The Christological Hymn of Philippians 2 should be Interpreted in light of Gen 1!

Today, while I was proctoring the midterm exam of the Paul course, I was reading Jerome Murphy-O’Connor’s Paul: A Critical Life (1996). In his section on Paul and the Philippian community, he argues that the famous Christological hymn in Philippians 2 should be read through an Adamic typology lens, hence, vis-a-vis Genesis 1. At that moment, I experienced a kind of intellectual epiphany and realized that Jerome MOC’s explanation is actually the best one I’ve encountered so far.

The Christological hymn has always been used to claim an early notion of pre-existence in the New Testament and has been lined up with John’s Prologue on the Word in order to prove, among other things, the notion that even biblical writers had some idea of Christ’s divinity that early on in the tradition. Well, Philippians 2 is actually based on a re-reading of Genesis 1. Adam, made in God’s image (hence, the mention of Jesus as being in the “form” of God), fell from grace and did not fulfill his original destiny of being God’s glorious image but instead had to be subjected to the punishment of a life as a slave - toiling, experiencing hardship and eventually dying. Christ, on the other hand, was faithful all throughout to God’s will and did not deserve any punishment at all. However, he freely subjected himself to the lot of Adam and thus he can be humanity’s rightful saviour and was raised to the glory that Adam was supposed to have attained if he had not fell.

This Adamic typology of course makes so much sense because Paul elaborates on it in other parts of his corpus of works such as in the letter to the Romans 5.

Jerome MOC’s insight is of course not a new thing. As he states in his book (p. 227), he already wrote about it back in 1976 and James D.G. Dunn also wrote about it in 1980. It’s just a wonder why I never paid attention to this aspect of Philippians 2 up until today!

Thanks, Jerome Murphy-OC for this insight. Intellectual epiphanies are what make an academic dedicated to the pursuit of truth and learning so happy. I cherish and relish them!