From: perry.stepp@chrysalis.org
Date: Wed Jul 10 1996 - 12:06:53 EDT
May I request a point of clarification for those of us who didn't drink their
coffee this morning?
> the office early in the second century. The context of Romans 16 is
> important here. Help is asked for her should she need it and the
> reason given is that that she has become a helper for many others. The
> word for helper is PROSTATIS, a guardian, a protectress, a patroness. She
> seems to have rendered significant service in an official capacity in
> Cenchrea. I would say that if the word DIAKONON is not the office, we
> probably do not have the office in the NT.
Dr. Winbery, I'm not sure I understand that last sentence. Are you referring
to the specific use of DIAKONON in Rom 16, or the various uses of DIAKONON here
and elsewhere?
Also (and only tangentially related to this discussion), what about the
patroness role in the early church? We read of wealthy women in *other*
Hellenistic religious settings who sponsored religious groups: what of wealthy
women in the church who did the same? And how would that relate to any
discussion of deaconesses, if it relates at all?
Grace and peace,
Perry L. Stepp, Baylor University
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