These things that he enumerates will, as he shows, be proved realities if the injunctions that he has given below are obeyed: They are of one mind and humble in spirit, not provoking one another but rejoicing in love. If so, the apostle’s joy in them may be complete.

See how this blessed man pleads with the Philippians concerning the things that are to their own advantage. For when he is counseling them about concord, the cause of all good things, what does he say? See how elegantly, how energetically he speaks, with what fellow feeling! If there is any encouragement in Christ. It is as though he were saying: If you take comfort in Christ and if you take any account of me, if you have any thought for me personally, if you have received any good from me, listen to this carefully. We use this way of speaking when we are making a request about a matter that we take to have the highest priority.

When we are in the midst of ills and labor under the ills of the world, if we have mutual love for one another, God will be our consolation in love. If, therefore, he says, there is this consolation in love, so that, because I love you, you console me in the midst of my ills, make my joy complete. . . . He has done well to put [the Spirit] third. For the first is to be called in Christ, the next to have love. But when both are true and they have already been called in Christ and enjoy the consolation of loving and being loved, without doubt the fellowship of the Spirit is there. . . . The church becomes one body when those who have been called are bound to one another in the love of Christ, when they are bound also in the Spirit and have the same affection and sympathy. The affection corresponds to the calling in Christ and the fellowship of the Spirit, the sympathy to the consolation of love.

Remember that God is one, his Son is one and his Holy Spirit is one, and all three are one. If so, then we too ought to be one in our thoughts, so as to be of the same mind with the one God. Then it follows that we are to have the same love. To be of the same mind pertains to knowledge, while to have the same love pertains to discipline, to the conduct of life.

He does not want this exhortation to appear to be addressed to those who have failed in their duty. So he does not say give me joy but complete my joy. That is as if to say: You have already begun to flourish. You have already pursued peace as I wish. Now I long for you to reach the highest levels of maturity in faith.

What does he mean by the same love? That you should have the same love for another that the other has for you, not a divided love but a love embedded in life in Christ. Then he adds in full accord and of one mind. He seems to me to be underscoring what he has said above but in a reversed order. In full accord corresponds to the same love. Of one mind refers to the previous phrase: being of the same mind. Yet there is something more nuanced in this pair than in the previous one. For being of the same mind and of one mind differ only slightly. Both pertain to knowledge. Being of the same mind suggests a knowledge that is not yet established, yet its capacity of knowing may be seen to be the same. . . . Being of the same mind seems to be still a continuing process. It is the way to life. But having the same love is the way of life to which that knowing leads.^[1]

Do nothing, he says, through ambition. For many are either prone toward ambitiousness of their own accord or moved toward ambitiousness through others. All these kinds of ambition are to be banished. There is to be no inordinate ambition, whether voluntary or constrained, since both are vicious. Some rush into this ambition through speculation; others are naturally of such temper as to be ambitious. So he advises: do nothing through ambition.

Selfishness is the cause of all sorts of evils. From it come strife and rivalry. From these come jealousy and contentiousness. Out of this that love grows cool when we are in love with human glory and become enslaved to the honors of popularity. One cannot be both a slave to popularity and a true servant of God.

If you accept that such and such a person is better than you and persuade yourself of this, not only saying it but being fully assured of it, you also will happily see him honored. And if you happily give him honor, you will not be disturbed to see him honored by others.

If we think only of ourselves, we may act for our own benefit and bother only with our own affairs, our hope, our own deliverance. But this is not enough. We are truly acting for ourselves if we also have a concern for others and strive to be of benefit to them. For since we are all one body, we look out for ourselves when we look out for others.

Above he has given two injunctions, first that they should delight in humility, then that they should think not only of their own affairs but of those of others. Then he says, Have this mind among yourselves that was in Christ Jesus. Which of these two then do we take to have been manifested in Christ Jesus? One or the other or both? For the first, his humility, is manifest, since Christ humbled himself and assumed the character of a slave. But the second injunction could be here as well, since he bore this for others and thought of others rather than of himself.

Our Lord Jesus Christ, when urging his disciples to undertake great works, makes himself an example.^[1] . . . This too the blessed Paul does, bringing Christ before their eyes when he urges them to practice humility. . . . For nothing so sustains the great and philosophic soul in the performance of good works as learning that through this one is becoming like God.

You see that he reveals Christ to be a man but not merely so, since he is the mediator of God and humanity. . . . He is trueborn God by nature with respect to his Father, but with respect to humanity he is Mary’s trueborn son by nature, begotten without the seed of a man.

If Christ were only a man, he would have been said to have been in the image of God, not in the form of God. We know that humanity was made in the image, not the form, of God.

