Hymn of Philippians 2

Philippians, 2:5-11 - Revised English Bible

Take to heart among ourselves what you find in Christ Jesus;
He was in the form of God, yet he laid no claim to equality with God,
But made himself nothing, assuming the form of a slave.
Bearing the human likeness, sharing the human lot,
he humbled himself and was obedient, even to the point of death,
Death on a cross.
Therefore God raised him to the heights and bestowed on him the name above all names,
That at the Name of Jesus every knee should bow -
in heaven, on earth, and in the depths -
and ever tongue acclaim, Jesus Christ is Lord!
To the glory of God the Father.

There are various scholarly opinions regarding the origin of the hymn which Paul presents here - yet it seems clear that its elements, including the "Jesus Christ is Lord" acclamation, were liturgical. It continues to amaze me, considering that this epistle was written not long after Jesus had walked the earth, how often the Church can grasp wondrous revelation in its worship, before it could be expressed 'logically,' if indeed that latter is fully possible at all. Yes, I know it is popular today to say that Paul had no concept of Jesus' divinity, or to note that Jesus never spoke of himself as divine. (I'm too practical at heart, I suppose. Jesus could hardly have referred explicitly to divinity before the resurrection. Nor could 1st century Jews have been told "I am God," which could not have been comprehended before Christ's Church had an awareness of the Trinity.) Paul's use of the reference to Jesus' name and to every knee bowing, every tongue swearing, cannot have only an accidental similarity to Isaiah 45 - this is a reference to God Himself.

I believe it was Thomas Aquinas who, in treating of divine grace, would aptly comment that the gift is bestowed according to the manner of the recipient. I often envy the simplicity of those who approach God as a loving Father - and who are comfortable with intercession and petition, undiverted by confusion, not fearing that God will smack them for asking for bread when someone dying in the streets does not even have the snake. My own 'path' is that of paradox, as it is for many Christians. We can express in doxology what we could never explain (...though we tend to be the very ones who try to explain.) God is unknowable - and, for one like myself, given to the literary and poetic, loving theology, passionate about history and culture in relation to mankind's grasp of the divine, there is a longing to speak of Him despite a difficult awareness that everything one could say would not present a fraction of the reality.

In relation to the passage from Philippians, Tom Wright (among others) notes that Jesus' not 'grasping at' equality with God tells us that Jesus would not use for his own gain the glory he always had. Peter T. O'Brien, expounding on Wright's work, explains the clause as not concessive but causal. Precisely because he was in the form of God, Jesus did not regard this equality with God as to be used for his own advantage. F. F. Bruce explains that it is not that Jesus exchanged the form of God for that of a slave, but that he manifested the divine form. Divine equality meant sacrificial self-giving. The Hymn reveals not only what Jesus is truly like, but what it means to be God.

I am not a scripture scholar by any standard. I do not lose sleep over the synoptic problem - or about whether an original source might have been "Q" or "M". I love the new lectionary for its liturgical 'themes,' even if, were I to be pressed, I'd concede that they often have no exegetical connection. The words of the scholars whom I quoted in that last paragraph (and they are only a snippet from the wonderful commentaries on Philippians which are on my shelves) leave me with awe. Yet another part of me is saying, "How can divine omnipotence leave us with sacrificial self-giving being a glimpse of what it means to be God? How could God have manifested this except in his human nature?"

With a little help from divine grace, I then will see that the answer is "I do not know - I cannot understand," at which point I shall recite the same hymn as one of praise.