CAESAR’s HOUSEHOLD (οἰκία Καισαρος). The imperial staff composed of both slaves and freemen.

The expression is used by the Apostle Paul (Phil 4:22), “All the saints greet you, especially those of Caesar’s household.” The term was used with wide meaning. Thus Josephus (Antiq. XVII. v. 8) described one of the slaves of Tiberius’ wife, Julia. It was more commonly applied to the imperial civil service, usually at Rome, but also throughout the empire, particularly in the imperial provinces. Thus Philo (In Flacc. 35) says, “If Agrippa had not been a king, but instead one of Caesar’s household, would he not have had some privilege or honor?”

Scholars have argued that since Paul’s greeting from the household of Caesar could refer to places other than Rome, the Epistle to the Philippians could have been written while he was imprisoned elsewhere. Ephesus and Caesarea have been suggested. Lightfoot has shown that the imperial household of Nero’s time was very large and could easily have included converts to Christianity. He has also shown that in the columbaria of the imperial household there is a high frequency of the occurrence of names which coincide with the names of Romans 16. From this it can be said that there is at least a good possibility that Rome was the place from which Paul wrote Philippians.

Bibliography J. B. Lightfoot, Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians (1903), 171-178.