Topic
Prize
4 passages cited, from 2 classic reference works.
These works date from 1896–1915 and are in the public domain. They reflect the Protestant scholarship of their time: their history, archaeology and dates can be out of date, and where they interpret, other traditions read the text differently. The verses are shown in the King James Version, the wording these works were written against.
The verses
The passages the works cite, those cited by more of them first.
- 1 Corinthians 9:24ISBE · Nave A reward of merit
Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.
- Philippians 3:14ISBE · Nave FIGURATIVE
I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
- Zechariah 11:13ISBE
And the LORD said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the LORD.
- Philippians 2:6ISBE
Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
In the reference works
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915) · 5 references
priz: Two Greek words are so rendered in English Versions of the Bible:
(1) brabeion, the award to the victor in the Greek games, consisting of a garland of bay, olive, or pine; so called because it was given by the brabeus, the adjudicator who assigned the prize at the games (Vulgate bravium, from which may be derived the English "brave" = originally gaily dressed, handsome). Used literally in 1Co 9:24, and figuratively of the heavenly reward for Christian character in Php 3:14.
(2) harpagmos, in the English Revised Version of Php 2:6, "counted it not a prize to be on an equality with God." The termination -uos, -mos, would lead us to expect the active sense: "an act of grasping," "plundering" (the King James Version "robbery"), which would imply that Christ did not deem it an act of usurpation to claim equality with God, for such equality was His inherent right. But the context demands a reference "not to the right which He claimed, but to the dignity which He renounced" (Lightfoot); hence, the majority of modern expositors take the word in a passive sense (= harpagma): "a thing to be seized, prized, retained at all costs as a booty" (the English Revised Version "a prize," the American Standard Revised Version "a thing to be grasped"), implying that Christ did not regard equality with God as a thing to be clutched greedily, but waived His rights (see Lightfoot on Php 2:6). The verb "to prize" occurs only in Zec 11:13.
See GRASP; HUMILIATION OF CHRIST; KENOSIS.
D. Miall Edwards
In the topical indexes
Texts: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915); Nave's Topical Bible (1896), from the CrossWire SWORD modules (public domain). Verse references were parsed from the works' own markup and checked against the KJV verse list.