Footnotes
Footnotes
1.R. P. Martin has made a detailed study of the passage, and he cites E. Lohmeyer for the view that "the poet’s mother-tongue was Semitic”; "Lohmeyer contrived to show that the Greek text must be based on an underlying Semitic original” (Carmen Christi, SNTSMS 4 [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967], p. 46). In his first remarks on authorship Martin finds the arguments "finely balanced” (p. 45) but after a detailed exegesis decides that Paul has made use of an earlier hymn. He thinks of the passage as "a missionary manifesto of some Christian or Christian group whose outlook reaches forth to the world beyond the confines of Jewish Christianity and sees that the cosmic Christ, the universal Lord, is the one true answer to the religious quests of the GraecoRoman world” (pp. 298-99).
2.Vincent Taylor, The Person of Christ in New Testament Teaching (London: Macmillan, 1959), p. 63. Elsewhere Taylor speaks of Paul’s "comparative neglect of the Servant-conception of Isaiah lii.13-liii” (The Atonement in New Testament Teaching [London: Epworth, 1945], p. 65).
3. It must be admitted, however, that some weigh the evidence from geography rather differently. Thus Moises Silva, observing that not more than three communications have taken place at the time of writing (one of which may have occurred even before Paul reached Rome) allows two months per trip—a generous estimate—and concludes that not more than four to six months are required. Silva contends that the
argument from geography should be dropped (Philippians, WEC [Chicago: Moody,
1988], pp. 5-8).
4."If he is writing from Rome, it is ten years or so since they sent to him: and it seems strange they had had no opportunity to send to him in so long a time. And during that time he had passed through Philippi twice (Acts xx.1, 3, 6)” (Clogg, p. 77).
5.L. Johnson argues that the captivity letters were written during this period ("The Pauline Letters from Caesarea,” ExpTim 68 [1956-57]: 24-26).
6.On the ambiguity surrounding this term, see n. 3 in chap. 9 above.
7.Gerald F. Hawthorne does not find that the evidence points conclusively to any city but argues that "it seems best for the sake of the understanding and explanation of Philippians to make a decision about where it was written and to exegete the text in the light of that decision. Hence, the assumption made in this commentary is that Philippians was written by Paul from prison in Caesarea.” (Philippians, WBC [Waco, Tex.: Word, 1983], p. xliii). By contrast, Childs remarks, "Caesarea has been virtually eliminated as a possibility” (p. 331).
8.G. S. Duncan argued the case strongly in his St. Paul’s Ephesian Ministry (New York: Scribners, 1929); he reiterated his view with minor modifications in "Were Paul’s Imprisonment Epistles Written from Ephesus?” ExpTim 67 (1955-56): 163-66.
9.Guthrie, who favors Rome as the site, says of Ephesus, "The cumulative effect of this evidence is undoubtedly strong but it falls short of proof. If the Roman hypothesis were proved untenable the Ephesian would probably be unchallenged as an alternative theory” (Guthrie, p. 555). Kummel, however, says that "the probability of the Ephesian hypothesis is the slightest” (p. 235).
10.Marvin R. Vincent, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistles to the Philippians and to Philemon, ICC (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1897), p. xxxvii.
11.So Silva, Philippians, pp. 22-27.
12.Not much more than that it is a hymn is agreed. "It quickly becomes apparent...that although much has been written on these verses there is little that can be agreed upon, whether the topic discussed is the precise form of this section, its authorship, its place and purpose in the letter, the sources used in its composition, and so on” (Hawthorne, Philippians, p. 76). Hawthorne is so impressed by the lack of agreement on insertions and the like that he treats it all as part of the original hymn.
13.G. S. Duncan, "Philippians,” in IDB, 3:791. Similarly, James D. G. Dunn relies on such Adam-Christology to justify his conclusion that the preexistence of Christ is not taught in this passage (Christology in the Making [London: SCM, 1980], pp. 114-21).
14.See Roy W. Hoover, "The Harpagmos Enigma: A Philological Solution,” HTR 64 (1971): 95-119; and esp. N. T. Wright, "αρπαγμος and the Meaning of Philippians 2:5
11,” JTS 37 (1986): 321-52. Christ "did not regard being equal with God as...something to use for his own advantage” (Hoover, "Harpagmos Enigma,” p. 118).
15.H. Koester, "Philippians,” in IDBSup, p. 666.
16. Ibid.
17.E. Kasemann, "A Critical Analysis of Philippians 2:5-11,” in God and Christ: Existence and Province, ed. Robert W. Funk, JTC 5 (New York: Harper & Row,
1968), pp. 45-88. (Kasemann originally wrote this article in 1950, in German.)
18.Martin, Carmen Christi, pp. 288, 291. Martin thinks that the hymn may have been used in a baptismal context. He also holds that it portrays "a soteriological drama.”
These verses "are not a piece of Christological speculation which answers our question who Christ was, but the record of a series of events of saving significance which declare what He did” (p. 295). See also discussion of this hymn in Martin’s Philippians, NCB (Greenwood, S.C.: Attic, 1976). This, of course, does not mean that we may not draw some conclusions about the nature of the person who could accomplish all this.
19.C. F. D. Moule, "Further Reflexions on Philippians 2, 5-11” in Apostolic History and the Gospel, ed. W. Ward Gasque and Ralph P. Martin (Exeter: Paternoster, 1970), p. 269.
20.J. L. Houlden, Paul’s Letters from Prison (London: SCM, 1977), p. 67.
21.See esp. Wright, "άρπαγμος.”
22.E.g., see the discussion in Hawthorne, Philippians, pp. xl-xli.
23.T. E. Pollard, however, compares Phil. 3 with the rest of the letter and concludes that there are "marked verbal agreements between chapter iii as a whole and the rest of the letter” ("The Integrity of Philippians,” NTS 13 [1966-67]: 66).
24."The composition breaks abruptly at Phil. 2:19; 3:2; 4:2, 10. It is possible—but cannot be proved—that Phil. is a conflation of various writings which Paul composed and sent to Philippi at various times” (Wikenhauser, p. 437). He adds, "At any rate, the entire Epistle bears the stamp of Paul’s language and style.”
25.B. S. Mackay has a strong refutation of the idea that Philippians is made up of three letters ("Further Thoughts on Philippians,” NTS 7 [1960-61]: 161-70).
26.Klijn, p. 110. He concludes his discussion of the point by noting, "The opponents, therefore, are Jews who will not tolerate Paul in their own missionary territory.”
27.H. Koester argues that the people opposed in Phil. 3 are "Christian missionaries of Jewish origin and background” ("The Purpose of the Polemic of a Pauline Fragment,” NTS 8 [1961-62]: 331).
28.Johnson thinks that they may not have been Paul’s opponents at all and that he refers to them as a counterexample to show his correspondents what they must not do (p. 346).