Annual Meeting, Evangelical Theological Society, 2010

Dr. Michael S. Heiser, Logos Bible Software; [email protected]

Should the Plural of Psalm 82

Be Understood as Men or Divine Beings?

1. Introduction
Psalm 82 has long been a nuisance for Jewish and Christian interpreters. The very first verse assaults
theological sensitivities:

God

( )stands in the divine assembly; in the midst of the gods ( )he passes judgment.

The first occurrence of is correctly translated God obviously to be taken as singular for

reasons of grammatical subject-verb agreement (

). The second is equally obvious as a
plural since it is the object of the preposition () . One cannot be in the midst of one (and for

anyone thinking of the Trinity here, as we will see, that presumption in this verse leads to heretical
theology no one in this room would embrace). The grammar and syntax are crystal clear. The God of
Israel is, in Psalm 82, presiding over a groupa council () of

. The plurality point is also

echoed in verses 6-7 where the suffer the loss of their immortality:

I said, You are gods (

), even sons of the Most High () , all of you;

nevertheless, like humans you will die, and fall like any prince.

But how can this be? How could the psalmist tolerate the existence of multiple within the

context of Israelite monotheism? How can the Hebrew Bible affirm plural in this psalm and yet
deny that there are other gods in other passages?

These questions telegraph why so many Jewish and Christian (evangelical) interpreters argue that the
plural of Psalm 82 are humans. Seeing these as divine beings is viewed as a threat to
monotheism, the heart of biblical theology. Making them human is the easiest path to removing the
problem. But is this correct? My answer is No. In this paper, I hope to show why arguing that these

are human beings is inescapably incoherent and, more importantly, completely unnecessary for
defending the real point of a monotheistic biblical theology. Toward that end, I will address how an
Israelite would have understood the term , thereby providing a corrective to our own mistaken

understanding. This will help us see that plural are no threat to monotheism. Ill then provide a

positive defense that the plural in Psalm 82 are divine beings by highlighting some transparent

details from the text why the plural in Psalm 82 cannot be humans. Lastly, Ill take a negative
approach, demonstrating that there is no coherent argument in favor of the human identification.

2. The Meaning of
2.1. The Variety of
Anyone who works in the Hebrew text and not English translations of the Old Testament will; readily
detect that there are actually five different entities referenced as in the Hebrew Bible.
A. Yahweh, the God of Israel (over 2000 times)

B. The of Yahwehs heavenly council, both loyal and disloyal (Psa 82; Psa 89; cf. Deut
32:8-9, 43; Psa 58:11 1)
0F

C. The gods of foreign nations (e.g., 1 Kings 11:33)

D. Demons (Deut 32:17 2)
1F

E. The disembodied human dead (1 Sam 28:13)

F. Angels (Gen 35:7 cf. the context of the plural predicator with subject 3)
2F

There is a text-critical issue with this instance. For text-critical reasons, as well as reasons of literary parallelism,
MT consonantal should be vocalized or emended to .
See Marvin E. Tate, Psalms 51-100 (WBC 20;
Dallas: Word, 2002) 82; Mitchell Dahood, Psalms II:51-100 (AB 16; New York: Doubleday, 1968) 57; M. Heiser,
Should ( lh m) with Plural Predication Be Translated Gods? Bible Translator 61:3 (July 2010): 135-136.
2

See M. Heiser. Does Deuteronomy 32:17 Assume or Deny the Reality of Other Gods? Bible Translator 59:3 (July
2008): 137-145.

See M. Heiser, Should ( lh m) with Plural Predication Be Translated Gods? Bible Translator 61:3 (July

2010): 135-136; cf. Dr. Heisers other 2010 ETS paper, What is/are (an) elohim? available for download at:
http://www.thedivinecouncil.com/WhatisareanelohimETS2010.pdf.

