Person
Onesimus
Mentioned in 2 verses across 2 books, first in Colossians 4:9. The verses below are the ones linked to this person (the Theographic dataset, with our sourced corrections).
In the Bible
All 2 verses, in Bible order. Text from the Berean Standard Bible; verse numbers follow the KJV.
Colossians
- Colossians 4:9
With him I am sending Onesimus, our faithful and beloved brother, who is one of you. They will tell you about everything here.
Philemon
- Philemon 1:10
I appeal to you for my child Onesimus, whose father I became while I was in chains.
Dictionary
From Easton’s Bible Dictionary (1897), as attached to this record by Theographic. The entry is for the name and can describe more than one person who bore it. Easton wrote in 1897, and some of his views are now debated.
Read Easton’s entry
Useful, a slave who, after robbing his master Philemon (q.v.) at Colosse, fled to Rome, where he was converted by the apostle Paul, who sent him back to his master with the epistle which bears his name. In it he beseeches Philemon to receive his slave as a “faithful and beloved brother.” Paul offers to pay to Philemon anything his slave had taken, and to bear the wrong he had done him. He was accompanied on his return by Tychicus, the bearer of the Epistle to the Colossians (Philemon 1:16, 18).
The story of this fugitive Colossian slave is a remarkable evidence of the freedom of access to the prisoner which was granted to all, and “a beautiful illustration both of the character of St. Paul and the transfiguring power and righteous principles of the gospel.”