the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Bible Dictionaries
Tychicus
Fausset's Bible Dictionary
or Acts 20:4. Paul's companion and fellow labourer in the gospel (Acts 20:4); accompanied him in part on his return journey from the third missionary circuit; "of Asia." Trophimus went forward with Paul to Jerusalem (Acts 21:29), but Tychicus stayed behind in Asia, perhaps at Miletus (Acts 20:15; Acts 20:38). With Paul again in his first Roman imprisonment: Colossians 4:7-8, "a (Greek the, the article marks that Tychicus was well known to them) beloved (in relation to the Christian community) brother and a faithful minister (in missionary services) and fellow servant in the Lord (in serving the same Master)."
Paul marks his high sense of the faithful and sympathetic character of Tychicus by his commission: "whom I have sent ... that he might know your estate (rather as the Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, and Alexandrinus manuscripts 'that YE may know OUR state,' compare Colossians 4:7; Ephesians 6:22) and comfort your hearts," distressed by my imprisonment as well as by your own trials. Tychicus, being an Asiatic himself, fitly carried both the epistles to the Asiatic Ephesians and Colossians, and Philemon; but was not a Colossian as Onesimus, for of the latter alone Paul says "who is one of you" (Colossians 4:9). If the epistle to the Ephesians be a circular letter Tychicus (the only person alluded to throughout the epistle) would be a fit person to see it read.
In Titus 3:12 Paul proposes to send Artonus or Tychicus (from Corinth or else Ephesus, where Tychicus was with Paul) to take Titus' place (which his past services to Paul in the neighbouring Asia qualified him for) at Crete, and so to set Titus free to join Paul at Nicopolis. In 2 Timothy 4:12, in his second Roman imprisonment, Paul says "Tychicus I have sent to Ephesus," implying "I need one profitable for the ministry; I had one in Tychicus, but he is gone" (Ellicott). Others make Paul send Tychicus ("I am herewith sending Tychicus to Ephesus") to take Timothy's place there as president of the church. Tradition made Tychicus subsequently bishop of Chalcedon. Some make Tychicus the first "brother" in 2 Corinthians 8:16-24, and Trophimus the other. Luke seems more probably the former, as "his praise in the Gospel" as Paul's companion was "throughout all the churches." If Tychicus be meant, remarkable integrity will be among his prominent graces.
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Fausset, Andrew R. Entry for 'Tychicus'. Fausset's Bible Dictionary. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/fbd/t/tychicus.html. 1949.
