Paul is apparently inconsistent about the status of women. In his seven authentic letters, various women are named as office holders: amid the large number of people whom he lists as sending greetings to the Romans are Phoebe the deacon (administrative officer or assistant) in the Church of Cenchreae (a port near Corinth), Prisca, a ‘fellow worker’ and Tryphaena and Tryphosa, ‘workers in the Lord’ – descriptions also applied to men in the same passage. Most strikingly, there is Junia, a female ‘apostle’, so described alongside another ‘apostle’ with a male name – this was considered such an
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