Onesimus

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title: "Onesimus" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1st-century-byzantine-bishops", "1st-century-christian-martyrs", "1st-century-romans", "68-deaths", "christian-slaves-and-freedmen", "christian-saints-from-the-new-testament", "people-in-the-pauline-epistles", "saints-from-roman-anatolia", "year-of-birth-unknown", "bishops-of-ephesus", "imperial-roman-slaves-and-freedmen", "people-from-colossae", "epistle-to-the-colossians", "epistle-to-philemon", "christian-abolitionists"] description: "Christian saint mentioned in the New Testament" topic_path: "society/religion" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onesimus" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Christian saint mentioned in the New Testament ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox saint"]

Field	Value
feast_day	15 February (formerly 16 February in the West)
venerated_in	Catholic Church
Eastern Orthodox Church
Oriental Orthodox Church
Lutheranism
image	File:Onesimus and Philemon.jpg
imagesize	220
caption	Decorated initial with Paul, Onesimus (delivering letter) and Philemon
death_place	Rome (then Roman province)
::

::callout[type=note] the biblical figure ::

| feast_day = 15 February (formerly 16 February in the West) | venerated_in = Catholic Church Eastern Orthodox Church Oriental Orthodox Church Lutheranism | image = File:Onesimus and Philemon.jpg | imagesize = 220 | caption = Decorated initial with Paul, Onesimus (delivering letter) and Philemon | death_place = Rome (then Roman province) Onesimus (, meaning "useful") was a Christian mentioned in the New Testament. He was a slave to Philemon, a Christian, and is the subject of Paul's Epistle to Philemon.

He may also be the same Onesimus mentioned by Ignatius of Antioch (died ) as bishop in Ephesus. Eastern Orthodox tradition also list an Onesimus as the third bishop of Byzantium.

In the New Testament

The name "Onesimus" appears in two of Paul's epistles. The Epistle to Philemon was written by Paul the Apostle to Philemon concerning a runaway slave named Onesimus. Onesimus turned up where Paul was imprisoned (Rome or Caesarea Maritima) to escape punishment for a theft of which he was accused. After hearing the Gospel from Paul, Onesimus converted to Christianity. Paul, having earlier converted Philemon to Christianity, sought to reconcile the two by writing the letter to Philemon which today exists in the New Testament. The letter reads (in 1:10-16):

In this passage Paul is offering a subtle and implicit wordplay on the name of Philemon’s runaway slave Onesimus Ὀνήσιμος (“Useful”) by referring to him as “the one once useless (ἄχρηστος) to you, but now useful (εὔχρηστος) [both] to you and to me.” Paul follows this wordplay up a few verses later (Phlm 20) with a figura etymologica on Onesimus’s name: in his exclamation to Philemon—ἐγώ σου ὀναίμην “may I gain some use from you”—he uses a rare verbal form of the word at the root of Onesimus’s name, ὀνίνημι, which is attested only here in the New Testament. By “gaining some use” (ὀναίμην) Paul means that he wishes to gain the services of “Mr. Useful” (Ὀνήσιμος).

In the Epistle to the Colossians 4:9 a person of this name is identified as a Christian accompanying Tychicus to visit the Christians in Colossae; nothing else is stated about him in this context. He may well be the freed Onesimus from the Epistle to Philemon.

In tradition

He may also be the same Onesimus named by Ignatius of Antioch (died ) as bishop in Ephesus In his Epistle written to the Ephesians while on his way to be executed in Rome, Ignatius wrote:

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/Onesimus_of_Byzantium_(Menologion_of_Basil_II).jpg" caption="1000}} AD)"] ::

Onesimus must have accepted episcopal see of Ephesus following Saint Timothy. If so, Onesimus went from slave to brother to bishop. According to Tradition), Onesimus was imprisoned and may have been martyred by stoning (some sources claim he was beheaded). Given that Ignatius of Antioch died under Emperor Trajan (97-117), Onesimus's death more likely fell under that Emperor as well.

