Good Deeds Should Not be Forced

The word goal for each of my blog articles is 1000 words because I want them to be something that can be read in less than 5 minutes. Online articles longer than that tend to make my eyes glaze over, especially if I’m reading them on my phone during lunch break.

Background of the Letter to Philemon

Paul’s letter to Philemon is only 335 words in Greek, somewhere between 400-500 words in English translation. It can easily be read in a few minutes. It is the third-shortest “book” in the NT (only 2 John and 3 John are shorter) and has no chapters. It might very well be my favorite of Paul’s letters because it is so personal and direct; Paul’s humanity shines through it.

The background to the story is quite simple. A slave named Onesimus (the name means “useful”) ran away from his master, Philemon, and found his way to Paul. Paul sends Onesimus back with the letter to Philemon (and the church that meets in his house), hoping to reconcile master and slave as brothers in Christ.

There’s very few clues in the letter as to where and when it was written. We know Paul was in prison and Timothy was with him. Some of the same cast of characters (Archippus, Onesimus, Aristarchus, Mark, Epaphras, Luke, Demas) are also listed in Colossians. There is doubt as to whether or not Colossians is an authentic letter of Paul, so the details may not be factual, but many scholars believe a reliable tradition lies behind them. The reasoning is that if the details were blatantly incorrect, Colossians would have been rejected as an authentic letter from Paul.

St. Paul the Apostle in prison, writing his epistle to the Ephesians (from a 19^th century bible). While Paul may have written shorter letters like Philemon in his own hand, longer letters were dictated to a scribe. Even so, Paul would add a couple of sentences or paragraph in his own handwriting so that the recipient knew that it came from him. His letters were much larger than those of the scribe (Gal 6:11).

If we therefore take as a workable hypothesis that Philemon lived in the region of Colossae, then Paul would most likely have written the letter during his Ephesian captivity. That would put the year of its writing the same as that of Philippians (circa 56 CE). Colossae is 100-120 miles from Ephesus and that is a plausible distance for a runaway slave to have travelled.

Purpose of the Letter

After a brief introduction, Paul gets down to business (vv. 8-21). He reminds Philemon that he could invoke his apostolic authority to command him to do his duty, but Paul would rather appeal to his better judgment. Apparently Paul is responsible for Onesimus coming to Christ (“whose father I have become during my imprisonment”). Paul speaks of how useful Onesimus has been in his captivity (playing on the meaning of the slave’s name). Paul would like to continue having Onesimus work for him, but needs Philemon’s consent. He wants Philemon to voluntarily offer Onesimus’ service and not have a good dead be forced upon him. If Onesimus owes damages to Philemon, Paul will make restitution.

It is not absolutely clear that Paul is asking Philemon to emancipate Onesimus. That could be the implication of v. 21 (“confident of your obedience … knowing you will do even more than I say”). But even if Paul is not expecting freedom for Onesimus, he does hope that Philemon will allow him to continue working with Paul. As far as Paul is concerned, it makes no difference whether Onesimus is a slave or a freeman because Christians should treat each other as equals, regardless of their state in life (see Gal 3:28). To Paul, all are slaves to Christ and all are free from sin.

Paul could have said something like “Slavery is incompatible with the message of Jesus,” but he did not. Why? As we have seen in Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, he had an apocalyptic view that the world would soon pass away. There’s no urgency is overthrowing the current social order if it is all to be soon wiped away by Christ’s second coming. Paul’s principle is set forth in 1 Cor 7:20-31: “Let each of you remain in the condition in which you were called.” Whether slave, married, or single, “the appointed time grows short.”

Importance of the Letter

Obviously, advice given to Christians expecting the imminent return of Christ in the mid 50’s is not the same as what would be given to a Christian in the early 21st century. Yet we hear advice from Col 3:18 (“wives, be subject to your husbands”) proposed as the eternal, unchangeable word of God, while ignoring “slaves, obey your masters” four verses later. If the centuries-old practice of slavery could one day be seen as utterly contrary to the Christian gospel, why not other inequalities such as those between men and women?

But, to me, the biggest takeaway is Paul refusing to exercise his apostolic authority. It is all too common to see authority (biblical or hierarchical) invoked to settle a church issue. Rare are the occasions when those in authority seek to persuade through an appeal to reason. It is so much easier to repeat “the Bible says” or “the Church teaches” than to build a case that could be convincing even to an atheist.

We don’t know what Philemon ultimately decided, but we can guess. Paul must have written countless personal letters to individual Christians, but this one was preserved and all the others were not. The most obvious reason why it was preserved was because Philemon did take Paul’s suggestion and allowed Onesimus to continue working with Paul. Colossians 4:9 cites Onesimus as one of the bearers of that letter – along with Tychicus – and says he is a “faithful and beloved brother” belonging to the church in Colossae.

Fifty years later, Ignatius of Antioch, writing to the Ephesians, praises Onesimus, their bishop (Eph 1:3). Could this be the same Onesimus? And could he have collected a sampling of Paul’s letters, including the one that eventually won him his freedom? There is no evidence for it, but it is a romantic theory and we would like it to be true.

