Last Adam Nevertheless, in talking of Christ as refusing to use for his own advantage or exploit for himself the godhead which was his, v. 6 might "also" be contrasting his humility (in becoming human and dying the death of a slave) with the presumptuous aspiration of Adam (and Eve) to enjoy illegitimate equality with God and become "like God" (). Whether one accepts the wider circle of references to Adam or limits oneself to the clear references in and 1 Corinthians 15, the New Testament used Adamic language to express the being of Jesus and, even more, his task and goal.
Last Adam doubtful by what follows. This divine status and mode of existence stand in counterpoint (the emphatic "but" of "but he emptied himself") to the subsequent state of "assuming the form of a slave", "being born in human likeness", and "being found in human form" (). It is what is said in v. 7 that "first" puts Christ with the community of human beings and their collective image., Adam. Christ belonged to the eternal sphere of divine existence () and joined the human (and Adamic) sphere only when he assumed another mode of existence () which concealed his proper (divine) being.