The 4th-century Apostolic Constitutions (VII, 46) mention Onesimus as the first bishop of Beroea in Macedonia.

Eastern Orthodox tradition also list an Onesimus as the third bishop of Byzantium, dating his reign from 54 to 68 AD. However, the authenticity of the first 25 bishops of Byzantium are met with skepticism by scholars as "there is no evidence of any significant Christian community at Byzantium before Metrophanes of Byzantium". | honorific-prefix = Saint | name = Onesimus of Byzantium | patriarch_of = Bishop of Byzantium | image = St.Onesimus.jpg | image_size = 220 | caption = Saint Onesimus | ordination = | consecration = | enthroned = 54 AD | ended = 68 AD | province = | diocese = | see = | church = | predecessor = Stachys the Apostle | successor = Polycarpus I of Byzantium | birth_name = | birth_date = | birth_place = | death_date = AD | death_place = | buried = | nationality = | religion = Christianity

Veneration

Onesimus is regarded as a saint by many Christian denominations.

Catholic Church

The traditional Western commemoration of Onesimus is on 16 February. But in the 2004 edition of the Roman Martyrology, Onesimus is listed under 15 February. There, he is described as "[a] runaway slave, whom the apostle Paul received to the faith of Christ while in prison, regarding him as a son of whom he had become father, as he himself wrote to Philemon, Onesimus's master".

Eastern Orthodox Church

The Eastern Orthodox Church commemorates Onesimus on a variety of dates:

• 15 February: Primary Feast Day;
• 4 January: Synaxis of the Seventy Apostles.
• 6 July: The Apostles Philemon, Archippus, and Onesimus.
• 22 November: The Apostles Philemon, Archippus, Onesimus, and equal-to-the-apostles Apphia.

Lutheran Churches

The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod commemorates him and Philemon on 15 February.

References

1. "Philemon 1:15-16".
2. (17 July 2009). "Onesimus – 'n wegloopslaaf? Oor die ontstaansituasie van die Filemonbrief". Verbum et Ecclesia.
3. "The Letter to Philemon", [[Joseph Fitzmyer]], S.J.; paragraph 5, pages 869–870, ''The New Jerome Biblical Commentary'', 1989, Geoffrey Chapman
4. "Saint Onesimus at SQPN website".
5. [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Philemon%201:10–16;&version=47; Christian Bible - Philemon verses 19–16]
6. Reece, Steve. (2025). "Wordplay on Proper Names in Luke-Acts". E.J. Brill.
7. [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Colossians+4&version=NIV Christian Bible: Colossians 4:9]
8. This identification is questioned by [[Joseph Fitzmyer]] SJ, "The Letter to Philemon"; paragraph 4, ''The New Jerome Biblical Commentary'', 1989, Geoffrey Chapman
9. Ignatius of Antioch. (1919). "The Epistles of St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch". [[Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge]].
10. [http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0104.htm The Epistle of Ignatius to the Ephesians]
11. http://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=4908
12. [https://www.oca.org/saints/lives/2018/02/15/100526-apostle-onesimus-of-the-seventy "Apostle Onesimus of the Seventy", OCA]
13. https://ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf07/anf07/Page_478.html
14. "Onesimus". Ecumenic Patriarchate of Constantinople.
15. Limberis, Vasiliki. (2002). "Divine Heiress - The Virgin Mary and the Making of Christian Constantinople". [[Routledge]].
16. Livingstone (2000), p. 414
17. ''Martyrologium Romanum'', 2004, [[Holy See Press Office. Vatican Press]] (Typis Vaticanis), p. 150.
18. "Lives of all saints commemorated on 15 February".
19. "Lives of all saints commemorated on 4 January".
20. "Calendar: 6 July".
21. "Lives of all saints commemorated on 22 November".
22. Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod, ''Lutheran Worship'', [[Concordia Publishing House]], 1982, updated by the same church's ''Lutheran Service Book'', [[Concordia Publishing House]], 2006.

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