Apelles

Apelles, whose name means exclusion or separation, is a Christian at Rome greeted by Paul in Romans 16:10 with the commendation that he is “approved in Christ”—a phrase suggesting a man whose faith had been tested and found genuine, perhaps through suffering or persecution. No further biographical details are provided in the New Testament, and he is not mentioned elsewhere in Scripture.

The name Apelles was common in the Greco-Roman world, known especially from the famous Greek painter of the fourth century B.C., and was also used by Jews in the diaspora. Some early church traditions, without strong historical basis, identify the Apelles of Romans 16 with one of the seventy disciples sent out by Jesus or with a bishop of Smyrna or Heracleia. His brief mention alongside other believers in the Roman church illustrates the diverse community of Jews and Gentiles that had gathered in Rome before Paul's arrival.