but I preferred to do nothing without your consent in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion but of your own free will.

χωρὶς δὲ τῆς σῆς γνώμης οὐδὲν ἠθέλησα ποιῆσαι, ἵνα μὴ ὡς κατὰ ἀνάγκην τὸ ἀγαθόν σου ᾖ ἀλλὰ κατὰ ἑκούσιον.

Early Fathers

John Chrysostom (349-407)

Homilies on Philemon

Ver. 14. But without your mind, he says, would I do nothing; that your benefit should not be, as it were, of necessity, but willingly.

This particularly flatters the person asked, when the thing being profitable in itself, it is brought out with his concurrence. For two good effects are produced thence, the one person gains, and the other is rendered more secure. And he has not said, That it should not be of necessity, but as it were of necessity. For I knew, he says, that not having learned it, but coming to know it at once, you would not have been angry, but nevertheless out of an excess of consideration, that it should not be as it were of necessity.

[For moral, see Phm 1:16]

Later Commentaries

George Leo Haydock (1774-1849)

Haydock Catholic Bible Commentary: Philemon

Do thou receive him as my own bowels. That is, as myself. Perhaps by the permission of God's providence (who never permits evil, but for some greater good) he departed from thee for a little while, that thou mightest receive him for ever, being now after his conversion in a way of being made partaker with thee of the same eternal happiness. Wi.