Romans 16:21

Timotheus my work fellow,.... Now follow the salutations of the friends and companions of the apostle: we may imagine that when this epistle was just concluding, that these his friends being about him, one said, pray send my Christian salutation to our dear friends at Rome, so said a second, and likewise a third, and so on, and Timotheus he began. This is the same person with Timothy, a disciple the apostle met with at Derbe, whose father was a Greek, and his mother a Jewess, and a believer in Christ. This same man he circumcised because of the Jews, and took him along with him, and was his companion in his travels, and very assisting to him in the work of the ministry, in spreading the Gospel, and promoting the interest of Jesus Christ; and therefore he here calls him his "work fellow"; he wrote two epistles to him afterwards when at a distance front him, in which he often calls him his son, his dear and well beloved son, having a great affection for him, because as a son with a father he served with him in the Gospel of Christ:

and Lucius, and Jason, and Sosipater my kinsmen salute you. This Lucius was either Lucius of Cyrene, who was one of the prophets in the church at Antioch, Acts 13:1, though indeed he is never said to travel with the apostle, or to be at Corinth, from whence this epistle was written; or rather, therefore, as others think, Luke the evangelist, who was a constant companion of the apostle, and was at Corinth with him at this time, as appears from Acts 20:5; Jason no doubt is he of Thessalonica, that received Paul and Silas into his house, and when an uproar was made concerning them, was brought before the rulers of the city, and gave security for them, Acts 17:5. This is a Jewish name, and he himself was a Jew, as is clear from his being a kinsman of the apostle's; his name was ישוע, "Jeshua" or "Jesus"; so we read of one Jason, the brother of Onias the high priest of the Jews,

"But after the death of Seleucus, when Antiochus, called Epiphanes, took the kingdom, Jason the brother of Onias laboured underhand to be high priest,'' (2 Maccabees 4:7)

and whose name, as Josephus a relates, was Jesus, but he chose to be called Jason, very likely because that was a name among the Greeks, whose fashions he was fond of. Sosipater was Sopater of Berea, who, with others, accompanied the apostle into Asia, Acts 20:4; he also was a Jew, and his Jewish name, as Grotius conjectures, might be Abisha, or rather Abishua, the name of the son of Phinehas the high priest, 1 Chronicles 6:4. Mention is also made of one of this name, Sosipater, in

"12. Howbeit Dositheus and Sosipater, who were of Maccabeus' captains, went forth, and slew those that Timotheus had left in the fortress, above ten thousand men. 24. Moreover Timotheus himself fell into the hands of Dositheus and Sosipater, whom he besought with much craft to let him go with his life, because he had many of the Jews' parents, and the brethren of some of them, who, if they put him to death, should not be regarded.'' (2 Maccabees 12:12,24)

These three last were Paul's kinsmen after the flesh, as well as in the spirit; being of the same nation, and perhaps of the same tribe, and it may be of the same family; they are all three mentioned among the severity disciples: Lucius is said to be bishop of Laodicea in Syria, Jason of Tarsus, and Sosipater of Iconium;

Luke 10:1.

a Antiqu. l. 12. c. 5. sect. 1.