This fact alone should immediately and unambiguously tell us that the word ought not be
identified with one particular set of attributes. That is our fundamental mistake. We are accustomed to
equating the word spelled g-o-d with the God of Israel and his unique attributes. As a result, the idea
that other gods are indeed realeven if that is what the biblical text saysis something to escape or
obscure.
But the Hebrew text should not be translated or exegeted so that it conforms to our theological
expectations or needs. Yet that is precisely what many translators and scholars do in Psalm 82 in the
name of fidelity to the unique God. We ought to know intuitively that the biblical writers would not
equate Yahweh in an ontological or qualitative sense with demons, angels, the human disembodied
dead, the gods of the nations, or subservient members of Yahwehs own council. as a term
does not refer to a set of attributes or ontology. Those issues are not explicated by a term; they are
described in the Hebrew Bible. So what does mean then?
2.2. What

Denotes

All the figures called in the Hebrew Bible have one thing in common: they all inhabit the nonhuman realm. That is, they are by nature not part of the world of humankind, a world of necessary
embodiment. is what I call a place of residence term. It identifies the proper domain of the
entity described by it. It labels the entity in terms of its residence, if you will. Yahweh, the lesser gods,
angels, demons, and the disembodied dead are all rightful inhabitants of the spiritual (i.e., non-human)
world. They may be able to cross over to our world, as Scripture tells us, and certain humans may be
transported to their realm (prophets; Enoch), but their proper domain and our proper domain are two
separate places. Within the spiritual world there is ontological differentiation, rank, and power: Yahweh
is an , but no other is Yahweh. That was what an orthodox Israelite believed about
Yahweh. He was not one among equals; he was species unique. Our modern term (17th century)
monotheism is deficient for describing this, since it carries the mental baggage of identifying g-o-d
with a single set of attributes held only by Yahweh. However, the thought behind the termthat
Yahweh is utterly and eternally uniqueremains completely intact. Our translations and our theology
ought to make this clear. We have nothing to fear from letting the text say what it says.

3. Positively: Why the of Psalm 82:1 are Divine Beings

The plural of Psalm 82:1 are called sons of the Most High in verse 6. We of course know that
for the Israelite, the Most High is Yahweh. Psalm 83:19 makes that equation explicitly. Elsewhere the
sons of God are very obviously divine beings (e.g., Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7-8). However, there is one passage,
Hosea 1:10, that uses a similar phrase of humans (sons of the living God), and Israelites on occasion
were referred to as Yahwehs son (Exo 4:22-23). How can we be sure that divine beings are in view in
Psalm 82?
3.1. Psalm 82 Should Not Be Isolated
If Psalm 82, with its plural in a council, were considered in isolation, we would be confronted
with ambiguity. That is not the case, though. We ought to interpret Scripture with Scripture. We can be
sure that Psalm 82 is not describing Yahweh presiding over a council or group of human judges for
several reasons readily discerned from the Hebrew Bible.
Rather than isolate Psalm 82, we need to ask whether there are any other passages that feature the
same language of divine plurality in a council found in Psalm 82 that rules out an equation of that
language with human beings. Fortunately, there is such a passage. Psalm 89:5-7 eliminates any
ambiguity with respect to the language in question.
5

Let the heavens praise your wonders, O LORD,

your faithfulness in the assembly ( )of the holy ones!

6

For who in the clouds ( )can be compared to the LORD?

Who among the sons of God/the gods (

7

)is like the LORD,

a God greatly to be feared in the council ( )of the holy ones,

and awesome above all who are around him?

Psalm 89 rules out the notion that Yahwehs council of sons of God refers to an assembly of
humans because it explicitly places that council in the clouds. There is no text in the entirety of the
Hebrew Bible that says or suggests that there are a group of human judges in the heavens ruling with
Yahweh over the nations. That position is offered only because of a perceived threat to monotheism,
not because it has any textual merit.
3.2. Deuteronomy as a Backdrop to Psalm 82
The fact that Psalm 82 has the council being judged for their corrupt administration also rules
out humans (not to mention the Trinity). This is clear when ones asks what the council were

supposed to be administrating corruptly. The answer is found in the last verse of the psalm, where the
psalmist implores the God of Israel to rise up and inherit all the nations. The lemma behind inherit

( )provides the wider contextual clue for the judgment of the psalm. This is precisely the same
lemma used to describe Yahwehs punitive judgment of the nations at the tower of Babel, when Yahweh
allotted the nations to the sons of God, and allotted those same divine beings to the nations that he was
disinheriting. The key passages are Deut 32:8-9 and its parallel, Deut 4:19-20:
Deut 32:8 When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance (lemma:

), when he

divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God

] .4 9 But the LORDs portion ( ) is his people, Jacob his allotted heritage
).
(

3F

Deut 4:19 Lest you lift up your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the
stars, all the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, whom
the LORD your God has allotted (

) to all the peoples under the whole heaven. 20 But the

LORD has taken you and brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be a people of his
own inheritance (

) , as you are this day.

