The Daily Office · Philippians 2:5–8
He emptied himself
Philippians 2:5–8
5Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,
6who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,
7but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
8And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
What's happening here
These four verses are one of the oldest Christian texts in the New Testament — almost certainly a hymn Paul inherited and quoted, not composed. He drops it into a letter to a church squabbling about status and the logic is devastating: you are fighting over who comes first, and here is what God did about his own rank. The passage tracks a descent — Godhead, human form, slave, cross — before its late reversal. But the center of gravity of the whole hymn is one verb.
The word that matters
Greek · to empty, to pour out completely
Kenoo literally means to drain a container until nothing remains. Paul's hymn does not say Jesus set aside his glory for a while, like an actor removing a costume. It says he poured it out. The theological ink spilled over what exactly this means is endless; the moral claim is simpler. Whatever privilege you are clutching, Jesus had more, and he did the opposite.
Where else this shows up
Isaiah 53:12
"He poured out his soul to death." The Suffering Servant text the hymn is almost certainly reaching back to.
John 13:3–5
Jesus, knowing he came from God, does the kenoo in miniature: gets up from supper, takes off his outer garment, wraps a towel around himself, and begins to wash feet.
2 Corinthians 8:9
"Though he was rich, for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich." Paul running the same move in a different register.