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  • From: Richard Fellows <rfellows AT shaw.ca>
  • To: Corpus-Paul <corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Corpus-Paul] Onesimus
  • Date: Sun, 08 Aug 2004 11:53:26 -0700

Tim Gallant wrote:

> All very fascinating, but I wonder if it may not be that the exact reverse
> is somewhat more likely. (1) Is it so strange that a slave would be
> identified as "useful"? Hmm. Probably not.

It would not be strange for a slave to be named "Useful". Anyone who had the
position of authority over him and who thought that he would be useful might
give him that name. It is certainly possible that a former master might have
named him "Onesimus", but that does not make it "more likely". If we had
evidence that a former master found him useful then he and Paul would be
equally likely to have been the one to give the name "Onesimus". But we have
no such evidence.

> (2) Is it so strange to think
> that Paul might wish to make a play on the meaning of Onesimus's name?

Paul may or may not be making a play on the meaning of the name "Onesimus",
but this is a separate question from the question of who named Onesimus.

> This
> seems all the more likely, given the fact that only here and in 2 Tim. do
we
> find euchrestos in the Pauline letters - i.e. it is not generally a term
he
> finds ready to hand. But Onesimus's name, it would seem, gets him
thinking
> about the category.

The meaning of the name Onesimus could have got Paul thinking about
usefulness and this could have prompted his rare use of the term euchrestos.
However, it is equally likely that it was Onesimus's usefulness that
prompted Paul to think about usefulness.

> It would seem to me that this is a more ready-to-hand solution than a
> renaming.

What is it about renaming that is not "ready-to-hand"?

Richard.






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