Philippians 2 · Passage · Humility
He Humbled Himself
Philippians 2:1 to 11 joins Paul's call to count others above oneself with the story of the Son's descent and exaltation.
Paul set the highest words he wrote about Christ inside a plea to a church to stop seeking its own glory.
And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross.
- The passage
- Philippians 2:5 to 11
- Book
- Philippians
- Hold in memory
- Philippians 2:8, Philippians 2:3
Summary
Paul asks the church at Philippi to do nothing out of selfish ambition or empty pride and to count others more important than themselves. His reason is Christ, who existed in the form of God and still took the place of a servant, going as low as death on a cross. God answered that descent by raising Him above every creature. The passage asks believers to share that mind toward one another.
- The call of verses 3 and 4 is to put the interests of others alongside one's own.
- The Son did not consider equality with God something to be grasped.
- His emptying is described by what He took, the form of a servant and human likeness.
- His obedience reached the death of a cross, the lowest point of the descent.
- God gave Him the name above all names, and Paul gives Him the bowing and the confession that the LORD claimed for Himself in Isaiah.
The Call to Humility
Verses 1 to 4 give the grounds of Paul's appeal and the conduct he asks for.
In the second chapter of Philippians Paul calls the church to humility, the right view of oneself before God and the regard for others that Scripture commands of God's people. He grounds the call in the example of Christ, who went from glory to a cross and was then raised by God. The passage matters to every reader because it makes the life of Christ the pattern for ordinary life in a church.
The question it answers is how the Son's humility should shape the way believers treat one another. Paul gives his answer in the same chapter, in the lives of two men he was about to send to Philippi.
Paul builds the call on four grounds in verse 1: encouragement in Christ, comfort from His love, fellowship with the Spirit, and affection and compassion. In verse 2 he asks the church to make his joy complete by being of one mind and one love.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or empty pride, but in humility consider others more important than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.Paul names the two faults that divide a church and the humility that answers them.
The first fault is eritheia (Strong's G2052), which the STEP Bible lexicon gives as faction or intrigue and the Berean text renders selfish ambition. The second is kenodoxia (G2754), which the Berean text renders empty pride, a word found only here in the New Testament. Against both Paul sets tapeinophrosyne (G5012), the humble mind.
The Descent and the Exalting
The Son is the subject of every verb of the descent, and God is the subject of the exaltation.
Paul gives seven steps down and four steps up.
1The descent
- What Paul says of the Son
- He existed in the form of God before He came
- What Paul says of the Son
- He did not consider equality with God something to be grasped
- What Paul says of the Son
- He emptied Himself
- What Paul says of the Son
- He took the form of a servant
- What Paul says of the Son
- He was made in human likeness and found in appearance as a man
- What Paul says of the Son
- He humbled Himself and became obedient to death
- What Paul says of the Son
- His death was the death of a cross
9The exaltation
- What Paul says of the Son
- God exalted Him to the highest place
- What Paul says of the Son
- God gave Him the name above all names
- What Paul says of the Son
- every knee in heaven, on earth and under the earth bows at His name
- What Paul says of the Son
- every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of the Father
Each step is shown with its verse reference and what that verse says of the Son in plain words.
Humbled and obedient, A cross, The exaltation, Exalted by God, The name given, Every knee, Every tongue
In the Greek of verse 8, etapeinosen heauton, He humbled Himself, the verb is active and the object is Himself, so the lowering is His own act. Verse 9 opens with dio, therefore, and God then highly exalted Him, with the verb hyperypsosen.
The word in verse 6 is harpagmos (G725), found only here in the New Testament. The STEP Bible lexicon gives its sense as something to grasp and its root sense as plunder, and it lists robbery as the word of the King James Version.
The Mind of Christ in the Church
In the same chapter Paul names two men who looked to the interests of others, and later two women he asks to agree.
After the passage on Christ, Paul tells the church to work out its salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in them (Philippians 2:12 to 13). He then names two men whose lives show that mind. The first is Timothy, whom Paul hoped to send to them soon.
