Did Phoebe Interpret Romans?

Continuing with yesterday's theme. 

A new commentary on Romans from a major New Testament scholar explains (in the midst of its 15-page discussion of Phoebe).

Phoebe would have been able to provide the recipients in Rome with further information, for instance, on the complex theological contents of the letter. In antiquity, the recipients commonly expected the letter carrier to convey additional news or information. [Here he cites Richards 2004: 183; see below.] This has occasionally been mentioned in such letters. [Citing P.Col. 3.6; and Epp 1991; see below.] Phoebe would then have been in the position of negotiating the complex issues advanced by the letter in a manner typical for the ancient world. She would have answered questions in case something remained unclear; she would have added her own Midrashic comments to passages if they were too lengthy or too concise or too complicated. (Christian Eberhart 2025: 328–29). 

Hmm. What are the chances that anything remained unclear for the people who first heard Romans read aloud? Has anyone ever thought after reading Romans that the letter was too complicated? 

Uh, yes. Like, everyone ever. I have 100% confidence that after a first reading of Romans some things would have remained unclear. 

And Phoebe was the one to solve the problems. 

I love how Eberhart says that in thus providing theological commentary to Paul's densest treatise, Phoebe would have been acting "in a manner typical for the ancient world." 

Oh, yeah, for sure. This kind of thing happened all the time. Letter carriers would deliver theological treatises to the intended recipients and then would explain anything unclear in the treatise. We have loads of evidence for this. 

You want to know what the evidence is? 

Here we need to go back to that Peter Head article from 2009 that everyone cites now about ancient letter carriers.

Head (p. 283) says that out of the 450 letters published in the Oxyrhynchus series, a hundred of them provide some information about their delivery. 

I noted last time that Head was unable to find any direct evidence that the letter carrier was also the letter reader. "We did not find any evidence that any particular letter-carrier was also expected to read the letter aloud to the recipient" (297). 

But Head did find some evidence that "the letter-carrier can have an important role in the communication process, in supplementing verbally material that appears in written form in the letter, continuing or extending the conversation of the letter" (289–90). I think this is the evidence that has led some people to suggest that Phoebe may have provided theological commentary on Paul's letter. So let's look at what evidence Head has uncovered. 

Head's examples include: P.Oxy. 2.296 (here); P.Oxy. 59.3990 (here); P.Oxy. 10.1295 (here); P.Oxy. 6.937 (here); P.Oxy. 34.2727 (here; image); P.Oxy. 14.1679 (here); P.Oxy. 51.3644 (here); P.Oxy. 56.3853 (here). I'll let you, dear reader, work through those papyri yourself, or get Head's article to see what he makes of them. The links provided in this paragraph take you to transcriptions for each of the papyri, and English translations for about half of them. 

A further section of Head's article (pp. 291–96) examines three letters that demonstrate that "the role of the letter-carrier was not exhausted by the physical delivery of the letter, but the letter-carrier had an important role in continuing or supplementing the conversation initiated (or at least expressed) by the written letter" (296). 

The examples (for which Head provides a complete translation) are the following: 

1. P.Oxy. 1.113 (second century; here; image). This letter seems to have been carried by two men, who both had additional duties mentioned in the letter aside from delivering the letter. For example, the letter says: "Take care that Onnophris [one of the letter carriers] buys me what Irene's mother told him." 
2. P.Oxy. 46.3313 (second century; here; image). "Serapas will tell you about the roses—that I have made every effort to send you as many as you wanted, but we could not find them." Head (p. 294) comments: "In this way Sarapas is expected to be able to supplement the emphasis of the letter itself with his own testimony about the crucial point: the problem of the roses." 
3. P.Oxy.49.3505 (second century? here; image). Head (p. 295) comments: "Alongside the letter [Didymus] will be able to declare the exact number of sheepskins that he has brought. This immediately suggests that Papontos regards him as a trusted courier...." 

How does this evidence relate to Paul's letters? According to Head, "The papyrological evidence surveyed here supports the further idea that in the Pauline tradition the accredited letter-carriers functioned not only as personal private postmen, but as personal mediators of Paul's authoritative instruction to his churches, and as the earliest interpreters of the individual letters. They related the specific material in their letter to what they knew of Pauline teaching more generally" (298). 

I am skeptical. (If you haven't already picked up on that.) 

I see that letter carriers were sometimes expected to perform basic tasks in addition to carrying the letter. They were expected to explain some things mentioned in the letter, like why so few roses were sent along with the letter. I find it interesting that we know letter carriers sometimes did this because it is mentioned in the letter. 

Also, letter carriers could be expected to provide details about the situation of the author of the letter (cf. Eph 6:21; Col 4:7). Richards (2004: 183–84) cites several examples, mostly from Cicero, in which this role of the letter carrier is mentioned in the letter: P.Col. 3.6 (here; see the last line); P.Mich 8.492 (here); Cicero, Fam. 4.2.1 (plus many more Ciceronian examples). The upshot is that we have evidence that carriers often provided news about the sender. 

Theological commentary strikes me as a completely different thing. 

Reporting the number of sheepskins transported is one thing. Explaining the Pauline doctrine of Justification is another. 

Maybe Phoebe did this, of course. Maybe Paul discussed the contents of the letter with Phoebe before she traveled to Rome. Maybe Phoebe contributed to the composition of certain passages in the letter. Maybe she read it aloud to the various house churches in Rome. Maybe she answered theological questions arising from that reading. 

But we shouldn't pretend that we have evidence for any of this. Neither the Oxyrhynchus papri nor any other collection of ancient letters suggest that the role imagined for Phoebe in the previous paragraph was typical for letter carriers in antiquity. 

