Evidence · Case 04 · The Trinity
An early hymn quoted by Paul, Philippians 2:6-11
One exhibit from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.
Many scholars regard this passage as a hymn already in use before Paul quoted it, which would push it into the first couple of decades after Jesus; others, such as Gordon Fee, think Paul composed it himself, which still dates it to the letter, around AD 60 to 62. Either way it says every tongue should “confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,” applying an exclusive-worship text from Isaiah to Jesus.
Sources
Philippians 2:6-11, NASB.
Objections & responses
- Couldn’t the hymn describe Jesus as a second Adam who, unlike Adam, did not grasp at equality with God and was exalted afterward? On that reading he becomes Lord at the resurrection and wasn’t divine before.
The Adam-Christology reading, associated with James Dunn, is a serious scholarly option. Its problems are that the hymn says Jesus was in the form of God before emptying himself, that he became in human likeness, which implies prior existence, and that the exaltation gives him the name above every name, which in Isaiah 45:23 belongs to YHWH alone. Most scholars, including many who are not conservative, read the hymn as presupposing preexistence. Both readings are worth knowing; the textual support for preexistence is the stronger.