These sons of God are not idols or mere astronomical objects; they were believed to be real spiritual
entities. This is readily discerned by reading through Deuteronomy with an eye to other gods.
In Deut 17:3 the host of heaven are referred to as other gods (

) , a phrase used

frequently in Deuteronomy, and are worshipped by Israelites in defiance of Deut 4:19-20. If one traces

through Deuteronomy, one discovers Deut 29:25-26, a passage that tells us clearly
that Israel went and served other gods (
) with language clearly echoed in Deut 32:89 and Deut 32:17.
Deut 29:25 Then people will say, It is because they abandoned the covenant of the LORD, the
God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt,
4

Textual critics of the Hebrew Bible are unanimous in agreement that the Qumran reading (in brackets) is superior

to the Masoretic text in Deut 32:8, which reads

( sons of Israel). See for example, P. W. Skehan, A

Fragment of the Song of Moses (Deut 32) from Qumran, BASOR 136 (1954) 12-15; idem, Qumran and the
Present State of Old Testament Text Studies: The Masoretic Text, JBL 78 (1959) 21; Julie Duncan, A Critical
b
e
h
j
b
k
Edition of Deuteronomy Manuscripts from Qumran, Cave IV. 4QDt , 4QDt , 4QDt , 4QDt , 4QDt , 4QDt ,
l
4QDt , (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1989); Emanuel Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis:
Fortress Press, 1992), 269; Eugene Ulrich et al., eds., Qumran Cave 4.IX: Deuteronomy to Kings (DJD XIV; Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1995), 75-79; Sanders, The Provenance of Deuteronomy 32, 156; J. Tigay, Deuteronomy, The JPS
Torah Commentary (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1996), 514-518.


) and worshiped them, gods whom they
had not known (

) and whom he had not allotted ( ) to

26 and went and served other gods (

them.

Deut 32:17 They sacrificed to demons, not God (

) , gods they had never known

) , new ones that had come recently, whom your fathers had never known

about.

The Deuteronomy 29 passage explicitly tells us that Israel worshipped gods whom they had not known
and whom he had not allotted to them. The reality of these

entities must be affirmed since

they are called demons. Anyone who respects the theological content of the text must affirm that
demons are real entities. That the host of heaven were spirit entities is also affirmed elsewhere in the
Hebrew Bible (1 Kgs 22:19-23; Job 38:7-8). And we cannot say these other are mere idols,
pieces of wood and stone, since demons are not wood and stone. 5
4F

3.3. The Wider Context of Ancient Canaan (Ugarit, Phoenicia)

The final positive argument that we have a council of divine beings in Psalm 82 concerns the comparative material.
As students of the Hebrew Bible know, the discovery of the Ugaritic material in 1929 provided a much more secure
context for understanding the Old Testament than Mesopotamia. The discovery effectively brought the era of Pan5

For the ancient polytheist and the Israelite who lived in the context of polytheistic nations, what we see in
Deuteronomy would not constitute a conundrum. While both the entity and the cult object are called a god, it cannot
be presumed that ancient people considered a humanly fabricated statue or fetish object to be identical with the god
in whose likeness it was fashioned. As one scholar of ancient cult objects notes: "When a non-physical being
manifested in a statue, this anchored the being in a controlled location where living human beings could interact
with it through ritual performance . . . In order for human beings to interact with deities and to persuade them to
create, renew, and maintain the universe, these beings had to be brought down to earth. . . . This interaction had to be
strictly controlled in order to avoid both the potential dangers of unrestricted divine power and the pollution of the
divine by the impurity of the human world. While the ability of deities to act in the visible, human realm was
brought about through their manifestation in a physical body, manifestation in one body did not in any sense restrict
a deity, for the non-corporeal essence of a deity was unlimited by time and space, and could manifest in all its
bodies, in all locations, all at one time" (Gay Robins, Cult Statues in Ancient Egypt, in Cult Image and Divine
Representation in the Ancient Near East [ASOR Book Series 10; ed. Neal H. Walls; Boston: American Schools of
Oriental Research, 2005], 1-2). Michael Dick, another scholar who has devoted two decades of attention to the
subject of idolatry in Israel and the ancient Near East, agrees. In his scholarly work on the subject, Dick cites a
number of texts where the ancient idolater used deity language for the product of his hands, but also made an
intellectual distinction between the statue and the deity it represented, or which was thought to take residence in the
statue (Michael P. Dick, Born in Heaven, Made on Earth: The Making of the Cult Image in the Ancient Near East
[Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1999], 33-34). In one telling citation, the destruction of the statue of Shamash of
Sippar was not regarded as the death of Shamash. Indeed, Shamash could still be worshipped.

