MEANING OF MOP[Phi]H IN PHILIPPIANS 2:6-7, THE

3. Difficulties. The three principal arguments employed in defense of the hypothesis that ... = ... in the context of Phil 2:6-7 thus seem not to demonstrate its probability, at least when it is understood in its "thoroughgoingly anthropological" sense. Three additional considerations should suffice to prove this version of the ... = ... hypothesis unlikely. First, as Peter T. O'Brien observes, "Adam is nowhere in the LXX or the NT referred to as ..." as one would expect him to be if ... conveyed the same meaning as ... .17 Phil 2:6-7, in fact, seems entirely bereft of allusions to Adam. As Larry Hurtado explains, "For allusions to work one must use, or at least adapt, at least a word or two from the alluded-to text so that readers can catch the allusion. In Philippians 2:6-8 [however], other than 'God,' there is not a single word from the Greek of the Genesis 1:26-7 description of God's creation of the human in 'the image of God' or from the Genesis 3 temptation story."18

Second, as Teresia Yai-Chow Wong notes, "[I]n the LXX, ... is never used in the context of man's creation, nor of his relation to God" as one would expect it to be, again, if it were associated with the biblical idea of the image of God.19 Third and finally, in the words of Joachim Gnilka, "... ... cannot . . . mean that the pre-existent existed according to the image of God. [For] ... is employed again in the same sense in v. 7 and, therefore, can have no other sense than it has in v. 6."20 Unless Paul equivocates enormously, that is to say, ... must bear at least roughly the same meaning in verse 7 as it does in verse 6. Yet Christ certainly takes to himself more than the image of a servant; he becomes a servant, however one wishes to express that more precisely. It seems, consequently, that when Paul depicts Christ as ... in Phil 2:6, he must ascribe to Christ some more intimate relationship to God than that of being created, like Adam and Adam's descendants, ... (Gen 9:6 LXX). The Son's real identification with a ... thus appears to exclude the "thoroughgoingly anthropological" version of the ... = ... hypothesis.

III. MOPΦH = ERSCHEINUNGSFORM

The second alternative to Augustine's understanding of ... in Phil 2:67, viz. the position that ... in this context signifies "visible appearance," or Erscheinungsform, finds eloquent expression in Johannes Behm's article on ... in the TDNT.

The phrase ..., which Paul coins in obvious antithesis to ..., can be understood only in the light of the context. The appearance assumed by the incarnate Lord, the image of humiliation and obedient submission, stands in the sharpest conceivable contrast to His former appearance, the image of sovereign divine majesty, whose restoration in a new and even more glorious form is depicted for the exalted ... at the conclusion of the hymn, v. 10f. The specific outward sign of the humanity of Jesus is the ..., and of his essential divine likeness (... . . .) the .... The lofty terminology of the hymn can venture to speak of the form or visible appearance of God in this antithesis on the theological basis of the ... concept of the Greek Bible, which is also that of Paul, . . . according to which the majesty of God is visibly expressed in the radiance of heavenly light.21