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Phil. 2: 6, 7. In the LXX we find it translated in Isa. 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."
Bacon could not have meant external shape by form here.
A.--It looks as though Hooker, Bacon, Shakespeare and the A.V. used the word form in
a much deeper sense than we do at present, and more akin to the usage of the LXX in
Dan. 4:
B.--Let me take an illustration from the works of God. Water is composed of two gases
in chemical combination: Hydrogen and Oxygen. The chemical formula for water is
H2O. The word formula is but the diminutive of forma, the Latin for morphe. Bacon's