Day 39, Sat, 24 Mar.: Philippians 2.5-11
I call this passage "The Big Vee". I'm not comparing it with St George Rugby League team's jersey, with its big red V on a white background. Far from it! In the world of biblical studies the study of who Jesus Christ is and was is called "Christology". Christology plays between the two poles of Jesus' humanity and His divinity. If you consider that Jesus was simply a human being, a man who may have said and done wonderful things and made an impact for good on the world, but ultimately was as the rest of us, you are said to have a "low" Christology. If, on the other hand, you are convinced that Jesus was God, who came to earth in the guise of a human, but was actually a heavenly being, then you are said to have a "high" Christology. Most Christologies situate Jesus somewhere between these two poles, though the differences between the poles seem paradoxical and irreconcilable.
"The Big Vee" that this famous hymn describes has the man Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God, Jesus the Christ descending from a highly exalted position to one that is unutterably low, then ascending on high once more. You may have already noticed that the Big Vee is the exact inversion of our human understanding of the proper order of things. We tend to strive towards the "top of the tree". In biology we talk about "apex predators" at "the top of the food chain". Even in democracies we tend to think that our relationships are to be hierarchical. Some years ago an American counted 10,000 role titles in that society, all of which designated where the occupier of the title fitted in a particular hierarchy.
For much of the Church's history the question of how all beings are related to each other was answered in detail by the concept of “the great chain of being”, a strict, religious, hierarchical structure, believed to have been decreed by God, that explained the place of all matter and life. The chain started from God and progressed downward to angels, demons (which were thought to be rebel angels), stars, the moon, kings, princes, nobles, common people, wild animals, domesticated animals, trees, other plants, precious stones, precious metals, and other minerals.
However, the great Chain of Being contradicts the Big Vee, and indeed it was not originally a Christian concept. It came from the great pre-Christian Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle, and was promoted several centuries into the Christian era by their successors, principally the pagan philosopher Plotinus. Christian theologians such as Augustine of Hippo were much influenced, particularly by Plotinus, and again during the Middle Ages and in early modern Neoplatonism
Jesus indeed turned all this on its head. And he did it by employing what in theological language is called "kenosis", that is, "emptying". One would think that as God's Son, and an aspect of the Godhead (that itself is hierarchical language) Jesus' status was as high as it possibly could be. Yet He emptied Himself of all that; and here the poem goes through the various stages of His degradation until its nadir, death on the cross.
Because Jesus emptied and humbled Himself and was obedient God exalted Him. The poem ends with the statement "Jesus is Lord". That flatly contradicts one of the two fake claims to fake power that held the Jews captive. The Roman emperor, through the emperor worship cult, claimed to be lord. By insisting that the risen Jesus was Lord the early Christians set themselves up to be persecuted. The other fake claim to power was that of the Jewish religious authorities. Ironically enough, the very word "hierarchy" means "rule of the priests".
This issue is forever old and forever current!
"The Big Vee" that this famous hymn describes has the man Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God, Jesus the Christ descending from a highly exalted position to one that is unutterably low, then ascending on high once more. You may have already noticed that the Big Vee is the exact inversion of our human understanding of the proper order of things. We tend to strive towards the "top of the tree". In biology we talk about "apex predators" at "the top of the food chain". Even in democracies we tend to think that our relationships are to be hierarchical. Some years ago an American counted 10,000 role titles in that society, all of which designated where the occupier of the title fitted in a particular hierarchy.
For much of the Church's history the question of how all beings are related to each other was answered in detail by the concept of “the great chain of being”, a strict, religious, hierarchical structure, believed to have been decreed by God, that explained the place of all matter and life. The chain started from God and progressed downward to angels, demons (which were thought to be rebel angels), stars, the moon, kings, princes, nobles, common people, wild animals, domesticated animals, trees, other plants, precious stones, precious metals, and other minerals.
However, the great Chain of Being contradicts the Big Vee, and indeed it was not originally a Christian concept. It came from the great pre-Christian Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle, and was promoted several centuries into the Christian era by their successors, principally the pagan philosopher Plotinus. Christian theologians such as Augustine of Hippo were much influenced, particularly by Plotinus, and again during the Middle Ages and in early modern Neoplatonism
Jesus indeed turned all this on its head. And he did it by employing what in theological language is called "kenosis", that is, "emptying". One would think that as God's Son, and an aspect of the Godhead (that itself is hierarchical language) Jesus' status was as high as it possibly could be. Yet He emptied Himself of all that; and here the poem goes through the various stages of His degradation until its nadir, death on the cross.
Because Jesus emptied and humbled Himself and was obedient God exalted Him. The poem ends with the statement "Jesus is Lord". That flatly contradicts one of the two fake claims to fake power that held the Jews captive. The Roman emperor, through the emperor worship cult, claimed to be lord. By insisting that the risen Jesus was Lord the early Christians set themselves up to be persecuted. The other fake claim to power was that of the Jewish religious authorities. Ironically enough, the very word "hierarchy" means "rule of the priests".
This issue is forever old and forever current!
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