2 Timothy 4:13 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

The cloak Perhaps the toga which belonged to him as a Roman citizen, or an upper garment, which might be needful as winter came on. The word φαιλονη, however, so rendered, also signifies a bag, in which sense the Syriac translator understood it, paraphrasing the expression, a bag containing books; or a kind of portmanteau, the contents of which might be more important than the thing itself. Which I left at Troas with Carpus Who was probably his host there; when thou comest bring with thee, and the books, especially the parchments What the books here referred to were, commentators nave not attempted to conjecture: but Dr. Benson fancies the parchments were the letters which he received from the churches, and the autographs of his own letters to the churches. For that he employed persons to transcribe his letters is probable from Romans 16:22, where the name of the amanuensis of that epistle is inserted. In those fair copies the apostle wrote the salutations with his own hand, (1 Corinthians 16:21; Galatians 6:11; Col 4:18; 2 Thessalonians 3:17,) and thereby authenticated them as his letters.