He did not say having a nature like that of God, as would be said of [a man] who was made in the image of God. Rather Paul says being in the very form of God. All that is the Father’s is in the Son.

God is the very principle of life. God is being itself. God contains life as a principle of life and so also understanding. But life and understanding are in a sense the form and image of what exists. What most truly exists is God. God is being itself, as many agree, and more so that which is above existence. The form of existence is motion, understanding and life. . . . Christ is said to be the form of God because Christ is life, consciousness and understanding.

The form of God is absolutely the same as the essence. Yet when he came to be in the form of a slave, he took form in the essence of the slave, not assuming a naked form for himself. Yet he is not thereby divorced from his essence as God. Undoubtedly when Paul said that he was in the form of God, he was indicating the essence along with the form.

First one may contemplate him existing in his primary form, that of God, before he emptied himself. One will then see the Son of God not yet having come forth from him, the [incarnate] Lord not yet having proceeded from his place. But then compare the preexistent state of the Son with that which resulted from his assuming the form of a slave when he emptied himself. You will then understand how the Son of God came forth and came to us and as it were became distinguishable from the One who sent him. Yet in another way the Father did not simply let him go but is with him and is in the Son as the Son is in the Father.

What clearer and more decisive proof could there be than this? He did not become better from assuming a lower state but rather, being God, he took the form of a slave. . . . If [as the Arians think] it was for the sake of this exaltation that the Word came down and that this is written, what need would there be for him to humble himself completely in order to seek what he already had?

Suppose that when he became a slave he ceased being truly Lord. How then could it be said that in his coming the one who was in the form of God took the form of a slave?

But if [the Arians] think the form of God is not the being of God, let them be asked what they think is the form of a slave. . . . If the form of a slave is the being of a slave, then the form of God is God. . . . Furthermore, let us recognize also that the apostle uses the example of Christ as a lesson in humility. . . . If the Son was not equal to the Father but inferior, he did not obey in humility—he merely fulfilled his station.

How can the wretched [Sabellius] say that Christ’s existence began from Mary? This implies that before this he did not exist. But Paul says that being the form of God he took the form of a slave. . . . The form of a slave is truly a slave and nothing less. So too the form of God is truly God and nothing less. Paul did not write that he was in process of coming to be in the form of God; rather being in the form of God, hence truly divine. This is as much as to say I am that I am.^[1]

When he dwelt among humans, he appeared as God by his acts and works. For the form of God differs in nothing from God. Indeed, the reason for his being called the form and image of God is to make it apparent that he himself, though distinguishable from God the Father, is everything that God is. . . . His works revealed his form. Since his works were not those of a human, he whose work or form was that of God was perceived to be God. For what is the form of God? Is it not shown by the evidences given of his divinity—by his raising of the dead, his restoration of hearing to the deaf, his cleansing of lepers?

[Paul] acknowledged Christ and no other to be the Son of God. The flesh that Christ assumed was called the form of a slave and son of man. But as to that birth which, unknown to all, was from the Father and before all ages, he was Son of God.

It was he who was and is and always shall be in the form of the Father, the true Son, immutable and unchangeable because he is God and the all-powerful Son of the Almighty, who nonetheless deigned to lower himself for our salvation, so that he might cause us to rise even as we lay prostrate.

Being in the image of God, [humanity] still needed to receive the likeness.^[1] The Word, having been sent into the world to perfect this, first of all took on our own form, even though in history it has been stained by many sins, so that we for our part, on whose account he bore it, should be once again capable of partaking in his divine nature. Hence it is now possible for us to receive God’s likeness. Think of a skilled painter painting a likeness of himself on a surface. So we may now imitate the same characteristics that God himself has displayed in his becoming a human being. We hold these characteristics before us as we go in discipleship along the path he set out. His purpose in consenting to put on human flesh when he was God was this: that we, upon seeing the divine image in this tablet, so to speak, might imitate this incomparable artist.

God who is eternally wise has with him his eternal Wisdom [the Son]. He is not in any way unequal to the Father. He is not in any respect inferior. For the apostle too says who, when he was in the form of God, thought it no robbery to be equal with God.^[1]

What does this mean—being equal to God? It means that he [the Son] is of the very same power and substance [as the Father].^[1] . . . It is in this sense therefore that Christ was equal to God. Note that Paul did not say Christ was similar to God, for that would imply that Christ possessed some accidental likeness to the substance of God but not that he was substantially equal.^[2] . . . Thus Christ is the form of God. The form of God is the substance of God. The form and image of God is the Word. The Word is forever with God.^[3] The Word is of one substance with the Father, with whom from the beginning it remains forever the Word.