Babylonianism to a close. The language of Ugarit proved to be the closest cognate to biblical Hebrew. Its
vocabulary provided exact or near exact equivalents to hundreds of words in the Hebrew Bible, many of which
were hapax legomena. Ugaritic literature also provided explicit parallels to a range of biblical passages.
Descriptions of a divine council and its

members were among those parallels, along with exact

parallels to names and epithets given to Yahweh, the God of Israel. Suffice it to say that these line-forline parallels are not contrived. Defending the human view of the in Yahwehs council would
not only require ignoring the context of other psalms and Deuteronomy, but it requires turning a blind
eye to psalms own historical and linguistic context. Those interested in this material can consult the
bibliography in the handout.

In summary of the positive arguments, it is misguided to assume that the plural of Psalm 82
who are being judged for their corrupt governance of the nations are humans. This approach lacks
coherence.

4. Negatively: Why the Human View of the Plural

of Psalm 82 is Without Support

4.1. The Judges of Israel

Perhaps the most familiar argument for the human view of

is the one that insists certain Old

Testament passages name the elders of Israel as judges. Once we look at the passages used for
that argument, well see that the argument lacks merit.

Exodus 22:6-8 [Eng., 22:7-9] is an important text in this argument. The translation used here is from the
JPS Tanakh:
6 When a man gives money or goods to another for safekeeping, and they are stolen from
the mans houseif the thief is caught, he shall pay double; 7 if the thief is not caught, the
owner of the house shall come near ( )to God ( )that he has not laid
hands on the others property. 8 In all charges of misappropriationpertaining to an ox,
an ass, a sheep, a garment, or any other loss, whereof one party alleges, This is itthe

case of both parties shall come before God (): he whom God ( )declares

guilty ( )shall pay double to the other. 6

5F

Scholars who deny that the plural in Ps 82:1 are divine beings assume that

and

in Exod 22:6-8 are human beings (the elder-judges of Israel) and take the results of that
assumption to argue that Psalm 82 is describing Israelite judges, not gods in a divine council. The plural
predicate in Exod 22:8 ( )allegedly supports this view, for surely the passage speaks of Israels
judges rendering decisions for the people. There are several problems with this use of the passage.

First, it is worth noting that these judges (if we presume for the moment that

and

are plural and referring to people) are rendering decisions for the nation of Israel not the nations of
the world as is the case in Psalm 82 and Deut 32. This contextual disconnect alone raises suspicions
about the merits of the use of the passage. The contextual incongruence aside, the argument here
actually depends on whether

and in verse 8 is to be taken as singular or plural, and

whether it in fact refers to human beings.

Behind the assumption that

and in Exod 22:8 are to be understood as semantically

plural human beings is the earlier story in Exodus, where Moses appointed judges at the suggestion of
his father-in-law, Jethro. This account is found in Exod 18:13-24. Note the occurrences of

carefully:

and

13 The next day, Moses sat as magistrate among the people, while the people stood
about Moses from morning until evening. 14 But when Moses father-in-law saw how
much he had to do for the people, he said, What is this thing that you are doing to the
people? Why do you act alone, while all the people stand about you from morning until
evening? 15 Moses replied to his father-in-law, It is because the people come to me
to inquire of God (). 16 When they have a dispute, it comes before me, and I
6

Tanakh: The Holy Scriptures: A New Translation of the Holy Scriptures According to the Traditional Hebrew Text
(Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society, 1985). The Tanakh translation follows the Hebrew versification.

decide between one person and another, and I make known the laws and teachings of
God. 17 But Moses father-in-law said to him, The thing you are doing is not right; 18
you will surely wear yourself out, and these people as well. For the task is too heavy for
you; you cannot do it alone. 19 Now listen to me. I will give you counsel, and God
( )be with you! You represent the people before God (): you bring the
disputes before God (), 20 and enjoin upon them the laws and the teachings,

and make known to them the way they are to go and the practices they are to follow. 21
You shall also seek out from among all the people capable men who fear God,
trustworthy men who spurn ill-gotten gain. Set these over them as chiefs of thousands,
hundreds, fifties, and tens, and 22 let them judge the people at all times. Have them
bring every major dispute to you, but let them decide every minor dispute themselves.
Make it easier for yourself by letting them share the burden with you. 23 If you do this
and God so commands youyou will be able to bear up; and all these people too will go
home unwearied. 24 Moses heeded his father-in-law and did just as he had said.

