despotēs

δεσπότης is the classical and Hellenistic term for the owner of slaves and, by extension, for the holder of unqualified authority (LSJ s.v.), standing in fixed correlation with δοῦλος and οἰκέτης. Papyri and inscriptions of the Roman period attest it both as the ordinary designation of a slave owner and as an honorific for rulers (Moulton and Milligan). The Septuagint had already extended it to God, notably in the vocative κύριε δέσποτα rendering אֲדֹנָי יְהוִה, and in Hellenistic Jewish writers such as Philo and Josephus it is a favored title for God as absolute sovereign and creator; Rengstorf's TDNT article traces this development and its relation to κύριος. The ten New Testament occurrences divide evenly: the household use (1 Timothy 6:1, 2; Titus 2:9; 1 Peter 2:18, and, within the imagery of the great house, 2 Timothy 2:21, so BDAG) and the divine use (Luke 2:29; Acts 4:24; Revelation 6:10; 2 Peter 2:1; Jude 4). Whether the δεσπότης of 2 Peter 2:1 and Jude 4 is God the Father or Christ is exegetically debated; the redemptive ἀγοράσαντα of 2 Peter 2:1 tells in favor of Christ, and Bauckham argues the christological reading for both, while the text of Jude 4 is further complicated by the secondary addition of θεόν after δεσπότην in part of the manuscript tradition.