4:10a

He who descended: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as He who descended is literally “the one having descended himself.” The pronoun He refers to Christ. It is an emphatic form. Try to translate this clause in a way that shows this emphasis.

Here are some other ways to translate this phrase:

And the same one who descended (New Living Translation (2004))
-or-
So the one who came down (Good News Translation)

descended: See how you translated descended in 4:9b.

4:10b

is the very One who ascended: The very One means “the same one.”

ascended: The verb ascended means “to go up.” It has the opposite meaning of “descended” in 4:9b and 4:10a.

above all the heavens: The word heavens here refers to the sky. It contrasts with “earthly regions” in 4:9b. Paul is using figurative language to say that Jesus is superior to any created being. Be careful not to translate heavens in a way that sounds as if Christ were in a higher place than God.

Here are some other ways to translate this clause:

is the same one who went into the highest heaven (Contemporary English Version)
-or-
is the same One who went up above all the sky (New Century Version)

4:10c

in order to fill all things: Most commentators believe that this refers to Christ being present everywhere in the universe.

Here are some other ways to translate this clause:

to fill the whole universe with his presence (Good News Translation)
-or-
so that he might fill the entire universe with himself (New Living Translation (2004))

© 1999, 2019 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.