From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Mon Dec 20 1999 - 20:14:01 EST
<x-rich>At 6:39 PM -0600 12/20/99, Grant Polle wrote:
<excerpt> While reading the chapter of Philippians 2, I noticed
that verse 6 varies significantly from translation to translation.
KJV for example reads: "Who, being in the form of God, thought it not
robbery to be equal with God."
WE: "He was in every way like God. Yet he did not think that being
equal to God was something he must hold on to. "
YLT "who, being in the form of God, thought [it] not robbery to be
equal to God, "
NIV reads, "Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality
with God something to be grasped,"
Darby "who, subsisting in the form of God, did not esteem it an object
of rapine to be on an equality with God; "
NASB "who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard
equality with God a thing to be grasped
"hOS EN MORFH QEOU hYPARCHON OUCH hARPAGMON hHGHSATO TO EINAI ISA
QEO."
It seems that two interpretations result.
On one hand, Jesus does not attempt equality." This seems to agree
with opponents of the Trinity.
Yet, on the other hand, KJV's translation and others shows Jesus as
not considering his equality as robbery or that his equality was wrong.
Which of the two translations agrees more with what the bible writer
intended?
</excerpt>
We really need to be careful in attempting to respond to this question;
the text is one that has played a very significant role again and again
in the history of Christian theology, and it is difficult, perhaps even
impossible, to go at this text as if one had never seen it before and
as if one were not aware of at least one significant way in which the
passage has been interpreted. There have been many threads on this text
on B-Greek in the past, one significant one on MORFH and hARPAAGMOS in
October of 1998, one a couple years earlier that I myself initiated and
that went on for quite some time. I take the liberty of citing from our
own archives from this past June a message from Mark Goodacre that is
very relevant to your question:
>From: "Mark Goodacre" <<M.S.GOODACRE@bham.ac.uk>
>Organization: The University of Birmingham
>To: Biblical Greek <<b-greek@franklin.oit.unc.edu>
>Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1999 12:28:43 GMT
>Subject: Re: Phil. 2:6-An Example of Anaphora?
>
>I would like to recommend a recent book on this topic:
>
>Ralph P. Martin & Brian J. Dodd (eds.), _Where Christology Began:
Essays on
>Philippians 2_ (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998)
>
>Every single essay (bar one) in the volume deal with Phil. 2.6-11. My
head was
>spinning by the end of it -- this is definitely not a book to be read
in one
>sitting. It is valuable, though. It features a defence by Jimmy Dunn
of his
>Adamic, non-pre-existence reading of this piece (cf. Carl's comments).
It also
>features much criticism of Dunn's reading, most explicitly by Richard
Bauckham
>in "The Worship of Jesus in Philippians 2.9-11", the best essay in the
book.
>He thinks that the hymn exhibits an "eschatological monotheism" that
"took
>christological form in the earliest Christian reflection on the
exaltation of
>Jesus" (p. 136).
>
>There is lots of discussion in the various essays re. the meaning of
hARPAGMOS
>and the specific clause mentioned. Indeed Gerald Hawthorne has an
essay in the
>book in which he defends the reading mentioned by Edgar Foster.
>
>The book will be a most useful one for anyone researching Phil. 2.6-11
-->strongly recommended.
Very briefly, one needs to be aware that there are at least two, but in fact, several variations on each of the two, interpretations of the passage in question. I would hope that whatever new discussion of this text ensues now will remain focus pretty sharply upon the Greek text and what it may legitimately be understood to mean in terms of its morphology, syntax, and diction.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
</x-rich>
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