Scripture is complicated! That’s probably the most profound statement you’ve heard all week, huh? Seriously though, each Sunday we hear from texts that tackle extremely some troublesome topics, texts written 2000 years ago on the other side of the world, for which we try to find meaning in our own time and place. This is a fraught, troublesome task, and it is not for the faint of heart. Yet we do it. Our lectionary gives us four readings every week, and if we wanted, we could choose not to focus on complicated texts, and just preach on the Psalm instead. But where’s the fun in that? Or more accurately, where’s the spiritual growth in that?
One such text is the Letter to Philemon—one of the most complicated “books” in our Bible, and one that was read in its entirety in every Episcopal Church this past Sunday. The Letter to Philemon is one of seven letters, or “epistles,” in the New Testament that scholars are all but certain that the apostle Paul wrote himself—the others being Romans, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, and 1st Thessalonians. But unlike those other letters, Philemon is the only one we have that was written directly to an individual, without the expectation that it be shared with a congregation. Of course you have the letters to Timothy and Titus (whose authorship is disputed), which were addressed to individuals, but these were also intended to be read and shared in the context of their church communities. Not so with Philemon. This is more like the letter you’d write to your troubled friend than a letter that a bishop would send to a troubled congregation. We can clearly see that this is a deeply personal letter for Paul, which may beg the question: why did a personal letter get included in the canon of Scripture?
Perhaps the answer to that question lies in the nature of this personal letter. After dispensing with the usual pleasantries, Paul gets right to the point. He is writing to a man named Philemon, whom Paul himself had brought into the faith. And he writes on behalf of another man named Onesimus, a slave who belonged to Philemon, but who ran away only to meet up with Paul. Paul brought him to the faith as well. Now, Paul says, he is sending Onesimus back to Philemon, and he appeals to the latter to welcome the former not as a slave, but as a beloved brother in Christ. We can clearly see a message of reconciliation at work here. But who is being reconciled to whom?
Though the text does not say so, certain church leaders of the 4th century such as John Chrysostom later came to regard Oneismus not only as a slave who ran away from Philemon, but also having stolen from him and commiting other possible offenses as well—offenses for which Paul now pleads to be reconciled. “If he has wronged you in any way,” Paul writes, “charge that to my account.” As a result of interpretations like Chrysostom’s, Christian preachers throughout the centuries have tended to focuse less on Oneismus’ status as a slave, and more on the fact that he appears to have committed an offense. He is the guilty party here, not Philemon.... not the one who literally owned him.
As a result, sermons on Philemon down through the years have most often ignored the injustice of slavery, because that was “just the way things were back then.” And because Chyrsostom and other early scholars do not call this out (or in Chrysostom’s case, he actually promoted it, referring to Oneisimus as a "good-for-nothing runaway" in his commentary on the text), Christians living in societies where it was considered normal for one human being to legally own another often turned to texts like this letter and said, “See! Slavery is fine in the eyes of God! It's right there in the Bible. Paul does not say that Philemon should free the returning Onesimus. Does he?”
Texts like this one were routinely read by slaveholders in our own country on Sunday mornings when they gathered with the African men, women, and children that they held in bondage. The message was certainly not one of emancipation, they said, but of a loving, reconciliatory relationship between masters and the slaves who had run away or in some other fashion wronged them. Modern preachers to this day often have a tendency of glossing over the slavery issue, instead saying things like, "Yes, there was slavery in Paul's time, but we'll just set it off to the side for now, so we can focus on reconciliation."
After all, if the message of Paul’s letter to Philemon was one of emancipation, why does Paul not seem to say so explicitly or in a way that we can recognize? Especially as a western audience that has had a particular experience of slavery and the call for freedom, American Christians today can scarcely read this letter without wanting Paul to echo the words of American abolitionists, who loudly called for the release of all people held in bondage. Why did Paul not explicitly denounce the practice of one human being owning another as an immoral act? Perhaps one reason is that Paul, unlike later folks like Chrysostom, is not writing from a place of power but as a prisoner held captive in the Roman Empire. Knowing the pervasiveness of the institution of slavery in the empire, Paul is not exactly in a position to make a public cry for its abolition, otherwise he risks bringing the wrath of Rome on this fledgling Christian movement, more so than it already was. But perhaps even more to the point, remember that this is not a public letter. It was a personal and pastoral one. We expect Paul to make a statement that’s meant to be shared with a wider group because that’s what he does in his other letters and because that is how we read his letters now. But because this is personal and not public, we can see how he makes his case in a much more subtle manner. Through his very careful use of language, Paul subverts the system in which he operates and calls for change within that system, even though he uses language that we might not expect in order to do so.