Being God, and God by nature, and having equality with God, he thought this no great thing, as is the way of those who have received some honor beyond their merits, but, hiding his merit, he elected the utmost humility and took the shape of a human being.

When someone who has the power to think great thoughts humbles himself, that one is humble. But when his humility comes from impotence, that is not what you would call humility. . . . It is a humility of a greater sort to refrain from seizing power, to be obedient to death.

It would be a kind of robbery if two things were not equal by nature but were forced to be made equal or made equal through some accident. It therefore shows great confidence and bespeaks the very nature of divinity when Paul says of Christ that he did not think it robbery to be equal with God yet did not consider this equality something he had to fortify.

Suppose someone commits a robbery and grabs something that does not belong to him. Wouldn’t he be inclined to hold on to it tightly, to grasp it and not lay it aside for fear of losing it? But suppose someone else possesses an estate by nature. He would not have any fear of losing it. He would not then be afraid to descend temporarily from his estate of dignity. He would know that he would suffer no loss, because it belongs to him naturally. . . . We are human beings. We are not divine by nature. We do not possess goodness by nature. But to God divinity belongs by nature. . . . His dominion was not acquired by seizure but was natural. It was not the gift of another but always stable and secure.

Knowing that he is in the form of God, he committed no theft. . . . Rightly, then, he equaled himself with God. For the one who thinks robbery is the one who makes himself equal to another whose inferior he is.

You must choose one of two paths. Either there is a single inequality in the two [divine Father and divine Son] or there is a single equality in the glory of divinity itself. For no one is either greater or less than his own form. . . . This singular equality is seen not only in the concord of their willing together. It is rather in their very deity, since the form of equality is in no way divided into parts. Where there is one equality, there is no dis-cord. Where there is one equality, neither is prior to the other. Neither is posterior nor subordinate, since there is no distinction in the united equality, which is the fullness of divinity.

Wherein lies the Son’s equality? If you say in greatness, there is no equality of greatness in one who is less eternal. And so with other things. Is he perhaps equal in might but not equal in wisdom? Yet how can there be equality of might in one who is inferior in wisdom? Or is he equal in wisdom but not equal in might? But how can there be equality of virtue in one who is inferior in power? Instead Scripture declares more simply he thought it not robbery to be equal. Therefore every adversary of truth who is at all subject to apostolic authority must admit that the Son is in some one respect at least the equal of God. Let him choose whichever quality he might wish, but from that it will appear that he is equal in all that is attributed to divinity.

Now equality is not predicated of one subject, for that which is equal must be equal to something. Do you see how the existence of two subjects is affirmed, not two mere names without real significance? Do you hear how the Only Begotten existed before the ages?

If therefore he thought it no robbery to assert his equality with God, he demonstrated that he was the true Son of God. No one could be God’s equal without being truly God.

While the whole Word came to us when the Word was made flesh,^[1] the whole remained with the Father in Spirit, equal to the Father, from whom he is eternally begotten yet made less by the gracious assumption of flesh so that he could be visible to us. And by this the Lord from the Lord remained Lord in the form of God. In order that he might come to slaves he received the form of a slave from his handmaid.^[2]

He did not rob, because who he was, he was by nature. Thus the omnipotence of the Father was in the Son and the omnipotence of the Son in the Father. The Father is never without the Son nor the Son without the Father.

He never either compared or opposed himself to God the Father. He remembered [throughout his earthly ministry] that he was from the Father.

These things are said partly on account of the economy by which the Son assumed humanity . . . partly because the Son owes to the Father his existence and also owes to the Father indeed his equality or parity with the Father. The Father, however, owes to no one his being, whatever he is.

To assume the form of a slave, he emptied himself through obedience. He emptied himself, that is, from the form of God, which means equality with God.

And even the word emptied clearly affirms that he was not always as he appeared to us in history. . . . He emptied himself, as the apostle says, by contracting the ineffable glory of his Godhead within our small compass. In this way what he was remained great and perfect and incomprehensible, but what he assumed was commensurate with the measure of our own nature.

He is said to have emptied himself in no other way than by taking the form of a servant, not by losing the form of God. For that nature by which he is equal to the Father in the form of God remained immutable while he took our mutable nature, through which he was born of the Virgin.

He emptied himself, not because as eternal Wisdom he underwent change. For as eternal Wisdom he is absolutely changeless. Rather with-out changing he chose to become known to humanity in such a humble form.

