Chapter 2 is devoted to discussion of the currently most popular view of the hymn’s interpretative framework. Since the 1990s many have come to think that in Phil 2:6–11 Christ is portrayed as an ideal king, ruler, or emperor and that his “divine” characteristics or status reflect the ways Greeks and Romans typically perceived and treated their rulers.
There are nine features of Phil 2:6–11 and 3:20–21 that contribute to this conclusion. The divine equality language of v. 6c evokes centuries-old technical terminology for the status of divine rulers who received cultic honours equal to those given to the eternal gods. Christ’s position of universal, cosmic, rule (2:10) echoes what was typically said of Rome’s emperors. Thirdly, the address “Lord (κύριος)” parallels one of the titles of the emperors; employed at a popular level for decades in the east and according to official Roman state policy under Nero. Fourthly, the gift of the supreme name recalls the many ways in which new names, titles and epithets were given to rulers, especially on their receipt of a new divine status or identity, whether in this life or posthumously. Fifthly, the scene of universal confession or praise and prostration in vv. 10–11 evokes scenes of acclamation and the giving of divine honours to ancient rulers. Sixthly, Jesus’ exaltation to a position of authority is given in response to his conduct (v. 9a “wherefore [διό] God highly exalted him and gifted (ἐχαρίσατο) to him …”) in a way that reflects, not biblical or Jewish tradition, so much as the Greek and Roman stance on the connection between powerful deeds, virtue and merited status. Seventhly, the Christological title “Saviour” in 3:20, that is untypical of Paul, reflects the common use of that epithet for Hellenistic rulers and Rome’s emperor. Eighthly, the passage is comparable to hymns and encomia praising the emperor and Hellenistic divine rulers. Lastly, it is fitting that Phil 2:6–11 contains an imperial Christology because Paul is writing from a Roman prison, under Praetorian guard, to a colony founded by Augustus, the first and greatest of Rome’s deified emperors, for whom there was a state-sanctioned cult in Philippi’s forum.
Two further considerations are consistent with the conclusion that 2:6–11 espouses an imperial Christology. The one praised is Χριστός, the Messiah, who in biblical and Jewish tradition is sometimes a king who rivals pagan rulers. Secondly, there is the fact that Paul praises Christ as an example to be followed, just as elite men, rulers and emperors were believed to live exemplary lives that would lead others to virtue. For all these reasons, it would be obvious to Paul’s readers that he praises Christ as the true emperor. The imperial Christology is not a “hidden transcript,” intelligible only to community insiders. It is there in both halves of 2:6–11 and in ways that would be instantly recognisable to both gentile and Jewish readers.
However, the view that an imperial paradigm is the key to the passage is not without its problems. For one thing, this view poses a challenge to those who have treated Phil 2:6–11 as evidence for an early Christology of divine identity. Some follow Adela Yarbro Collins in thinking that the political or imperial reading means vv. 9–11 is not a scene of “worship … in the full sense,” but only “submission to embodied power and authority”. Most also say that the Christology is not one of divine “nature” or “essence” in a proto-Chalcedonian sense. On the other hand, Hurtado, insisting the text is evidence of an early Christ devotion, plays down or dismisses the case for an imperial Christology.
The rest of this volume offers a rapprochement between a political-but-not-fully-theological and a robustly theological-but-not-imperial construal of Phil 2:6–11. Both sides are right in much of what they affirm but mistaken in what they deny. To begin with, in the rest of this chapter, I problematize simplistic imperial Christology readings and make some suggestions that point towards a conceptual framework in which the political elements are contained within a theological discourse that pits Christ against the gods in general, not just against the imperial gods.
Much of the evidence for an imperial Christology suggests Christ is presented as one who is much more than the ideal (human) ruler. He is LORD, not just Lord. He reigns over the three-tiered cosmos, not just earth and sea (as did the Caesars). The syntax suggests the διό (“wherefore”) of verse 9 looks back all the way to pre-existence: it is because Christ is “in the form of God” that he was exalted by God; not just because he acts in human obedience and humility. In 3:20 he is much more than a typical Hellenistic Σωτήρ (Saviour) of cities in economic and political distress. He is the Saviour who will return from heaven to transform people to conformity to his own divine body.
Some items in the inventory of evidence that others put forward as evidence for the case for an imperial Christology are not straightforward indicators that 2:6–11 has a primarily political orientation. Passages in Philo’s Embassy to Gaius say that the third emperor adopted “many forms (πολυτρόπους μορφάς)” of gods, but not that Caligula was “ἐν μορφῇ θεοῦ ὑπάρχων”. Philo does not provide grounds for thinking “form of God” language was commonly used for rulers. In any case, the expression in Phil 2:6a is best interpreted as a way of relating Christ’s pre-existent identity to the proper, visible, or recognizable, outward character of the gods in pagan traditions. For the original audience, the words ἐν μορφῇ θεοῦ ὑπάρχων (at the start of the passage) would sound like a description of a divine being in heaven, not a ruler on earth who claims a divine identity.