The Oxyrhynchus letters (at least, the ones highlighted by Head 2009) are uniformly personal and not communal, not in any way philosophical or theological treatises. So they are not close parallels to Paul's letters. But certainly there is no evidence I have seen from Oxyrhynchus that the letter carriers were empowered to explain the theology of the author of the letter

The only evidence I have seen that a letter carrier probably had a larger role (larger than the roles mentioned in Head's examples from Oxyrhynchus) having to do with the reception of the letter involves another major early Christian treatise, 1 Clement, and I quote here the very end of another article by Peter Head (2015). 

Although it does not appear to be understood that they [the letter carriers of 1 Clement] would have read the letter themselves (since they are not mentioned until the very end of the letter [= 63:3–4; 65:1]), it is understood that they would be present in Corinth for the hearing and reception of the letter—in fact they are an integral part of the communication process between the two churches, and would have been understood as essential to gaining a successful reception of the epistle (from the Roman perspective). (Head, p. 493)

These inferences about the role of the letter carriers of 1 Clement arise from a reading of the letter itself. Is anything similar suggested for the carrier of Paul's letter to the Romans? Or have scholars recently imagined a large role for Phoebe because they think that letter carriers typically performed such tasks? My impression is that the latter is the case, and that evidence for that view is lacking. That doesn't mean Phoebe didn't perform the tasks imagined by scholars recently, but it does mean that we do not have evidence for it. 

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence—or evidence of any other kind. 

The comments of Paul S. Minnear seem to me to say just about what we can say about Phoebe's mission: "It is likely that she carried the letter with her. It is therefore possible that she also had oral instructions for securing specific help for Paul from the recipients of the letter" (p. 6). 

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. 

Ehrman on Didymus on 2 Peter

Just a note to register my confusion over a comment in Bart D. Ehrman, Lost Christianities (2003). Yes, it's a 20-year-old book, and it's a bit sensationalistic, but it's also helpful in some ways. There is a chapter late in the book on the formation of the New Testament canon (ch. 11). Ehrman mentions Athanasius, and then explains that Athanasius did not settle the matter, partly because there continued to be disagreements, even in Alexandria. 

For example, the famous teacher of the late-fourth-century Alexandria, Didymus the Blind, claimed that 2 Peter was a 'forgery' that was not to be included in the canon. Moreover, Didymus quoted other books, including the Shepherd of Hermas and the Epistle of Barnabas, as scriptural authorities. (pp. 230–31) 

Ehrman's endnote references Metzger pp. 213–14—which is strange for two reasons. First, it is Ehrman himself who has written the classic article on the biblical canon of Didymus the Blind (1983), so I expected him to cite himself rather than Metzger's general treatment of the development of the New Testament canon. Second, Metzger does not seem to support Ehrman's claim about Didymus' treatment of 2 Peter. 

It is noteworthy that more than once Didymus quotes from 2 Peter as altogether authentic and authoritative. This circumstance requires reassessment of a statement made in a commentary on the seven Catholic Epistles heretofore commonly attributed to Didymus, a work now extant only in a Latin translation. In connection with a discussion of 2 Peter iii.5–8, a passage which does not suit the author, he says flatly: 'It is therefore not to be overlooked that the present Epistle is forged, which, though it is read publicly [in the churches], is nevertheless not in the canon.' (Metzger, p. 213)

In the footnote, Metzger provides the Latin for the quoted portion of the commentary, and then the reference: PG 39.1742a. (Metzger actually cites PL, but the correct citation is PG.)  

So, Ehrman (2003) says unproblematically that Didymus the Blind considered 2 Peter a forgery, and to substantiate the statement, he cites Metzger's discussion, which problematizes the notion that Didymus considered 2 Peter a forgery. Hmm. 

On the next page, Metzger cites Ehrman's classic article mentioned earlier. What does Ehrman (1983) say about the way Didymus treated 2 Peter? Ehrman (1983) mentions 2 Peter first on the opening page of the article: "occasionally a Latin commentary, presumed to be a translation of Didymus's work on the Catholic epistles, is quoted to show that he, at least, rejected 2 Peter" (p. 1). The endnote cites Westcott p. 448. This statement from Ehrman (1983) certainly sounds less confident than Ehrman (2003). 

Ehrman (1983) next addresses 2 Peter starting on p. 9. 

One of the most puzzling matters of this investigation has already been alluded to—the explicit claim, allegedly made by Didymus, that 2 Peter is a forgery and does not belong in the canon. This claim is found in a Latin commentary that, since its discovery in the sixteenth century, has often been thought to be that referred to by Cassiodorus (sixth century), namely, Epiphanius's translation of Didymus's work on the Catholic epistles (both the original Greek commentary and its translation having been lost for centuries). (Ehrman 1983, p. 9)

Ehrman doesn't give the exact reference to Cassiodorus, which is Institutes 1.8.6.  

The discussion of 2 Peter now continues for a couple pages in Ehrman (1983). He first collects the citations in the Tura commentaries of Didymus that show our author relying on 2 Peter and considering it genuine. "Several times in these exegetical works he affirms both the Petrine authorship of the epistle and its rightful place in the NT canon" (Ehrman 1983, p. 10). What about the Latin commentary? "Clearly it was written by someone other than Didymus." 

Ehrman (1983) concludes this discussion: "Contrary to the claims of several textbooks on the NT, this shows that Didymus himself did not reject either the genuineness or the canonicity of 2 Peter" (p. 11). 

So, what happened between Ehrman (1983) and Ehrman (2003)? 

I do not intend to do any sort of survey of Ehrman's intermediate works for the purposes of identifying a development in his views, nor a survey of his post-2003 publications that might have bearing on the matter. I merely note the oddity in Ehrman's oeuvre.