I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere and in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.
Parallel translations
- WEB I know how to be humbled, and I know also how to abound. In everything and in all things I have learned the secret both to be filled and to be hungry, both to abound and to be in need.
- KJV I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.
- BSB I know how to live humbly, and I know how to abound. I am accustomed to any and every situation—to being filled and being hungry, to having plenty and having need.
- NASB I know how to get along with little, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need.
- NLT I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Paul has learned the secret of contentment in both plenty and need, in every circumstance. His peace is independent of his outward conditions.
Overview
Paul knows the full range of human experience, from abundance to hunger, and has discovered the 'secret' of being content in all of it. This is no Stoic self-sufficiency but a contentment rooted in Christ, as the next verse makes clear. His example assures believers that stability of soul is possible whatever their circumstances.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Matt 11:29Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart; and you will find rest for your souls.
- 2 Cor 12:7–10By reason of the exceeding greatness of the revelations, that I should not be exalted excessively, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, that I should not be exalted excessively.
- 2 Cor 11:27in labor and travail, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, and in cold and nakedness.
- 2 Cor 11:9When I was present with you and was in need, I wasn’t a burden on anyone, for the brothers, when they came from Macedonia, supplied the measure of my need. In everything I kept myself from being burdensome to you, and I will continue to do so.
- 2 Cor 6:4–10but in everything commending ourselves, as servants of God, in great endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses,
- Deut 32:10He found him in a desert land, in the waste howling wilderness. He surrounded him. He cared for him. He kept him as the apple of his eye.
- Isa 8:11For Yahweh spoke thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed me not to walk in the way of this people, saying,
- 1 Cor 4:9–13For, I think that God has displayed us, the apostles, last of all, like men sentenced to death. For we are made a spectacle to the world, both to angels and men.
- 2 Cor 10:1Now I Paul, myself, entreat you by the humility and gentleness of Christ; I who in your presence am lowly among you, but being absent am bold toward you.
- Neh 9:20You gave also your good Spirit to instruct them, and didn’t withhold your manna from their mouth, and gave them water for their thirst.
- Jer 31:19Surely after that I was turned, I repented; and after that I was instructed, I struck on my thigh: I was ashamed, yes, even confounded, because I bore the reproach of my youth.’
- Eph 4:20–21But you did not learn Christ that way;
- 2 Cor 10:10For, “His letters”, they say, “are weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech is despised.”
- Matt 13:52He said to them, “Therefore every scribe who has been made a disciple in the Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who is a householder, who brings out of his treasure new and old things.”
- 2 Cor 11:7Or did I commit a sin in humbling myself that you might be exalted, because I preached to you God’s Good News free of charge?
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The one who, being in the form of God, emptied himself to the point of death on a cross and was exalted to the name above every name — the joy and prize of the believer.
How Philippians 4:12 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.