Taken at face value, there is nothing in Exodus 18 that compels us to understand or

as semantically plural, something that is essential for the notion that the men appointed in the episode
are a convenient explanation for the and of both Exod 22:8 and Psa 82. Each

occurrence of or in this passage can quite readily refer to the singular God of Israel.
And the same is true of Exodus 22. There is nothing in either passage that compels a plural translation. A
singular translation referring to God himself makes for a clear reading. The plural verb form is one
instance of several where the predicate conforms morphologically to a morphologically plural subject, in
this case ( see 1 Sam 28:13). Without compelling evidence for a plural translation, the argument

that the elders of Israel were judges turns to vapor. But even damaging is the fact that the men

appointed by Moses in Exodus 18 are never actually called or in the passage. This

account of the appointment of judges, then, is no support for seeing human in Psalm 82.

There is one other passage that speaks of in a context similar to that of Exod 22:8. Exodus 21:26 must be brought into the discussion:

2 When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go
out free, for nothing. 3 If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in
married, then his wife shall go out with him. 4 If his master gives him a wife and she
bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her masters, and he
shall go out alone. 5 But if the slave plainly says, I love my master, my wife, and my
children; I will not go out free, 6 then his master shall bring him to God (), 7
6F

and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost. And his master shall bore his ear
through with an awl, and he shall be his slave forever.

The interpretation is put forth that the master is commanded to bring the slave before the elder-judges
of Israel before piercing his ear, and that these judges are called . This position appears
coherent, but there are obstacles to its lucidity.

First, could be semantically singular, referring to the God of Israel, as was the case with Exod
18 and Exod 22. The promise about the status of the slave is being made in truth before God. This is the
simplest reading. However, there is evidence that the redactor-scribes responsible for the final form of
the text did not interpret as singularand also did not interpret a plurality as referring to
human beings! The key is the parallel passage in Deuteronomy 15. Later redactors apparently saw

as semantically plural since the parallel to it found in Deut 15:17 removes the word
from the instruction. This omission is inexplicable if the term was taken as singular, referring to YHWH.
Why would the God of Israel need to be removed from this text? Moreover, if

had been

construed as plural humans, Israels judges, the deletion is just as puzzling. What harm would there be if
the point of the passage was that Israels judges needed to approve the status of the slave? The excision
on the part of the Deuteronomist is quite understandable, though, if was intended as a
semantically plural word that referred to gods. Seventy years ago Cyrus Gordon pointed out that the
omission in Deuteronomy appears to have been theologically motivated. 8 Gordon argued that
7F

in Exod 21:6 referred to household gods like the teraphim of other passages. Bringing a
7

The Tanakh translation adds a note here: to the judges.

Cyrus H. Gordon, " in Its Reputed Meaning of Rulers, Judges," Journal of Biblical Literature 54 (1935):
139-44.
8

slave into ones home in patriarchal culture required the consent and approval of ones ancestors
departed human dead who were as we saw much earlier was the case in 1 Sam 28:13. Under a
later redaction this phrase was omitted in the wake of Israels struggle with idolatry. Only a plural
referring to multiple divine beings can coherently explain the deletion. As a result, this passage is also no
support for the plural human view.

4.2. Jesus Use of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34

A second strategy for arguing the plural of Psalm 82 are humans attempts to utilize the
quotation of Psalm 82:6 by Jesus in John 10:34. I would suggest that this text has been fundamentally
misunderstood by New Testament scholars who approach it with little or no background knowledge of
the divine council.
Briefly, the context of Jesus quotation is crucial. In John 10:30 he has just told his audience that he and
the Father were one. Jesus isnt going to follow that statement by essentially saying, I get to call myself
God because you mere mortals do it too by virtue of Psalm 82. That approach undermines Johns
presentation in this chapter of the deity of Jesus, yet this is precisely the trajectory one finds of all the
published material on John 10:34 and its use of Psalm 82.
This backdrop is important for interpreting the significance of Jesus quotation of Psalm 82:6 in John
10:34-35. I have never come across the view I have of this issue in print, and so it seems best to give the
full context of Jesus quotation in order to make my thoughts clear (John 10:22-42):
22

