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`Behold, there was a man named Joseph, a counsellor ... this man went unto Pilate, and begged the body of
Jesus'.
The Greek reads Ioseph bouleutes huparchon. Do I understand you to believe that Joseph of Arimathaea ceased
to be a `counsellor' as soon as he begged the body of Jesus?
A - No, I see no necessity.
B - Turn again to Acts 2:30,31 and read:
A - 'Therefore being a prophet ... spake of the resurrection'.
B - The Greek reads prophetes oun huparchon. Do you believe that David ceased to be a prophet when he spoke
of the resurrection of Christ?
A - No, I do not; what is your purpose in these examples?
B - My purpose is to show by these parallels that there is no warrant for assuming that Christ `ceased to be in the
form of God' when `He emptied Himself and took upon Him the form of a servant'.
A - I cannot agree with you, for the Lord Jesus was certainly not in the form of God when He walked the earth.
The Samaritan woman when she saw Him said, `How is it that thou, being a Jew', and that is evidently the `form'
that all saw.
B - We can go no further until we have studied the expression `form of God', for you evidently look upon the
word as being synonymous with `figure' or `shape'. The word form is a translation of the Greek word morphe, and
is simply the same word twisted round as it passed through the Latin. It occurs only three times in the New
Testament, Mark 16:12, Philippians 2:6,7. In the LXX we find it translated in Isaiah 44:13 as `figure' and in Job
4:16 as `form'. Job makes a distinction between `form' and `image', saying `I could not discern the form, an image
was before mine eyes'. When Christ said concerning the Father, `Ye have not ... nor seen His shape' (John 5:37) the
word is eidos, not morphe. Morphe is used by the LXX to translate the Chaldee `splendour' in the Book of Daniel.
The True Meaning of `FORM'
In Daniel we have the record of the humbling of Nebuchadnezzar. There we read that he was driven into the
fields and ate grass like an ox. When the time came for his restoration we read:
`And for the glory of my kingdom, mine honour and brightness (morphe) returned unto me' (Dan. 4:36).
There is no idea that Nebuchadnezzar meant that his shape changed, for the Chaldee word used does not allow
the thought. Even the word shape bore something more than external figure, as may be seen in Shakespeare's King
Lear. Like Nebuchadnezzar, King Lear had left his throne, but as a result of his daughter's wickedness he says:
`Thou shalt find that I'll resume the shape which thou dost think I have cast off for ever'.
Hooker and Bacon
The A.V. was made in the year A.D. 1611. In A.D. 1594 Hooker wrote his Ecclesiastical Policy, and in A.D. 1620
Bacon wrote his Novum Organon. These writers come on either side of the date of the A.V. They are both writers
who used language with precision. Hooker says:
`Form in other creatures is a thing proportional unto soul in living creatures'.
The modern meaning `figure' or `shape' cannot possibly fit this definition except in the world of crystals where
shape is inherent and essential. Bacon says:
`The form of a nature is such that, given the form, the nature infallibly follows. Therefore it is always present
when the nature is present, and universally implies it, and is constantly inherent in it. Again the form is such,
that if it be taken away, the nature infallibly vanishes'.