Some think that Christ’s rejecting ἁρπαγμός refers to the belief that good rulers neither aggressively seize, plunder, nor snatch at a divine status. Verse 6 has been taken to reflect the convention, initiated by Augustus, of emperors refusing the offer of divine honours during their lifetimes (a recusatio). Following Augustus’ example, the Roman state approved instead a model according to which divine honours are only granted after death (for those deemed worthy of them). However, against this construal of the ἁρπαγμός clause there stand several historical and linguistic arguments. Words formed from the root ἁρπα– never appear in texts that criticize rulers, or other mortals, for their inappropriate claims to divinity. However, there was a conventional way of speaking about such self-aggrandizement. Hubristic rulers act for themselves (ἑαυτῷ) or upon themselves (ἑαυτόν) in acts of self-deification (so John 5:18). On the other hand, good emperors politely refuse (παραιτοῦμαι) divine honours, in a diplomatic formula that appears regularly in the texts, inscriptions and papyri. If Phil 2:6–11 seeks to praise Christ for rejecting a self-seeking self-deification it is puzzling that it does not echo either of these common linguistic patterns.
To understand better the nature of the relationship between Phil 2:6–11 and political traditions, it is as well that we take a step back and consider the variegated character of first-century ruler and emperor traditions. A brief survey of several centuries of Greek and then Roman forms of ruler cult suggests that if our text paints Christ with imperial hues the author must also have felt the need to negotiate a place for Christ amongst distinct and competing understandings of the relationship between the human ruler and the divine. From Alexander the Great onwards, patterns of ruler cult had always been contested, debated, ridiculed, and creatively reinvented. In particular, in the first century a distinction was made between the worship of living divine-and-human rulers and the official, Roman-state-sponsored, worship of posthumously deified emperors (the imperial divi). There were political (republican) and philosophical reasons why the latter was more acceptable than the former. Philippi was a Roman colony, modelled legally and architecturally on Rome itself, and such evidence that we have suggests the city’s imperial cult practices adhered to the distinction established by Augustus: at state level, there was worship of dead emperors who had experienced an apotheosis, but not living ones. This, at least, was what we think happened in Philippi’s forum. Though privately (in the domestic environment, in workplaces, and in cults organised below the level of the official civic authorities), worship of living emperors had probably been a practice since the city’s refoundation by Octavian in 30 B.C.E.
How does Phil 2:6–11 position its “imperial Christology” in relation to the variety of available ways for thinking about and honouring a ruler’s divinity? In the first place, it appears to consistently avoid any hint of Christ having a divine identity during his earthly life. Verses 7–8 lack an indication that the author thinks Christ fulfilled the role of a divine ruler before his death and exaltation. He is not the “image,” on earth, of God in heaven. He is not a “Saviour” or “benefactor” or “present god”. The contrast with Peter’s culturally adapted summary of the gospel story in the centurion’s house in Acts 10:34–43 is especially striking. This absence might suggest that Phil 2:6–11 has an imperial Christology tailored to the Philippians context: it says that Christ is divine only after his exaltation to a new status after death (vv. 9–11). That would be a Christology that conforms to the parameters of Roman state policy regarding divine emperors.
However, verses 7–8 of Philippians 2 are preceded by verse 6 and that verse contains language which, if it clearly denoted Christ’s earthly life or his posthumous status would be royal or imperial (μορφή θεοῦ and τὸ εἶναι ἴσα θεῷ). As it is, the syntax of verses 6–8 suggest that, although Christ does not have an overtly divine identity during his human life, his identity is nevertheless grounded in a divine pre-existence that interprets what follows. This is a strange kind of imperial identity by comparison to the usual patterns of Greek and Roman ruler cults.
Some have concluded from the several ways in which the second half of the hymn parallels pagan ruler traditions that verses 9–11 describe an apotheosis. However, apart perhaps from the gift of the supreme name, these verses lack features that would lead its first readers to that conclusion. As far as we know, prostration is not a typical feature of the worship of dead emperors. And stories of apotheosis contain elements that are lacking in Philippians: transportation to heaven (by clouds, an eagle, or a horse-drawn chariot) and the transformation of the ruler (so that they become fit for their new realm of existence). Also, the verb ὑπερυψόω “to highly exalt” (v. 9) is nowhere used in Greek accounts of apotheosis and common terms that are used in those texts (θεὸν γενέσθαι/θεὸς γίνομαι “to become a god/God,” ἀποθεόω/ἀποθέωσις “to deify/apotheosis,” for example) are not used in Philippians. Perhaps then verses 9–11 describe an exaltation of one who was already divine, not an apotheosis by which a mortal becomes divine.
Perhaps also it is a mistake, as John Barclay has argued, to focus too narrowly on a competitive relationship between Christ and the Caesars. Indeed, several considerations suggest that if the hymn’s worship of Christ has in its sights rival spiritual forces, the contrast is with the worship of the Olympian gods and lesser divine beings. The emperor appears nowhere explicitly in the hymn and the whole pagan pantheon is probably in view in the expression ἐπουρανίων καὶ ἐπιγείων καὶ καταχθονίων. Cultic realities in Philippi gave more prominence to the traditional gods than to the imperial ones and the account of Paul’s ministry in Acts 16 supports the working hypothesis that, for Paul and his first followers, the greatest conflict there was with traditional religion and its not, not with the imperial cult.
The results of this chapter are mixed. It provides qualified support for the now common view that Christ is depicted as a divine ruler in Phil 2:6–11 and 3:20–21. However, the lack of a neat fit, or polemical relationship, between the hymn and a clearly defined imperial theology suggest a quest to understand its Christology should consider other possibilities, especially the likelihood that there is a contrast between Christ and the olden gods (not just the new ones created by Rome’s Senate). It’s presentation of Christ may be primarily theological, rather than political.