House churches and named households (16:3–16)

Says Romans 16:3–16 greets Prisca and Aquila, fellow workers who “have risked their lives for me,” “the church that meets at their house,” and others, including Andronicus and Junia, who “are outstanding among the apostles” and “were in Christ before I was” (Rom 16:3–7, BSB).

Implies Prisca and Aquila are the couple named in Acts 18 and 1 Cor 16:19, where a church meets in their house. That identifies the pair, not the whole list.

Lightfoot and Sanday and Headlam take the household of Aristobulus (16:10), not improbably, as that of Herod’s grandson, perhaps later in the imperial household, and that of Narcissus as the household of the freedman executed early under Nero (Philippians, 1903, pp. 174–175; Sanday and Headlam, pp. 425–426). These remain their proposals. See the Philippians note on Caesar’s household.

Implies Printed Ἰουνίαν naturally reads as a woman, Junia. The masculine Junias, with another accent, is the alternative; Sanday and Headlam prefer it if the pair are counted among the apostles (pp. 422–423). See the Greek note.

Uncertain ἐπίσημοι ἐν τοῖς ἀποστόλοις (episēmoi en tois apostolois) means either “outstanding among the apostles” (BSB) or “well known to the apostles”; if the first, the apostles may be the Twelve or a wider circle. No lean is taken here.

Uncertain Whether some or all of these greetings first belonged to another letter, often to Ephesus, is open. Grounds offered include the list’s length and Asia rather than Achaia at 16:5 (SBLGNT Ἀσίας; Byzantine Ἀχαΐας). No lean is taken here.