By emptying the holy Scripture signifies becoming of no account, just as in Corinthians Paul speaks of faith as if it had been made of no account, or emptied of significance, if Christ be not raised.^[1] So our preaching has been made empty means that it is of no account and futile. . . . Thus the phrase he emptied himself means that he did not yet reveal himself. Assuming the form of a slave, he concealed that dignity which was his. So he was deemed by onlookers to be what he seemed.

We do not believe that he was so emptied that he himself as Spirit became something else. Rather he, having put aside for this time the honor of his majesty, put on a human body. Only by assuming human form could he become the Savior of humanity. Note that when the sun is covered by a cloud its brilliance is suppressed but not darkened. The sun’s light, which is suffused throughout the whole earth, penetrating all with its brilliant splendor, is presently obscured by a small obstruction of cloud but not taken away. So too that man, whom our Lord Jesus Christ put on, being our Savior, which means God and the Son of God, does not lessen but momentarily hides the divinity in him.

The Son, empting himself, of his equality with the Father and showing us a way of knowing him, was made an express image of his substance,^[1] so that we who were unable to see the glory of pure light that inhered in the greatness of his divinity might, through that which was made splendor for us, find a way of contemplating the divine light through the sight of that splendor.

He let himself be emptied. It was not through any compulsion by the Father. He complied of his own accord with the Father’s good pleasure.

If he therefore emptied himself, assuming the form of a slave, he was not coerced but was of his own accord made the Son of Man, existing as God’s equal in the form of God. Therefore you have the Son expressing in himself the faith proper to humans.

In emptying himself, he became a man and was incarnate while remaining truly God. Having become a man, he remained the God that he was. He assumed a body like our own, differing only in that it was born from the Virgin by the Holy Spirit.

What sort of emptying is this? To assume the flesh, even in the form of a slave, a likeness to ourselves while not being like us in his own nature but superior to the whole creation. Thus he humbled himself, descending by his economy into mortal bounds.

We must understand this emptying himself to consist not in any loss or privation of his power but in the fact that he lowered himself to the basest level and condescended to the meanest tasks. By fulfilling these he momentarily emptied himself of his power. Assuming flesh and human form and likeness, he suffered, died and fulfilled all the things that belong to humanity.

Christ, therefore, knowing himself to be in the form of God, showed himself equal to God. But in order to teach the law of humility when the Jews were binding him, he not only refrained from resistance but emptied himself, that is, withheld his power from taking effect, so that in his humiliation he seemed to be weakened as his power lay idle.

Even in this he has what is supernatural and superessential, not only because he underwent no change or confusion in his communion with us, suffering no detriment to his exceeding fullness from his ineffable emptying but because also—the newest of all new things—he was supernatural even while in our natural condition. He was above the realm of essences while being in the realm of essences. He possessed our properties from us in a manner superior to ourselves.

Remaining in the form of God, he took the form of a slave, not being changed but emptying himself and hiding within himself and being made empty within his own power. He tempered himself to the form of the human state as far as was necessary to ensure that the weakness of the assumed humility would not fail to bear his immeasurable power. He went even so far as to tolerate conjunction with a human body. Just this far did his goodness moderate itself with an appropriate degree of obedience. But in making himself empty and restraining himself within himself, he did nothing detrimental to his own power, since even within this lowliness of his self-emptying he nonetheless used the resources of the evacuated power within him.

How could he possibly have taken only human form and not human substance? For he put on the flesh and was in the flesh and suffered in the flesh. This is the mystery and the means of our salvation. . . . What therefore does it mean, he emptied himself? That the universal Logos was not universal in his actual being as the logos of the flesh and becoming flesh. Therefore he did not merely pretend to become a man but became a man.

By this alone let the difference between the divinity and humanity in him be perceived. For Godhead and humanity are not the same in natural quality. Otherwise how has the Word, being God, been emptied, having let himself fall among lesser beings such as ourselves? But when we speculate on the mode of incarnation the human mind inevitably sees two things commingled by an inexpressible and unconfused union yet in no way divides the united elements but believes and firmly accepts that there is one from both, who is God, Son, Christ and Lord.

The Godhead is emptied so that the human nature may accommodate it. What is human, on the other hand, is made new, becoming divine through mingling with the divine.

He emptied himself, as the Scripture says, so that as much as nature could hold it might receive.

Since he is emptied on our account when he came down (and by emptying I mean as it were the reduction and lessening of his glory), he is for this reason able to be received.

How then did he empty himself? When the form of God accepted the form of a slave, when he who is preeminently the Lord deigned to take on himself what belongs to a slave. The Word was made flesh by bearing and doing what was beneath him in his indulgence and compassion toward us. All that he possessed by nature is emptied into this his person. Having been made obedient as a man in the true fashion of humanity, he has restored to our nature by his own humility and obedience what had perished through disobedience in Adam.

