Paul the aged (Paulov presbuthv). Paul is called neaniav (a young man) at the stoning of Stephen (Acts 7:58). He was perhaps a bit under sixty now. Hippocrates calls a man presbuthv from 49 to 56 and gerwn after that. The papyri use presbuthv for old man as in Luke 1:18 of Zacharias and in Titus 2:2. But in Ephesians 6:20 Paul says presbeuw en alusei (I am an ambassador in a chain). Hence Lightfoot holds that here presbuthv = presbeuthv because of common confusion by the scribes between u and eu. In the LXX four times the two words are used interchangeably. There is some confusion also in the papyri and the inscriptions. Undoubtedly ambassador (presbeuthv) is possible here as in Ephesians 6:20 (presbeuw) though there is no real reason why Paul should not term himself properly "Paul the aged."
Other Robertson's Word Pictures (NT) entries containing Philemon 1:9:
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