A Prisoner Measures What His Chains Cannot Stop

Paul does not call himself an apostle here, as he does not in the Thessalonian letters or Philemon; with this church he had no authority to defend. “Servants” is douloi, slaves, a title shared with Timothy, who was with him when the church began (Acts 16). It is the only letter of Paul to name overseers and deacons in its address.

Philippi was a Roman colony, refounded for veterans after the battle fought outside its walls in 42 BC, where Antony and Octavian defeated Brutus and Cassius. In a city built on a victory that ushered in the Roman peace, a greeting of peace “from God our Father” had its own edge.

The Greek can also mean “for all your remembrance of me”, thanking God for the way the Philippians kept Paul in mind, which their gifts had shown. “My God” is personal, and it returns at the end of the letter: “my God shall supply all your need” (4:19).

“With joy” is the first sounding of the letter’s keynote: joy and rejoicing appear some sixteen times in four chapters. The Greek also doubles the word “all”, in every prayer, for you all, a habit the letter keeps up.

“Fellowship” is koinonia, which in commercial Greek meant a business partnership. “From the first day” reaches back to Lydia, the seller of purple at Philippi, who after her baptism pressed Paul and his companions to stay in her house (Acts 16:15).

“Begun” and “perform” are enarchomai and epiteleo, a pair Greek used for starting and completing a religious rite. Paul pairs the same two verbs in Galatians 3:3: “having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?” Here God does both halves.

“Think” is phroneo, the letter’s signature verb, used about ten times for a settled way of thinking. “Defence and confirmation” are legal words, apologia, a speech in court, and bebaiosis, a guarantee. The Greek of “I have you in my heart” also allows “you have me in your heart”.

“God is my record” is an oath, calling God as witness. “Long after” is epipotheo, to yearn for. The bowels, splanchna, were the heart, lungs and liver, taken as the seat of feeling, and Paul says his yearning is Christ’s own: he loves them with the affection of Jesus.

“Judgment” is aisthesis, perception or moral discernment, found only here in the New Testament and the root of the English aesthetic. “Knowledge” is epignosis, the fuller knowing of Ephesians 1:17. Love is asked to grow in both at once.

“Approve things that are excellent” can equally mean test the things that differ: the same Greek phrase covers both. “Sincere” is eilikrines, traditionally explained as judged by sunlight, like cloth held up to the sun to check for flaws, though the etymology is uncertain. “Without offence” can mean not stumbling or not tripping others.

“Fruits” is singular in the Greek, fruit of righteousness, one harvest. “Being filled” is perfect in tense, already filled and remaining so. The phrase “fruit of righteousness” comes from the Greek Old Testament (Proverbs 11:30; Amos 6:12).

“I would ye should understand” is a standard letter formula, “I want you to know”. “Furtherance” is prokope, progress, a word some explain as cutting a way forward, as pioneers clear a road for an army. It comes back in verse 25 for the Philippians’ own progress.

“Palace” is praitorion, which could mean the Praetorian Guard, the emperor’s troops in Rome, or a governor’s headquarters, as at Caesarea (Acts 23:35). Prisoners were chained to soldiers in shifts, so one guard after another heard why this man was held. “In Christ” means the chains are known to be for Christ, not for a crime.

“Waxing confident” is peitho in the perfect, persuaded and remaining so. “Bold” is tolmao, to dare. Many early copies lengthen “the word” to “the word of God”. The logic is surprising: seeing a leader in chains made others braver, not more careful.

Envy and strife, phthonos and eris, stand side by side in Romans 1:29 in the list of what fills a mind given up to itself; here Paul finds them among preachers of Christ. “Good will” is eudokia, the word used in Ephesians 1:5 for God’s own good pleasure.

In the oldest manuscripts this verse and the next are reversed: those preaching from love come first, those from contention second. The King James follows later copies. “Contention” is eritheia, selfish ambition, a word Aristotle used for canvassing for office through hired partisans.

“I am set” is keimai, to lie in place, used of a soldier posted at his station or of a stone laid where it belongs; Luke 2:34 uses it of the child Jesus, “set for the fall and rising again of many”. “Defence” repeats the apologia of verse 7.

“What then?” is a colloquial shrug in Greek, “So what?”. “Pretence” is prophasis, a pretext, a plausible front for another motive. The final clause looks ahead: “and will rejoice” is future, turning the reader toward what Paul expects next.

“This shall turn to my salvation” is word for word the Greek of Job 13:16, spoken by a man sure he would be vindicated. “Supply” is epichoregia, from the choregos, the wealthy citizen of Athens who paid for a chorus in the theatre: a generous provision, not a ration.

“Earnest expectation” is apokaradokia, watching with the head stretched forward, craning the neck to see; Romans 8:19 uses it of the whole creation. “Magnified” is megaluno, to make great. Paul’s own body is what stands on trial, and in it, alive or dead, Christ is to appear large.

The Greek has no main verbs: “for to me the living, Christ, and the dying, gain.” “Gain” is kerdos, profit, the word Paul uses again in 3:7, “what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ”. Death alone keeps the word on the profit side of the ledger.

The Greek grammar of this verse comes apart, as though the sentence is pulled two ways at once. “Wot” is 1611 English for know. The verb, gnorizo, usually means to make known, so Paul may be saying not that he does not know which to choose but that he will not declare it.

“In a strait” is synechomai, to be hemmed in, pressed from both sides, as the crowd pressed Jesus in Luke 8:45. “Depart” is analuo, to loose, used of striking a tent or casting off a ship’s moorings. “Far better” piles up three comparatives, literally much more better.

“Abide in the flesh” uses flesh in its plain sense, bodily life, not the power of sin it names in Galatians 5. “For you” is the whole reason. Paul sets what is needful for others above what he calls far better for himself.

“Abide and continue” is a wordplay, meno and parameno: remain, and remain alongside. “Furtherance” is the prokope of verse 12 again: the gospel’s progress in Rome, the Philippians’ progress in faith. Whether Paul did return is not recorded, though 1 Timothy 1:3 places him later in Macedonia.

“Rejoicing” is kauchema, ground for boasting, the word of Galatians 6:4. “By my coming” uses parousia, the word for an official visit, which the New Testament also uses for the coming of the Lord (1 Thessalonians 4:15). The boast is to be “in Jesus Christ”, with Paul as its occasion.

“Let your conversation be” is politeuomai, to live as a citizen. In Philippi, a colony whose people prized their Roman citizenship (Acts 16:21), the word was pointed, and it returns in 3:20, “our conversation is in heaven”. “Striving together” is synathleo, to compete as teammates in the games.

“Terrified” is ptyro, used of a horse that shies in fright, found only here in the New Testament. “Evident token” is endeixis, proof, a word for evidence in a legal case. The same steadiness is read as a sign pointing in two opposite directions.

“It is given” is echaristhe, from charis: graciously granted, given as a favour. The Greek begins “to you it was granted, on behalf of Christ” and then breaks off to insert “not only to believe on him” before resuming with the second gift, suffering, which the sentence had been heading for all along.

“Conflict” is agon, a contest in the games, the root of agony. They had seen it in person: at Philippi Paul and Silas were stripped, beaten with rods and fastened in the stocks (Acts 16:22–24). Now they hear of it from his prison.