Philemon

Philemon is the shortest of Paul's letters, a single chapter of twenty-five verses written from prison to Philemon, a well-to-do believer in Colosse whose house hosted a church. It is a personal letter about a personal crisis: Onesimus, Philemon's slave, had run away, apparently after wronging his master, and had somehow found his way to Paul. Under Paul's ministry Onesimus became a Christian, whom Paul calls his son, begotten in my bonds. Now Paul sends him back, carrying this letter, at the same time the epistle to the Colossians was dispatched.

The letter is a masterpiece of gentle persuasion. Paul, who says he could be bold to command, chooses instead to beseech for love's sake, as Paul the aged and prisoner of Jesus Christ. He plays tenderly on Onesimus's name, which means profitable: once unprofitable, the runaway is now profitable to them both. Paul offers to repay anything Onesimus owes, put that on mine account, while reminding Philemon that he owes Paul his very self. He asks that Onesimus be received as Paul himself, no longer a servant but a brother beloved, and adds that he trusts Philemon will do even more than he asks.

Philemon matters because it shows the gospel dissolving a social barrier from the inside out. Paul never issues an edict against slavery here; instead he makes master and slave brothers, a logic that in time undermined the institution itself. It is the New Testament's clearest picture of forgiveness, intercession, and imputation in miniature.