“the fellowship of his sufferings”

I’ve been immersed in the letters of Paul for the last two weeks as I’m preparing to teach on that subject for BBS next month.  I’ll try to share some of my findings here over the next few posts, beginning today with Philippians 3:2-11.

I was drawn to this text in light of the question, Who was Paul?  Indeed, in this text, Paul outlines as explicitly as he does anywhere else the details of his personal identity.  Thus, in terms of determining the identity of the man to whom is ascribed the majority of words in the New Testament, this seemed to be as good a place to start as any.

the Apostle Paul

Philippians 3:2-11 is notable for Paul’s usage of the language of “losses” (also could be translated as “damages”) and “gains”.  Those features of Paul’s life which he regarded as gains or benefits he came to regard as losses for the sake of his relationship to Jesus Christ.  If we line up Paul’s gains and losses, as the structure of Paul’s rhetoric suggests we might, some fruitful interpretive possibilities begin to emerge.

Following the Greek, I count seven losses in Christ (gains from the perspective of life apart from Christ) and seven gains in Christ (losses from the perspective of life apart from Christ).  This, then, is how they line up.

Losses in Christ (vv. 5-6)                           Gains in Christ (vv. 9-10)

1. circumcised on the eighth day . . . . . . be found in him [Christ]

2. from the people of Israel . . . . righteousness from faith of Christ

3. from the tribe of Benjamin . . . righteousness from God upon faith

4. a Hebrew of Hebrews . . . . . . . . . . . . to know him [Christ]

5. as to the law a Pharisee . . . . . . and the power of his resurrection

6. as to zeal a persecutor of the church . . fellowship of his sufferings

7. blameless under the law . . . . . . . . being conformed to his death

Though many of the losses in Christ, on the one hand, and gains in Christ, on the other, may be synonymous, seeing each as distinct uncovers rich nuances in meaning.  Paying attention to distinctions enables us, as we’ve done above, to match losses with gains.  A few of those matches may be worth commenting on.

For example, a direct contrast might be seen between Paul’s first line of loss and gain, his circumcision as a Jew on the eighth day and being “found in Christ”.  Whereas circumcision was the rite by which males born to Jewish families became forever incorporated into the people of God, Paul prefers rather now “to be found”—not among his own people—but “in Christ”.

We might draw another contrast from Paul being, “according to righteousness under the law, blameless” (line 7 above) and Paul “being conformed to the death [of Christ]”.  According to the law, Jesus himself in his death on the cross was not righteous but precisely “cursed” (Gal 3:13/Deut 21:23), though to God the cross revealed his righteousness, later sealed by his resurrection.  Having been found in Christ, Paul too seeks the righteousness of Christ “by becoming like him in his death” (3:10 NRSV)—not the righteousness “that comes from the law” (3:9).  It is no longer to the law but to God himself whom Paul desires to be “blameless”.

A third contrast can be found on line 6, between Paul formerly being a zealous “persecutor of the church” to Paul sharing in “the fellowship [Greek: koinonia] of [Christ’s] sufferings”.  In Christ, Paul now suffers with that very community upon which he once inflicted pain.  The enemies of his zeal have become the fellowship of his joy.  Likewise, it is this “fellowship of Christ’s suffering”, the church, which is the key to understanding the letters of Paul.  It is to the church that he wrote, urging its members on to faithfulness to God and love for one another amidst suffering, the cause for which Paul counted all else as loss in Christ.

-Joe