Did Phoebe Read Romans?

Have we achieved maximum silliness with regard to Phoebe's role in delivering Paul's letter to the Christians in Rome? Maybe not; some scholars may yet have more silliness planned for us. But we have at least achieved significant silliness. 

Let me explain.

At the beginning of Romans 16, Paul commends to the Christians in Rome a lady—a "sister"—named Phoebe, whom he introduces as a diakonos of the church in Cenchraea and a benefactor of many. He also wants the Roman Christians to help Phoebe with a project, unnamed and perhaps undetermined. 

So far so good; all this is in the text of Romans 16:1–2, our sole source for Phoebe. But can we say more about her? Sure, we can. Here's Scot McKnight: "[Paul] asks a wealthy, influential female, Phoebe, not only to deliver his prized letter but also to read it to each of the five or six (or more) house churches in Rome" (Reading Romans Backwards, p. 3). And a couple pages later: 

More needs to be said about reading the letter. The courier Phoebe performed the letter, and I assume to each house church (but it is possible she read it only once). ... Writers like Paul didn't hand letters over to schmucks to stumble their way through the letters. He (and his coworkers) mentored the readers so they could read the letters in a way that made Paul seem present and his lived theology compelling. [The note here points to Acts 15:31; Col 4:16.] How was such a letter read? The standard elements of reading as performance included gestures at the right time and to the right segment of the audience (when Phoebe read "Strong" or "Weak" [McKnight is alluding to Romans 14], she looked them in the eye, or, if she thought they needed it, the opposing group in the eye!); inflection of the voice (here pastoral, there admonishing, here softening, and there exhorting); acting out specific elements of the letter; pausing and speeding up when needed; making eye contact at crucial moments; and having "ad-libbed" if she thought the audience needed it. How to read the letter would have been discussed by Paul as well as Timothy, Tertius, and Gaius (16:21–22). She no doubt practiced in their presence. Some think she had the whole letter memorized and performed it from memory. (p. 5)

Interesting. So, apparently we don't actually know whether Phoebe had the letter memorized, because McKnight acknowledges that this idea is only a thought that "some" have. Presumably, all the other stuff in the paragraph, then, is not just speculation but facts based on evidence and argumentation. I wonder. 

Two caveats about this paragraph from McKnight. First, McKnight has already warned readers in the preface that his is not the kind of book that presents evidence and arguments. This is a book presenting McKnight's own reading of Paul's letter to the Romans, and he says you need to look elsewhere for more detailed argumentation and interaction with scholarship. Okay, fair enough. Second, McKnight is hardly alone in thinking of Phoebe as exhibited in the quoted paragraph. His treatment just happens to be the one I read on the day when I first wrote the skeleton of this post. 

References to Phoebe punctuate McKnight's book. When discussing Romans 15:8–9, he surmises: "Here, Phoebe must be especially looking at the Weak to remind them of what their Bible says" (p. 43). What is this supposed to mean? Are we to imagine Phoebe reading Romans in front of a combined church gathering with Strong and Weak together? And Phoebe somehow knows which ones are Weak? Did they wear nametags, or introduce themselves to her: "I'm George, and I'm Weak." 

McKnight says something similar when overviewing chs. 9–11: "Phoebe would have looked at the Weak until 11:10 and then turned her gaze on the Strong through the rest of the chapter. She would have altered her voice, too, when quoting various Scriptures" (p. 68). Not only did she perform the letter, she also "fielded questions" (p. 58). On Romans 9–11, "Phoebe must have fielded numerous questions and even explained Old Testament texts as she read the text of Romans aloud. These three chapters were a long evening discussion" (p. 62). 

So Phoebe read the letter aloud and provided theological commentary.

She probably wrote the letter—or, at least, helped Paul write it. So says the most recent authoritative commentary (a commentary whose inscription dedicates the book to Phoebe). 

Further, Phoebe may well have had a voice in the content of the letter [...]. Paul did not dash off this lengthy and complex letter must have composed it over a period of time. His circle in Corinth would likely have listened at least to sections of the letter, perhaps even full drafts, and entered into discussion of those drafts [...]. As the one charged with the delivery and reading of the letter (and located in nearby Cenchreae), Phoebe would have been part of such conversations. Paul attached to much importance to the letter to hand it off without comment or direction. Her importance for Paul, for Rome, and for the origin of interpretation of this letter, begins to come into view. [Here she cites Cadwallader 2015.] 

Phoebe’s identity as a believer and her anticipated role at Rome are both reasonably clear. (Beverly Roberts Gaventa 2024: 431)

Phoebe's role is clear: contributing to the composition of Romans, carrying the letter to Rome, reading aloud Romans to various house churches, and providing theological commentary. Oh yeah, and divining which members are Weak and which are Strong so that she can give them the stink eye at certain key moments while performing the letter. 

It's nice to have so much clarity. I wonder what evidence there is for it. 

It must be strong evidence, because Michael Bird acknowledges in his commentary on Romans that it was Phoebe that caused him to accept an egalitarian position in modern church debates: "... it was reading about and reflecting on Phoebe—in particular her place in the Pauline circle, the reason why Paul chose her to deliver this letter, and imagining what subsequent role she might have played in the Roman churches ahead of Paul's visit—that left me completely gob smacked and led me to affirm the role of women in the teaching ministries of the church" (526). 

Okay, so let's dig into the evidence, and let's start with the idea that Phoebe is the one appointed by Paul to read aloud the letter in Rome. What is the evidence that has so impressed these scholars that the letter-carrier would read aloud the letter to its recipients? 

Gaventa (430 n. 17) cites the same study everyone else seems to rely on: "Head 2009, in a study of personal letters among the Oxyrhynchus papyri, found no evidence that letter carriers named within letters also functioned as letter readers, but he concedes that this silence may not be conclusive."

Um, what? No evidence?! 

That can't be! Not with all this scholarly certainty. I mean, Gaventa says that Phoebe's role is clear. That can't be based on "no evidence." 

Let's hear from another expert in ancient letter writing. 

In a world that so valued oratory, reading the letter was more like performing the letter. This is why the wealthy owned slaves whose duty was reading; there are numerous references to Caesar, Pliny and Cicero having letters read to them. [Footnote with reference to Pliny, Epist. 8.1.] The majority of recipients, of course, did not have private readers. If the private carrier was literate (and privy to the letter's situation), he was the logical choice to read the letter. He knew the details of the situation and could provide the nuances of voice and expression that best conveyed the author's intents. This was an advantage to both the sender and the recipient. It seems likely that the recipient (excluding the wealthy rhetoricians) had the letter read aloud by the carrier if the carrier was able. (Richards, p. 185)

Richards makes it clear that he's taking a guess here. He provides no evidence for the notion that the letter carrier read the letter aloud to the recipient. (There are no footnotes for the paragraph other than the one I have indicated.) He can provide evidence only that the letter carrier was not the letter reader in the case of wealthy recipients, because they had their own dedicated readers. 

What are the chances that the Roman house churches had their own dedicated readers? Hmm, that strikes me as sorta likely. I would imagine that the Roman house churches would want documents read out on a more-or-less regular basis. (Even when Phoebe wasn't around.) 

So, in the case of Romans, is it more likely that the Roman house churches would have a dedicated reader who would read the letter, or that the letter carrier would perform that function? I don't see how it's better than a 50-50 proposition in favor of the letter carrier. 

It does turn out, though, that there is somewhat more evidence (more than zero) from ancient letters that the letter carrier could be expected to provide a bit of commentary additional to the letter. What sort of evidence? And what sort of commentary? This post is already too long, so I'll save that discussion for tomorrow.