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  • From: Richard Fellows <rfellows AT shaw.ca>
  • To: Corpus-Paul <corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Corpus-Paul] Re: Was Paul sponging off Gaius?
  • Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 13:33:48 -0700

John,

you argue well, but I am not convinced that your suggestions entirely solve
the problem. Your first suggestion is that Paul paid Gaius for his
accommodation, and I'll address this first. XENOS in Rom 16:23 means 'host',
and would surely have given the impression that Gaius was providing
accommodation to Paul for free. That was the usual sense of the word, in
such cases. I have found no evidence that XENOS could mean 'landlord'. The
very fact that Gaius's relationship to Paul is mentioned at all implies that
his contribution was significant and deserving of mention. The natural
interpretation is therefore that Gaius provided accommodation to Paul
without receiving payment, and I have not found any commentator, either
ancient or modern, who reads it any other way, though admittedly my search
has not been thorough. Chrysostom writes:

"But when you hear that he was Paul's host, do not admire him for his
munificence only, but also for his strictness of life. For except he were
worthy of Paul's excellency, he would never have lodged there, since he, who
took pains to go beyond many of Christ's commands, would never have
trespassed against that law, which bids us be very particular about who
receive us, and about lodging with "worthy" persons."

It is clear then, that Chrysostom took XENOS to mean that Paul stayed with
Gaius and did so for free. We should assume that the readers of Romans would
have taken it the same way. Therein lies the problem. If Romans was written
in Corinth and Paul stayed there for some weeks or months, then the Roman
believers would have received the impression that Paul had accepted
accommodation from Gaius for an extended period. They would then expect that
he would accept their own offers of material support when he came to Rome.
16:23 would then create false expectations and create problems for Paul in
Rome. "But we were expecting you to stay with us as our guest - you stayed
with Gaius - aren't we good enough for you". After the problems that Paul
had had in Achaia on this very issue, he would surely be careful to avoid
such problems in Rome. The problem is avoided if Romans was written from
Cenchreae where Paul may have stayed for just three or four days, say.

Your second suggestion, John, was that "Paul simply means that Gaius
provides the
space for the whole church to meet and listen to the teaching of Paul".

you wrote:
> In what way Gaius played XENOS to Paul is not exactly clear, since he is
> described as XENOS to the hOLHS THS EKKLHSIAS as well as to Paul himself.

The verse describes Gaius's relationship to Paul, and Gaius's relationship
to 'the whole church' as host (XENOS). I think it is important to note that
Paul mentions himself first and the 'whole church' second: "Gaius, the host
(XENOS) of me, and the whole church." Therefore Gaius's relationship to Paul
should not be interpreted according to assumptions about Gaius's
relationship to the 'whole church'. GAIOS hO XENOS MOU is read first, and
therefore interpreted first. It is unlikely that the hearers would be
expected to re-evaluate their first impression of these words in the light
of the following "hOLHS THS EKKLHSIAS". If Paul had meant that Gaius
provided a venue where he was the guest preacher, then he would at least
have reversed the order: "Gaius, host of the whole church and of me".

Another problem with this interpretation is that it makes the word MOU
almost redundant. The importance of Gaius would be that he provided a place
for the whole church to meet. If Paul is saying that he also came to the
meetings in Gaius's house during his stay in Corinth, he would not be adding
anything significant to the readers knowledge of Gaius. Paul is sending
greetings from Gaius so the focus here must be on the contributions made by
Gaius, not on Paul directly.

Finally, if Paul was not referring to the provision of accommodation by
Gaius, it is not clear how the readers were expected to know that that was
the case. Why would Paul leave it so ambiguous and risk giving the wrong
impression (see above)?

> Clearly, the man cannot be offering lodging to the whole church.

Not so fast! Firstly, a very popular interpretation is that "hOLHS THS
EKKLHSIAS" denotes the wider church and that Gaius offered lodging to
travelling Christians who passed through his town. Secondly, we should not
rule out the possibility that Gaius provided lodging to the whole church of
Cenchreae, which may have been rather small.

>While it is possible that Paul had a
> change of mind since writing 2 Cor 11:9-10 (perhaps to offer the
Corinthians
> something of a 'peace-offering' with respect to the offense caused over
his
> refusal to accept their support) it is just as likely that Paul did, in
> fact, pay Gaius, even for his own food.

Why do you assume that Romans was written from Corinth?

> In short, I'm suggesting that if Gaius 'hosted' Paul in the material
sense,
> it is entirely possible that Paul paid for this (even if only in a token
> manner) out of his own pocket.

Paul probably stayed in Corinth for some time and would have paid for his
food and accommodation. This is hard to reconcile with Rom 16:23, so it is
unlikely that Romans was written in Corinth. I think Cenchreae is a more
likely location for Romans. It is the only city mentioned by name.

Most commentators argue that Corinth was the place of writing because Gaius
(1 Cor 1:14) was from Corinth. This argument is very week. Firstly, Gaius
was a very common name (there are probably three Gaii in the NT who were not
from Corinth) so there is no necessity to equate the Gaius of 1 Cor 1:14
with the one in Rom 16:23. Secondly, the high status believers in Achaia
were very mobile, so Gaius may well have moved from Corinth in the six years
or so between his baptism and the writing of Romans. Prisca, Aquila, and
Crispus-Sosthenes all moved (to Ephesus); and it is likely that Stephanas
was not originally from Corinth. Therefore we should not be surprised to
find Gaius moving from Corinth to Cenchreae. These people may have moved
cities to plant churches, as Frank has recently suggested, or to escape
persecution.

In short, there is no good reason to place Romans in Corinth, and 16:23
argues against it.

Edgar Krentz wrote:
<<The usual custom of xenodochia, guest friendship, accounts for this,
I think. In a world without motels, where tavernas were morally
suspect, being hosted by a friend of a friend was normal, as one can
document from Egyptian papyrus documents. Paul seems to be arranging
that for Phoebe in Rom 16:1-2>>

I think I agree, Edgar. It is my suggestion that this means that Paul cannot
have stayed with Gaius for very long, otherwise he would have been in
violation of his own policy of not sponging. What do you think?

Richard Fellows.








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