By avoiding complaining and arguing within the community, the Philippian Christians may become innocent and pure. The adjective innocent is often used to characterize someone who is flawless in the sight of other people, while pure means literally “unmixed” or “unadulterated.” The latter term is used of wine not mixed with water and of metal that contains no alloy. It is often used to describe inward purity and sincerity (e.g. Matt 10.16; Rom 16.19).
The phrase so that introduces purpose. If, however, verse 14 is so restructured as to make complaining or arguing the principle verbs, it may not be easy to indicate clearly the purpose involved in verse 15. It may be necessary to refer back to the contents of verse 14 by saying “you should refrain from complaining and arguing so that you may be innocent and pure.”
In many languages the closest equivalent of innocent is “not guilty.” It is also possible to use a phrase such as “you will have nothing to be blamed for.” In some languages the closest equivalent is an idiomatic expression, for example, “there will be no mark against you,” or there will be nothing weighed against you.
It is possible in some instances to translate pure as “nothing wrong in you,” or “no badness in your heart.”
As God’s perfect children, who live in a world of corrupt and sinful people represents a more natural restructuring of the literal “children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation” (American Standard Version). These words are adapted from the “Song of Moses” (Deut 32.5 Septuagint). The adjective rendered perfect (New English Bible “faultless”) is generally used in connection with sacrifices. Only a “spotless” and thus “perfect” sacrifice is fit to be offered to God. In the New Testament, the adjective is usually employed to portray what a Christian is and should be in the sight of God (Eph 1.4; Col 1.22; Jude 24; Rev 14.4-5). God’s perfect children may be rendered as “God’s completely good children.” The same sense may be expressed negatively as “God’s children in whom there is nothing bad.”
In the original setting in Deuteronomy, corrupt and sinful people refers to the erring Israelites; but Paul applies it to the hostile world, not to the Christian community at Philippi. The word rendered sinful means literally “twisted” or “distorted,” denoting an abnormal moral condition. It can also be rendered “perverted” (Goodspeed Barclay), or “depraved” (New American Bible). A world of corrupt and sinful people may be expressed as “a world filled with corrupt and sinful people,” or “a world in which corrupt and sinful people live.” The closest equivalent of corrupt may be in some languages very bad, and sinful may be rendered as “those who constantly sin,” or “those who habitually do what is bad.”
There are several possible ways of rendering the next clause, which is literally “among whom you appear (are seen) as luminaries in the world.” Some of the older commentators insisted that the middle verb should be taken in the sense of “appear,” “become visible,” or “are seen.” Most modern translators, however, render the verb as “shine,” but they are divided as to whether it should be taken as indicative or imperative. The context appears to require the imperative, thus you must shine (Good News Translation Barclay). The Greek noun rendered “luminaries” is commonly used in the Septuagint to refer to the heavenly bodies, the sun, the moon, and the stars (Gen 1.14, 16 Septuagint). Rather than a generic term such as “lights” (King James Version Revised Standard Version), most modern translations use (on the basis of similar expressions in the Septuagint of Dan 12.3) a more specific term, “stars,” to render this Greek word (New English Bible Jerusalem Bible New American Bible Good News Translation). Since the expression “like stars in the world” is somewhat awkward, some modern translators change it to “like stars in the dark world” (Goodspeed Moffatt New English Bible Biblia Dios Habla Hoy). Although the Greek word kosmos usually means “world,” it can also mean “sky” accordingly, one can render the expression as “like stars in the sky” (New American Bible Bible en français courant Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch), or, even more vividly, like stars lighting up the sky.
A literal rendering of you must shine among them like stars lighting up the sky may not be very meaningful in some languages, since good behavior is not normally regarded as “shining.” Nevertheless, it is probably better to retain this figure of speech, since it can be comprehended, at least in some measure, and it is not likely to cause special problems of understanding.
Quoted with permission from Luo, I-Jin. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Paul’s Letter to the Philippians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1977. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .