ⁷ tn Grk “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ with your spirit.” The elided verb, normally an optative, has been rendered as “be.”

[1:25]  ⁸ tc Most witnesses, including several excellent ones (א C D¹ Ψ 0278 Ï lat sy), conclude this letter with ἀμήν (amhn, “amen”). Such a conclusion is routinely added by scribes to NT books because a few of these books originally had such an ending (cf. Rom 16:27; Gal 6:18; Jude 25). A majority of Greek witnesses have the concluding ἀμήν in every NT book except Acts, James, and 3 John (and even in these books, ἀμήν is found in some witnesses). It is thus a predictable variant. Further, several good witnesses (Ì⁸⁷ A D* 048^vid 6 33 81 1739* 1881 sa) lack the ἀμήν, rendering the omission the preferred reading.