A Different Account of Gain, and a Race Still Unfinished

The sharp change of tone after this verse has led some scholars to think chapter 3 began as a separate letter; Polycarp, writing to Philippi in the second century, speaks of Paul’s “letters” to them. “Not grievous” is okneros, not irksome. “Safe” is asphales, a safeguard, something that keeps them from slipping.

“Dogs” were street scavengers, unclean animals, and a term some Jews used for Gentiles (compare Matthew 15:26); Paul turns it back on those insisting on circumcision. “Beware” is blepete three times, which can also mean look at, take note of. “Concision” is katatome, mutilation, a bitter pun on peritome.

“Worship” is latreuo, the word for priestly service in the temple. Papyrus 46 and the great fourth-century codices have “worship by the Spirit of God”, making the Spirit the means of worship rather than its manner. The claim “we are the circumcision” draws on the circumcision of the heart promised in Deuteronomy 30:6, which Paul develops in Romans 2:29.

Paul adopts his opponents’ scale for the sake of argument, as he does in 2 Corinthians 11:22: “Are they Hebrews? so am I.” “I more” is two words in Greek, ego mallon, and the list that follows is the proof of them.

The eighth day is the day the law set (Genesis 17:12), unlike a proselyte circumcised as an adult. Benjamin gave Israel its first king, Saul, whose name Paul bore. “An Hebrew of the Hebrews” likely means born of Hebrew-speaking parents and raised in their language, though in Tarsus; in Acts 23:6 he is “the son of a Pharisee”.

Zeal had heroes in Israel: Phinehas, praised for his spear in Numbers 25:11, and Mattathias, who in 1 Maccabees 2:24–26 killed an apostate “as Phinehas did”. Paul’s zeal stood in that line (Galatians 1:14). “Blameless” is amemptos, the word Luke 1:6 uses of Zacharias and Elisabeth.

“Gain” is plural in Greek, kerde, a set of profits, and “loss” is singular, zemia: many assets entered together as a single debit. “I counted” is perfect in tense, I have come to reckon and still do, so the verdict is not a passing mood.

“Dung” is skubala, refuse, whether excrement or the scraps thrown from the table; an ancient guess derived it from “to the dogs”, which would tie it back to verse 2. “Excellency” is the hyperecho of 2:3, surpassing worth. “Win” is kerdaino, to gain, the profit word again.

“Be found” pictures an examination or audit where a man is found holding one thing or another. Two righteousnesses stand side by side with matching prepositions: one out of the law, the other out of God, resting on faith. The King James “faith of Christ” keeps the Greek genitive as it is, where many modern versions decide between faith in Christ and Christ’s faithfulness.

The order reverses the historical sequence: resurrection power first, then sufferings, then death. “Being made conformable” is symmorphizo, found only here in the New Testament, built on morphe, the “form” of 2:6–7. To be conformed to his death is to take the same shape as the one who took the form of a servant.

“If by any means” is modest rather than doubtful. “Resurrection” here is exanastasis, a double compound found only here: the out-resurrection, a rising out from among the dead. Paul reaches for a rarer word than the usual anastasis as if the ordinary one were not strong enough.

“Follow after” is dioko, the same verb as “persecuting” the church in verse 6. The man who once chased believers now chases a different quarry. “Apprehend... apprehended” is katalambano, to seize, used twice so that Paul’s grasping answers Christ’s prior grip on him.

The “I” is emphatic, “I myself”, perhaps against others who reckoned they had arrived. “This one thing” has no verb in Greek; “I do” is supplied. “Reaching forth” is epekteinomai, stretching out, the runner’s body leaning toward the line. Gregory of Nyssa built his teaching of endless growth into God on this word.

“Mark” is skopos, the goal the eye is fixed on. “Prize” is brabeion, the award handed out by the umpire of the games, usually a wreath (1 Corinthians 9:24). “High calling” is literally the upward call: at the games, the herald called the victor up to receive the prize.

“Perfect” here is teleioi, the mature, set against the “not already perfect” of verse 12. Some scholars suspect it was a word his opponents used for themselves, which Paul borrows with some irony. The remedy for disagreement is left with God: “God shall reveal even this unto you.”

“Walk” is stoicheo, to keep in line, the verb of Galatians 5:25 and 6:16. The words “rule” and “let us mind the same thing” are absent from the oldest manuscripts, which read only “let us walk by the same”; later copyists filled out the sentence from Galatians 6:16 and Philippians 2:2.

“Followers together” is symmimetai, fellow-imitators, found only here. “Ensample” is typos, originally the mark left by a blow, then an imprint or pattern pressed into something soft. The “us” is plural, taking in Timothy and Epaphroditus alongside Paul.

The sentence opens a parenthesis that runs to the end of verse 19. “Weeping” stands among the few places Paul mentions tears in his writing; 2 Corinthians 2:4 is another. “Often” says he had warned them in person on earlier visits. The enemies are unnamed.

“Destruction” is apoleia, ruin, the same word as the “perdition” of 1:28. “Whose God is their belly” is echoed in Romans 16:18, those who “serve... their own belly”; whether it means food laws or appetite is argued. “Mind” is phroneo, the letter’s good verb for thinking, here pointed at the ground.

“Conversation” is politeuma, a commonwealth or register of citizens. Philippi’s citizens were enrolled in a Roman tribe and counted as citizens of a capital most had never seen. “Look for” is apekdechomai, eager waiting, the verb of Galatians 5:5. In Greek “Saviour” stands first in its clause, without the article, for emphasis.

The verse reuses the vocabulary of the Christ passage in chapter 2. “Vile body” is the body of our humiliation, tapeinosis, from the root of “he humbled himself” (2:8). “Change” is built on schema, “fashion” (2:8), and “fashioned like” on morphe, “form” (2:6–7). What Christ went down through, he raises his people up through.