The sovereignty of the divine Word temporarily submitted to assume a man and for a season humbled himself and abased himself, not exercising his nature through his powers, while he bore the man that he had assumed. He emptied himself when he bowed to injuries and slanders, when he heard unspeakable insults and suffered indignities.

If it were through a natural inferiority that he undertook to bear the form of a slave,^[1] this would not be an instance of humility. Yet Paul makes excellent use of this example as an exhortation precisely to humility.

The one who says that he took the form of a slave—and this form is flesh—is saying that, being himself something else according to his divine form, something else in his nature, he assumed the servile form.

God did all things through him. Therefore he is also said to have taken the form of a slave. It is not only the flesh of the slave that he assumed but the very nature of a slave that he assumed. He became a slave so that he could share human suffering in the flesh.

He is said not to have taken the form of God but to have been in the form of God. What he is said to have taken is the form of a slave when he was humbled like a sinner. People become slaves through sin, like Ham the son of Noah, who first received the title of slave through his own actions.^[1] His taking the form of a slave was not simply his becoming human but his profound identification with sinners, voluntarily taking the form of a slave.

The Son humbled himself, taking the form of a slave. But meanwhile he remained above any slavery because he had no stain of sin.

He assumed the form of a slave without the stain of sin, enhancing the human without diminishing the divine. That emptying by which the invisible One offered himself to be seen and the Creator and Lord of all things elected to be one among mortals was a sovereign act of stooping in majestic pity, not a defect of power.

The Lord Jesus Christ came in flesh and, having accepted the form of a slave, became obedient even to death on the cross. He has no other purpose than that by this dispensation of his most merciful grace he might give life to those who have become, as it were, members of his body. He is their head in order to obtain for them the kingdom of heaven. This he did to save and set free. He redeemed and enlightened those who had formerly been consigned to the death of sin. They had been languishing in slavery, captivity and darkness under the power of the devil, the prince of sinners.

Taking the form of a slave. He indeed was taken captive, bound and driven with blows. His obedience to the Father took him even as far as the cross. Yet throughout he knew himself to be the Father’s Son, equal in divine dignity. Yet he did not make a display of this equality. Rather he willingly subjected himself. This patience and humility he teaches us to imitate. We are to refrain from making a display of our claims to equal dignity, but even more so we are called to lower ourselves into service as we follow the example of our Maker.

The Word who appeared in the flesh was the same as the Word that was with God.^[1] But the earthly flesh he assumed was not the same as the Godhead^[2] until this too was changed into Godhead, so that necessarily some attributes belonged to God the Word, others to the form of a slave.

The Son was sent by the Father and fulfills the Father’s will. The mystery stated here is that it was by his own will that he came and assumed the form and image of a slave. . . . The Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father. . . . So what the Father willed the Son also willed, and what the Son willed the Father willed.

Read the record of his compassion. It pleased him, being the Word of God, to take the form of a slave. So he willed to be joined to our common human condition. He took to himself the toils of the members who suffer. He made our human maladies his own. He suffered and toiled on our behalf. This is in accord with his great love of humankind.

See how the varied attestors agree. The Evangelist says the Word became flesh.^[1] The apostle says that he, being in the form of God, came to be in the form of a man^[2] The Evangelist says he pitched his tent among us. The apostle says he took the form of a slave. The Evangelist says we saw his glory, as of the only begotten of the Father. The apostle speaks of One who being in the form of God thought it no robbery to be equal with God. In a word, both teach the same: that, being God and the Son of God, and clothed in the Father’s glory and having the same nature and power as his Begetter, the One who in the beginning was with God and was was God^[3] and wrought the creation took the form of slave.

If we take him simply and solely to be a man made from a woman, how could he be said to be in the form equal to the Father? If only a man, how could he have the fullness that would make sense of his being emptied? What height could he have occupied before that he might be said to have humbled himself? How did he come to be in the likeness of men if he was already so by nature?

Note well the breathtaking economy by which the Son assumed flesh: Through the obedience of the one who was in the form of God [and] was emptying himself of the form of God, [he] was born as a man. In doing so, he took a new nature upon himself! This occurred not by a loss of his power and nature but by an assumption of a new condition. . . . Though he retained the power of his nature as God, he was in much of his earthly ministry temporarily relinquishing his exercise of the power of his nature as God as he walked as a man. The effect of this economy of order was this: The Son in his entirety, namely, as both man and God, was now, through the indulgence of the Father’s will, in union with the nature of the Father. This is what occurred to God the Son: that he became a man.

