Archaic KJV Word
Fashion
Modern equivalent: form
What Was Lost
The incarnational weight. Christ was found 'in fashion as a man' -- He was shaped, formed, made into human appearance. The word described the visible form the invisible God took on. It was not about clothing but about the shape of embodied existence. Fashion was about what something was made into, not what it wore.
Closest Survivor in Modern English
fashion (as a verb: 'to fashion something' still means 'to shape/form it')
Peak Usage (1611)
KJV Philippians 2:8 -- 'Being found in fashion as a man'; Mark 2:12 -- 'We never saw it on this fashion'
Died ~1850
Narrowed from 'form/shape/appearance/manner' (Old French facon from Latin factio 'a making') to primarily 'clothing trends and style industry,' trivializing a word about essence into a word about accessorizing.
What Replaced It
“form”
Abstract; fashion-as-form meant the visible, tangible shape something took -- how it appeared to observation
“appearance”
Passive; fashion implied the act of being fashioned/shaped into a form
“manner”
Behavioral; fashion was physical and visible -- how something looked and was structured