Look at some of Paul's other letters to see some of his thoughts on slavery: “Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” he says in Galatians 5:1. And in II Corinthians 11: 20-21 he even castigates those who let others enslave them, hardly the words of someone who approves of the human institution of slavery. We must assume that these words reflect an attitude that is consistent with the personal appeal made in his letter to Philemon, instructing him to welcome Onesimus back no longer as a slave, but as a beloved brother. Philemon is not to see Oneismus as a slave anymore than he would see Paul as a criminal; for prisoners, like slaves, had no authority or status in society. This point is eloquently illustrated at the beginning of the letter, where he introduces himself not as a prisoner of Christ. Philemon is then instructed to welcome Oneisimus as he would welcome Paul. As Saint Jerome points out in his own 4th century commentary on the text: Philemon is to welcome Onesimus as an apostle; that is, one with authority.
Paul furthermore instructs Philemon that Onesimus’ value is not as a slave, but as a person: “formerly he was useless to you, but now he is useful both to you and to me.” Pay attention to how he reminds Philemon of his own status as a servant of Christ: “...so that he might be of service to me in your place...” but then emphasizes that servitude must be “voluntary and not forced.” We may wonder why Paul would send him back rather than helping him to escape, but Paul is clearly interested here in reconciliation - not of Oneisimus to Philemon, but Philemon to Oneismus. Paul’s letter gives us a glimpse of how the early Christian movement sought to undermine the pervading social structures and norms of the Roman Empire, one relationship at a time. In case Oneisimus had any doubts about whether Philemon might follow through on his liberation, Paul reminds him that he would be visiting them shortly to check up on them, and that Philemon should prepare a room for him.
The implication here is clear: one who is truly a brother in the Lord Jesus cannot possibly be a slave in the flesh.
Last week marked the anniversary of Fredrick Douglass’ escape from slavery in 1838, along with plans by Virginia Theological Seminary to begin reparations payments. In light of these historical markers we need to be reminded that, while Scripture has been used countless times by those who seek to advocate oppression, the Good News of God in Christ has never and will never advocate the oppression of any of God’s people. The fact that pieces of the Bible, like this one, have been used by powers and principalities throughout the world to legitimize the institution of slavery, especially in our own country, cannot be ignored whenever we read this letter in our churches. We cannot just "set the slavery issue to the side" when we talk about this text.
Paul’s plea to Philemon is all the more scandalous in light of the fact that here we see one Christian appealing to another to respect the dignity of a fellow human being, and to treat him not as the law of the empire would treat him... not as the culture would treat him... and not even as Philemon himself would treat him... but as Christ would treat him. There is indeed a message of reconciliation here, but it is not about Oneismus being reconciled to Philemon—victims are never the ones who must be reconciled to their abusers. It is Philemon who, upon welcoming Oneismus as a brother, will become reconciled to his former slave. As Lloyd Lewis, author of An African American Appraisal of the Philemon-Paul-Oneismus Triangle has written: “Paul exposes an unwillingness to canonize the social roles found in his environment.” Onesimus the slave is “useless,” but Onesimus as a child of God is beloved, useful, and so much more. Paul’s appeal to Philemon gives us not just a message of reconciliation, but one of emancipation, along with the call for us even now to refrain from canonizing the oppressive roles and within our own context.
Scriptures like these are often difficult to understand, especially when we are quick to read only the surface level of these ancient texts, projecting our modern perspective onto them or using them to promote our own theologies and ideas—a method called “proof-texting.” For those determined to maintain institutions of slavery, segregation, and other forms of social and relational domination that place the responsibility on victims to be reconciled to their oppressors, this text has been used over and over again to promote these positions. But brothers and sisters, I am here to tell you that is wrong, un-Christian, and not what is actually going on in the text itself. If we are to make any sense of Scripture for our own time and place, and find the Good News in the Gospel, we must do the hard work of wrestling with these text, digging for the deeper meaning and not just merely being satisfied with surface-level words that seem vindicate our own thoughts and beliefs and fears about God and the world. We must use our Scriptures as tools for building the Kingdom, not as weapons for repressing the freedoms of any child of God. We must listen to the experiences of those who have been marginalized through the years because of tough Scriptures like this one, and respect the effect that harmful preaching has had. As Christians, we must reject any message that disrespects the dignity of any human being. This is not easy work, but if we are to be a “People of the Book”—as our Muslim brothers and sisters like to call us—then we must be ready, willing, and able to dig into the book, to wrestle with the tough texts and to listen to others' experiences of the book. Even when they are less than favorable. For in doing so, we can better equip ourselves and our churches to find the Good News that the Spirit is saying to all of God’s people.
An Eastern icon of Onesimus, whom tradition tells us was freed by Philemon and later made Bishop of Ephesus.