I have nobody else like him who will genuinely care for your needs. For all the others look after their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ.Paul sets Timothy's care for the church against those who look after their own interests.
The second is Epaphroditus, the church's own messenger to Paul. He fell sick and came close to death, and Paul says he "nearly died for the work of Christ, risking his life" to serve him (Philippians 2:30).
I urge Euodia and Syntyche to agree with each other in the Lord.Two women of the church are asked to agree in the Lord, the unity Paul sought in chapter 2.
Isaiah 45 Behind the Last Verses
The prophet's words about the one God are given in Philippians to the Son.
In Isaiah 45 the LORD calls the ends of the earth to turn to Him and be saved, for He is God and there is no other.
By Myself I have sworn; truth has gone out from My mouth, a word that will not be revoked: Every knee will bow before Me, every tongue will swear allegiance.Paul takes up this oath of the LORD in Philippians 2:10 to 11.
Paul gives the bowing of every knee and the confession of every tongue to the name of Jesus, "to the glory of God the Father" (Philippians 2:11).
What the Mind of Christ Asks
The passage asks believers for regard for others, for obedience and for patience until God exalts them.
The first thing the mind of Christ asks is regard for others. Paul introduces the passage with the words "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 2:5), right after telling each believer to look to the interests of others.
The second is obedience. The Son's humility was shown in His obedience, and Paul next commends the church because "you have always obeyed" (Philippians 2:12).
The third is to leave the lifting up to God. The Son humbled Himself, and God exalted Him. Jesus taught the same rule in the Gospels, and Peter wrote it to the churches.
For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”Jesus gives the rule that the one who humbles himself is lifted up, the order of Philippians 2:8 to 9.
Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, so that in due time He may exalt you.Peter tells believers to humble themselves and to wait for God to exalt them in His time.
How Teachers Have Read the Passage
Chrysostom and Augustine read the passage as a lesson in humility grounded in who the Son is.
died 430 · Augustine of Hippo
John Chrysostom taught in Homily 7 on Philippians (translated by John A. Broadus, 1889) that the passage answers those who fear being made low.
"This equality with God He had not by seizure, but as his own by nature."
Read the page on John Chrysostom
Augustine of Hippo taught in On Faith and the Creed (section 11) that the shame of the cross was meant to strengthen believers who face death.
“He humbled himself, being made obedient even unto death, even death on a cross, so that none of us, though being able to face death without fear, might shrink from any kind of death that human beings regard as a great disgrace.”
Augustine of Hippo · On Faith and the Creed 11 · on Philippians 2:8Patristic
An Example to Follow or a Confession of Christ
Readers agree that the passage does both, and they differ over which it puts first.
One reading puts the example first, because Paul gives the passage inside a call to humility in verses 3 to 5. The objection is that verses 9 to 11 go far past any example a believer could copy.
The other reading puts the confession of Christ first. Athanasius used verses 6 to 9 against the Arians to show that the Son was God before He took the form of a servant (Discourses Against the Arians, book 1, section 40). The objection is that the command of verse 5 is aimed at the church, which shows why Paul wrote the passage.
The Way Down Is the Way Up
Jesus spoke of His own coming as service on the road to Jerusalem, in Matthew 20.
Paul asked the church to take the road Christ took, down into service and up only by God's hand. Jesus had said it to His disciples before the cross.
just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.”Jesus names His own coming as service and His death as a ransom, the descent Philippians 2 sets out.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- The Greek text of Philippians 2:3 to 11 with Strong's numbers and morphology, as the site's store holds it.
- STEP Bible, Translators Brief lexicon of Extended Strongs for Greek (Tyndale House, Cambridge, CC BY 4.0), entries g2052, g2754, g5012 and g725.
- John Chrysostom, Homily 7 on Philippians, translated by John A. Broadus, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, first series, volume 13 (1889)
- Augustine of Hippo, On Faith and the Creed, section 11, on Philippians 2:8.
- Athanasius of Alexandria, Discourses Against the Arians, book 1, section 40, on Philippians 2:6 to 9.
Keep Studying
Values1
Doctrines2