Wednesday, June 08, 2005

Philippians 2:16

Textus Receptus:
λογον ζωης επεχοντες εις καυχημα εμοι εις ημεραν χριστου οτι ουκ εις κενον εδραμον ουδε εις κενον εκοπιασα

King James:
Holding forth the word of life; that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain.

Comments:
Holding forth the word of life: In Greek the word for "holding forth" is the word "having" with the word for "upon" prefixed to it. The idea communicated by the phrase is similar to the point of verses 12 and 13. They already have the word of life. Now they need to have it out.

that I may rejoice: Literally, this phrase is "toward boasting-glorying-rejoicing." He uses the same word for "rejoice" in chapter 1:26 and chapter 3:3. The same word is translated as "glory" in Galatians 6:14.

in vain: Literally, this phrase is "toward vanity." Paul uses the same word for "vanity" here that he combined with "glory" in verse 3 to describe the shallowness of self-promotion and which he used as a verb in verse 7 to describe the willing self-humiliation of Christ.

Expanded Paraphrase: As all of you who are believers in Philippi take the word of life which is in you and hold it out for the world to see, I will be moved toward glory as Christ's return approaches, rather than toward vanity--since otherwise I would have run my race and worn myself weary with labor for no benefit.

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