TIMOTHY or TIMOTHEUS in the New Testament was one of the younger companions of the Apostle Paul. He was connected with Lystra in Lycaonia, born of a pagan father and of a Jewish mother called Eunice, his grandmother being also a Christian. When the apostle came across him at home, he was still uncircumcised, but a full member of the church at Lystra (Acts xvi. if., 2 Tim. i. 5f.). As the defection of Barnabas and Mark had left St. Paul alone, he took Timotheus with him as a colleague, first of all circumcising him out of respect to the prejudices of the communities in which he was to do mission work. This was a matter of convenience, not of principle. He accompanied St. Paul and Silas to Europe, where he was em ployed by them on various missions, especially among the Mace donian churches which he helped to found. But Corinth as well as Thessalonica and Philippi drew out his activities as an "apostle" in the wider sense of the term (2 Cor. i. 19, etc.). From Corinth he
appears to have accompanied the apostle to Ephesus and Asia Minor (Acts xix. 22, I Cor. xvi. Io seq.). He is then associated with St. Paul in his imprisonment, as the collocation of his name in the titles of Colossians, Philemon and Philippians indicates, whether that imprisonment was at Rome or elsewhere. In the Pastoral Epistles (q.v.) he is absent from his chief, in charge of work at Ephesus, and there is a notice of him in Hebrews 23), which chronicles his release from imprisonment, though there is no clue to its date or place. Tradition, probably based on in ferences from the New Testament, made him bishop of Ephesus, where it is said he was martyred under Domitian, one legend asserting that he was clubbed to death by the mob for protesting against the orgies of Artemis worship. The Greek martyrology celebrates his death on Jan. 22, the Latin on Jan. 24. (J. MoF.)