He says of the Son that he has come to be in the likeness and form of men. If he came to be in this likeness, this obviously implies that he was not invested with it from the beginning. Before coming to be in that likeness he was not fashioned according to some corporeal pattern. For no embodied form could become the pattern for what is previously not embodied.

What does it mean to be in a human likeness? Does it mean that his appearance was merely a fantasy? This would be something merely similar to^[1] a human and not made in the likeness of a man. For to be made in the likeness of a man is to be a man. . . . So what does it mean, in a human likeness? With few exceptions he had all our common human properties. The exceptions: He was not born from sexual intercourse. He committed no sin. These properties he had which no human being has. He was not only human, which is what he appeared to be, but also God. . . . We are soul and body, but he is God, soul and body. For this reason Paul says in the form—and so that when you hear of his emptying you may not suppose that he underwent change, degradation and some sort of annihilation of his divinity. Rather remaining what he was he assumed what he was not. Becoming flesh, he remained the Word of God. So it is in this respect that he is in the likeness of men, and for this reason he says and in form. His nature was not degraded, nor was there any confusion [of the two natures], but he entered a form.

It is not as though Paul was in the slightest uncertain about Christ’s identity that he said Christ was found in human likeness. He did not say in human likeness as though our Lord maybe was not truly a man but a phantom. Rather he was found in human likeness while still being God yet at the same time being truly a man in the flesh, with a physical human body that he had assumed.

He says of the divine Word that, being God, he was not seen to be God but wore a human appearance. Yet the words in the likeness of men are appropriate to him, for the nature that he assumed was truly human, and yet he was not [merely] a man, though he at first glance appeared to be only a man.

He did not take on his humanity in the simple way that a person puts on clothes, as something exterior to him. Rather he took on human form in a manner inexpressibly more excellent and more intimate than that. The apostle has made it sufficiently clear what he meant He was made to appear in human likeness. He was not exhaustively reduced to being a man. He rather assumed the true human estate when he put on the man.

He carefully uses the phrase in human likeness. For Christ was not one of the many but as one of the many. God the Word did not degenerate into a man. His essence as God did not change. Rather he appeared like a man, not deluding us with a phantom but instructing us in humility.

Why is he found in human form, if not because he was also God? Before he allowed himself to descend he was always seen in the power of God. But having subsequently been made weak he was found in human form? . . . And the reason for saying like is to indicate that he was also God.

He added being found in human form because the form of God, which is properly God himself, has never been seen by anyone.

Suppose the terms figure (or image or fashion), likeness and form referred merely to a phantom. There would then have been no substance to Christ’s humanity. But in this case figure, likeness and form all point to the reality of his humanity. He is truly God, as Son of the Father, in his figure and image. He is truly man, as the Son of Man, found in the figure and image of man. It is noteworthy that elsewhere Paul calls Christ the image of the invisible God.^[1] And indeed he had a reason for saying found, meaning that Christ was most certainly a man; for what is found surely must exist. Just as he was found to be God in power, so too he was a man in flesh. The apostle would not have declared him to become obedient to death if he had not been constituted of a mortal substance. Still more plainly does this appear when he adds the heavily laden words even unto the death of the cross. For he would not exaggerate the atrocity in extolling his power in a conflict which he knew to have been imaginary or a mere fantasy. In that case Christ would rather have eluded the cross than experienced it. There would then have been no virtue in his suffering but only an illusion.

It is apparent that the Lord accepted natural feelings to confirm that his humanity was real and not illusory, but the feelings that come from wickedness, all those that besmirch the purity of our lives, he repudiated as being unworthy of his unsullied Godhead.

His humbling was not undertaken as a slave in relation to a master’s command. Rather he willingly undertook the saving work on our behalf. He obeyed as a son, not as a slave.

He honored the Father all the more, not that you may honor him less but that you may marvel all the more. Here we learn that he is truly a son who honors his father more than all else. No one could have honored God the Father more than God the Son. The measure of his sublimity corresponds with the depth of his humility.

Humility is hard, since the one who humbles himself has something magnificent in his nature that works against his lowering. The one who becomes obedient, however, undertakes the act of obedience voluntarily. It is precisely through the act of humbling that he becomes obedient.

He humbled himself, according to the Scriptures, taking on himself the form of a slave. He became like us that we might become like him. The work of the Spirit seeks to transform us by grace into a perfect copy of his humbling.

He was made obedient even to death. His obedience teaches us that we too cannot obtain salvation except through obedience. By this means he has reconstituted the laws of ruling and being ruled, so much so that he has put all his enemies under his feet.^[1]

It was a great thing—ineffably great—that he became a slave. But to undergo death was much greater. Where can anything be found more paradoxical than this? This death was the most shameful of all, the most accursed. And he in death appeared to be a reprobate. This was not an ordinary death.^[1]

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.