Damned Ham

Okay, let’s say you and your family just survived a global cataclysm. What’s the first thing you do? Well, according to the Bible, it’s to get stinking drunk.

The first story the Bible recounts after the flood (Gen 9:20-27) is how Noah planted a vineyard, got drunk on wine, and lay naked in his tent:

Noah, a man of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard.
He drank some of the wine and became drunk, and he lay uncovered in his tent.
And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brothers outside.
Then Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it on both their shoulders, and walked backward and covered the nakedness of their father; their faces were turned away, and they did not see their father’s nakedness.
When Noah awoke from his wine and knew what his youngest son had done to him,
he said, “Cursed be Canaan; lowest of slaves shall he be to his brothers.”
And he said, “Blessed be YHWH, the God of Shem; and let Canaan be his slave.
May God make space for Japheth, and let him live in the tents of Shem; and let Canaan be his slave.”

There are some odd aspects of this passage. How does it relate to what’s happened previously?

Back in Gen 5:29, it was said that Lamech named his son Noah because “Out of the ground that YHWH has cursed this one shall bring us relief from our work and from the toil of our hands.” Thus Noah’s name is related to his role as the first winemaker (“wine to gladden the heart”, Ps 104:15) and not as the hero of the flood. Because of the mention of the name YHWH and the callback to the cursing of the ground in 3:17-19, this verse has been considered the one verse from the Yahwist (J) in all of Gen 5. Verse 29 seems to have been originally connected to 9:20-27 (another J passage) but got separated when the flood narrative was inserted. The description of Noah as the founder of viticulture is consistent with J’s list of the founders of cities, nomads, musicians, and metalworkers in 4:17-25.

Many commentators have wondered as to the nature of Ham’s crime that earned him such condemnation from Noah. Some have speculated if “saw the nakedness of his father” was a euphemism for something much worse. But the words can be taken literally and make perfect sense. While a husband and wife can be naked and not feel shame – as was the case of Adam and Eve – public nudity in the OT was seen as shameful. If a son was to see his father lying helplessly drunk and naked, the appropriate action was for the child to cover the genitals of the parent. Instead, Ham left Noah uncovered and told his brothers, thus publicizing Noah’s shame. We can speculate that Ham felt disgust or contempt for his father lying in that state, but that is reading more into the story than is there. Shem and Japheth, for their part, did what was expected of a good son.

"The Drunkenness of Noah" by Andre Sacchi (1599-1661). Seeing the look on Ham's face, I could see why Noah would curse him.

What’s odd is that Ham is introduced as “the father of Canaan” and, when Noah finally sobers up, he curses Canaan, not Ham. Ham is also referred to as Noah’s “youngest” son. This has led some biblical scholars to wonder if originally the story named Shem, Japheth and Canaan as Noah’s son. According to this theory, Canaan was changed to Ham in order to make the story consistent with the tradition that Noah’s sons were named Shem, Ham and Japheth. It is also equally possible that the story always concerned the sin of Ham and it was well-known that Ham was the father of Canaan (10:6). Just as Noah was dishonored by his son, he curses Ham’s son. It was only a later redactor who identified Ham as “the father of Canaan” for readers who were not clear on the genealogical connection.

The whole point of the story is the cursing of Ham/Canaan. The last two verses (which I placed in italics) is a secondary addition. Perhaps the redactor felt that if Canaan was cursed, Shem and Japheth needed to be blessed. But in v. 26 it is not Shem but YHWH who is blessed. YHWH is referred to as “the God of Shem” and since YHWH is only the God of Israel, Shem is identified with Israel. Biblical scholars declare that this is an etiological story of how Canaan came to be slaves to Israel. The problem with that theory is that in the rest of the OT, God tells Israel to either drive out or exterminate the Canaanites, never to make them their slaves.

The last verse is a play on the name Japheth (japt = “may he make large”). But who is Japheth? And why would he be dwelling in Seth’s tents? According to Gen 10:2-5, Japheth’s descendants were people to the north of Israel, but that comes from the Priestly writer. J may have had the Philistines in mind, for all we know. And perhaps the subject of v. 27a (“may God make space for Japheth”) is also the same subject of 27b (“and let him live in the tents of Shem”), in which case it would be a continuation of the blessing of YHWH in v. 26.

My final comment concerns the triple affirmation that Canaan is to be the lowest slave to Seth. In his primeval history, J continues to describe broken relationships and their consequences. In Gen 2-3, we had the broken relationship between the first couple and God and how it led to an inequality between husband and wife. In Gen 4, we have the broken relationship between brothers and how it led to Cain being outcast. Finally, here in Gen 9, we have a broken relationship between father and son and how it led to the son becoming slave to his brothers. Slavery was a reality in the ancient world but the author understands that it is not part of God’s original plan. Therefore, slavery must be punishment for some primordial sin. J is not challenging the institution. It exists in his world and he tries to explain how it came about.