“Oh! how great is the devotion (philosophia) of this woman, that she should be even…”
Oh! how great is the devotion (philosophia) of this woman, that she should be even counted worthy of the appellation of apostle!
John Chrysostom · Homilies on the Epistle to the Romans · NPNF1 XI, Homilies on the Epistle to the Romans, Homily XXXI (on Rom. XVI. 5 ff.), at Rom. XVI. 7
Reading Paul's greeting to Andronicus and Junia, Chrysostom takes Junia for a woman and is astonished that a woman is called an apostle. It is the decisive ancient witness on a verse modern editors have read both ways.
How this is known
These words were matched, word for word, against this project’s own copy of the volume cited.
Verbatim in the volume this project holds, checked against its bytes at Homily XXXI on Romans. The reading is Chrysostom's own and not his translators': the NPNF reviser prints a note against it in the same volume, calling the masculine Junias the more probable and adding that a woman apostle is 'out of the question'. An ancient reading its own modern editor argues with is not one the edition supplied.
Read in Morris & Simcox, NPNF series 1 vol. 11 (1889) · J. B. Morris and W. H. Simcox, revised by George B. Stevens
Also by
- John Chrysostom every saying recorded of this person, and their page