The Word tasted death once on our behalf, the death of the cross. He went to his death so that by death he might put death to death. The Word, becoming human flesh, did not suffer in his divinity but suffered with humanity.

Even to the most inattentive it is obvious that the divine nature needs nothing. He did not become human by being raised up from lowliness. Rather he abased himself from the utmost height. He did not receive what he did not have before but received as a man what he possessed as God.

It is not in his divine nature that the Son is said to have been exalted by the Father. Rather the one who was exalted and received the name above every name is the one who appeared by taking flesh from the Virgin’s womb, to be born as God and man.

It was not the Word of God who needed or received exaltation. For the Word was in the beginning exalted with the Father. It was the Son of Man who was exalted from lowliness. This exaltation occurred when he had glorified God in his death.

Therefore, he says, God exalted him. But who was it that was exalted? Evidently the one who underwent the torture of the cross and death. It was not God himself, who is always on high throughout.

That God has highly exalted him does not imply that the essential nature of the Word at long last became exalted. For God the Son is and always was equal to God the Father. The exaltation is of the humanity. . . . The text says he humbled himself with reference to the assumption of the flesh. So too it says he exalted him with reference to the flesh. It was the human race that needed this, because of the humiliation of its flesh and because of its consequent death. Thus the Word who is immortal and the image of the Father has taken the form of a slave and suffered death on the cross as a man for our sake. He did this in order that he might thus present himself as an offering to the Father. It is thus as a man that he is said to have been exalted for our sake. Hence all of us die in Christ and through his death may again be exalted in Christ himself.

It is obvious that the highest is in need of no exaltation. Only what is lowly can be lifted to the exalted state, becoming now what it was not before. Being united to the Lord the human nature is lifted up to share in his divinity. What is exalted is that which has been lifted up from lowliness.

Having said that he became a man, Paul is not afraid thereafter to predicate lowly things of him, knowing that this predication of lowly things does the Godhead no injury. It is to Christ’s human nature that they apply.

He shows what and how much his humility deserved, so that we, trampling down our boastfulness, might find ourselves all the more humble.

Those who teach falsely imply that his glory lies in his name itself. The inference is that his glory consists entirely in his being worshiped by us. The implication is that he would not be glorious until he received our worship. Is this all his glory means? Those who think this way are far from the greatness of God.

He received the name that is above every name, which we must certainly understand as nothing other than the name of God. For it belongs to God to be above all. So it follows that the name that is above all belongs to him who is above all, namely, God.

God is above every name. The only proper way to name God is as above every name. God exceeds every operation of the intellect. God cannot be contained in any nominal definition. This is a sign to us of God’s incommunicable greatness.

None of the faithful doubt that the Son of God was begotten in perfect reception of all that belongs to the character of God. The Son received all the attributes of divinity in being born from God the Father. It was then that he received the name that is above all names, that is, that he should be called what the Father is called. Nothing different is predicated of him with regard to the future, since he has all things before him. So he was born for the re-creation and restoration of all these. Seeing that order and reason demand that every knee should bow to the name of the Father, the Father bestowed this name upon the Son because of the salvation he was to perform. This name was bestowed when he begot the Son. The Father begot him that he might enjoy the same honor as the Father himself.

The name that is above every name is God. It is not given to God in order that he should become God. For God the Son was the Word in the beginning with the Father. But the man assumed by the Son takes on his mission. In this way the Son of God, who had always existed, remains still equally God when joined to the humanity that he received from the Virgin.

Through the Son human nature was redeemed. It was human nature that he undoubtedly came to redeem. It was this human nature that the Son took up into the unity of his person. And because his humanity is never sundered from the Son of God, it therefore rules in heaven and earth over all angels and all humanity.

Some argue the name which is above every name was given only to his humanity. In no way could this be so. For it is not possible that God should lack those things that he once had. For God, even while assuming humanity, remained God.

There must be two natures, that of the divinity and that of the humanity. The divinity has emptied itself into the likeness of a servant. The humanity, in the likeness of a servant, has been raised into the name which is above all names. . . . This in fact is what summarizes the chief greatness of the nature of humanity. Christ remains in the nature of humanity. It is he who accepts a name that is more excellent than all names. He does this neither in consequence of moral progress nor in consequence of knowledge and faith. Rather he accepts that it has come about that humanity should be transformed in his image and his person. In this way humanity becomes by exaltation what God is, the name which is above all names.

