Biblion Bible Commentary
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He Emptied Himself
Philippians 2:7-8
7 but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men. · WEB
Seven steps downward, each one voluntary — and the last two are added as though the descent had not already gone far enough.
But emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men.
The verb means to empty out, and the sentence does not say what was poured away. What it does say is what was taken up — the form of a servant, using the same word morphē as verse 6, so the servanthood is as real an expression of him as the divine form was. Nothing is described as laid aside; something is described as assumed.
The steps run downward in order. In the form of God. Emptied. Servant's form. Human likeness. Found in human fashion.
Then verse 8 adds two more, and the second is added almost as an afterthought that stops the reader: he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death — yes, the death of the cross.
Death would have been the bottom. The cross is lower, because crucifixion was reserved for slaves and rebels and was the one death a Roman citizen could not suffer. A hymn sung in a Roman colony reaches its lowest point at the execution that town's citizens were legally exempt from.
And every verb is reflexive. He emptied himself; he humbled himself. Nothing was done to him that he did not do.
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