He received the name that is above every name. He received this name because of his saving word, because of the mystery of his passion, where death was vanquished by the very death of Christ. Through this grace he received the name. It was at that point that the name rightly accrued to him. But the reality to which the name pointed was already given before. The Word, the very power of God, did not become real for the first time only when it entered flesh. Rather it possessed its reality as the power, wisdom, action and work of God from the outset, when it was called the Word and when it indeed was the Word. It is that same Word that has now put on flesh . . . that has received the title of Son, which title is above every name.

It is not assumed here that the Son of God was lacking or imperfect before the name that is above every name was given to Christ. . . . Even before his passion he showed himself equal to God, as I have stated. Hence it is clear that he was born perfect, for he is seen to have possessed all things from the beginning. He was born in the fullness of divinity for the very purpose of doing all that he was destined to perform. So he had already received the gift before he performed the things that he was born to do. It therefore seems that the gift of God, which consists in his being Son, was that his name should be above every name, which consists in his being God.

That [saving sacrifice] which no human or angelic or divine power had yet endured he accepted for the sake of our salvation. Therefore upon him alone the Father has bestowed the name that is above every name, committing to him the judgment of all.

He worships as one who has assumed the worshiping nature of humanity.^[1] It is this same One who is now worshiped as transcending the worshiping nature of humanity. He is now known to be God.

This means that after the mystery of the passion and the triumph of the ascension he who was wholly the Son of God with that which he had consented to be for our sakes, while remaining in the glory of God the Father (which means of course in the divinity of his own nature), should be adored by all the powers in heaven, on earth and below.

This name has become superior to every name. His divinity is such that it cannot be adequately manifested merely through verbal signs, no matter how exalted they are. As the exalted One comes to be in the lowly, so the lowly One may receive in return the properties of the exalted.

God the Word inhabited as his own temple the body taken from the woman. In this body lived a rational soul. God remade it into his own glory. On this account the holy Scripture declares that worship is proper only to the one who is God by nature. This is what Paul means when he writes that at the name of Christ Jesus every knee shall bow.

From a single beginning come many differences and varieties in creation. All these are now being recalled once again, synoptically in this text. They are now being viewed in relation to God’s goodness made known through the obedience of Christ. They are being drawn into a unity by the Holy Spirit. Everything is moving toward a common end, which corresponds to the goodness of the beginning. This means all those in heaven and earth and the lower regions, who, bowing the knee at the name of Jesus, have declared through this very act the tokens of their subjection. In these three appellations the whole universe is indicated. All things issue from one origin. They have been driven by their own motions in diverse ways. They are to be allotted different levels of blessedness in accord with their own willing.

We should not understand this carnally, so as to suppose that even the heavenly bodies, which he says bend their knees, do this with fleshly limbs. . . . What spirit has knees? But the bending of the knees indicates that all is in subjection and observes the worship of God.

The One who once came into the world has now become the Firstborn from the dead, both of brothers in faith and of all creation. He will return to the world as judge of all the world in righteousness, as the prophet declares, when it will become clear. The name of Firstborn, which he assumed first on our behalf, will not be cast away in in those last days. Every knee will bow at the name of Jesus. He is above every name. The whole company of angels worships this One who has been called the Firstborn. They all rejoice in the restoration of humanity, whom he has restored to their original grace by becoming the Firstborn among us.

Every tongue stands for every people. But if the confession of Christ as Lord is a glorification of the Father, it is clear that those who call him a creature and a slave deface the glory of the Father also. In these few words, however, the divine apostle has subdued every heresy, among those who blaspheme the divinity of the Only Begotten, and those who deny his humanity and those who misconstrue the hypostatic union of the two natures.

The glory of the Father is that the human race not only was created but was re-created when lost. It was given life once again when dead, so as to become a renewed temple of God. For the powers in heaven also, the angels and the archangels, worship him and now worship the Lord in the name of Jesus. This joy and exaltation belongs to human beings, because the Son of God, having himself become a human being, is now worshiped. The heavenly powers are not offended when they behold all of us being led into our heavenly abode as we share in his body. This could not have happened in any other way. It happened only because, being in the form of God and taking the form of a slave, he humbled himself, agreeing to assume our bodily condition even to death.

[T]o Christ Jesus, our Lord, and God, and Savior, and king, according to the will of the invisible Father, “every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess” [Phil 2:10–11] to him, and that he should execute just judgment towards all. . . . [T]he ungodly and unrighteous and wicked and profane among men [shall go] into everlasting fire; but [he] may, in the exercise of his grace, confer immortality on the righteous, and holy, and those who have kept his commandments, and have persevered in his love, some from the beginning [of their Christian course], and others from [the date of] their penance, and may surround them with everlasting glory.