And it was at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication, and it was winter. 23 And Jesus walked in
the temple in Solomon's porch. 24 Then came the Jews round about him, and said to him, "How
long are you going to make us doubt? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly." 25 Jesus answered
them, "I told you, and you believed not: the works that I do in my Father's name, they bear
witness of me. 26 But you believe not, because you are not of my sheep, as I said to you. 27 My
sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 28 And I give to them eternal life;
and they shall never perish, neither shall anyone pluck them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who
gave them to me, is greater than all; and no one is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand. 30
I and my Father are one." 31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him. 32 Jesus answered
them, "Many good works have I shown you from my Father; for which of those works do you
stone me?" 33 The Jews answered him, saying, "For a good work we would not stone you; but for
blasphemy; and because that you, being a man, make yourself God."
The quotation of Psalm 82:6 follows:

Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law: 'I said, you are gods?' 35 If he [God]
called them gods, to whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; 36 do
you say of him whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world, 'You blaspheme!'
because I said, I am the Son of God? 37 If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. 38 But
if I do, though you don't believe me, believe the works: that you may know, and believe, that
the Father is in me, and I in him." 39 Therefore they sought again to take him: but he escaped
out of their hand, 40 And went away again beyond Jordan into the place where John at first
baptized; and there he abode. 41 And many resorted unto him, and said, John did no miracle: but
all things that John spake of this man were true. 42 And many believed on him there.
34

Here is what we can glean without interpretive disagreement:

1. Jesus prefaced his quotation by asserting that he and the Father were one (10:30).
2. This claim was regarded as blasphemy in that Jesus was making himself out to be God (10:33).
3. In defense of his assertion, Jesus quoted Psalm 82:6. That is, to establish his claim to be God,
Jesus went to Psalm 82:6.
4. He follows the quotation with the statement that the Father was in him, and he was in the
Father.
The consensus view of this quotation is that Jesus was endorsing the human view and thereby
arguing, I have every right to call myself divineyou guys can do it as well on the basis of Psalm 82:6.
The problem, of course, is that this amounts to Jesus saying you mere mortals can call yourself gods, so
I can, too. If this is what John intends to communicate to go along with verse 30 to put forth the idea
of Jesus deity, its an inept strategy.

I propose that Jesus knew the of Psalm 82 were not human, and that Jesus was in fact asserting

his own unique ontological oneness with the Father. 9 The human view derives from two
8F

assumptions brought to the text: (1) that it is required by the assumed impossibility of there being

other because of Judeo-Christian monotheism; and (2) that the phrase "to whom the word of
God came" refers to the Jews who received the law at Sinai (i.e., the Pharisees' forefathers). This paper
has already dispensed with the first assumption, so well move to the latter.
9

The notion that John 10:33 has Jesus only claiming to be a god (a la Mormon or Jehovahs Witness theology) is
not tenable. A syntactical search of the Greek New Testament, however, reveals that the identical construction
found in John 10:33 occurs elsewhere in contexts referring specifically to God the Father. The search is
accomplished via the OpenText.org syntactically-tagged Greek New Testament database in the Libronix platform
developed by Logos Bible Software. The search query asks for all clauses where the predicator of the clause can be
any finite verb except where the subject complement is the lexeme with no definite article present. Any
clause component can intervene between these two elements. Other than John 10:33, the following hits are yielded
by the query: Acts 5:29; Gal. 4:8, 9; 1 Thess. 1:9; 4:1; 2 Thess. 1:8; Titus 3:8; Heb. 9:14. It is incoherent within the
immediate and broader context of the book in which each passage hit occurs to translate as a god.

I would suggest that what first needs to be done is to come to terms with what is meant by the word of
God and who it is that receives that word in Psalm 82:6-7:
I said, You are gods (), even sons of the Most High (

), all of you;

nevertheless, like humans you will die, and fall like any prince.
The speaker (I) in the passage is the God of Israel, the God who is standing in the council in 82:1
among the . God announces that the of the council are his sons, but because of their
corruption (vv. 2-5), they will lose their immortality. I believe that Jesus was referring to this utterance
itself when he quoted the psalm, not the Jewish nation receiving the law at Sinai or the revelation that
would become the Old Testament. To illustrate the difference in the views:

Common Interpretation /
Jesus strategy assumes are human
The word of God that came = revelation from
God at Sinai, or the entire OT
to whom the word of God came = the Jews at
Sinai, or the Jews generally
Result = the Jews are the sons of the Most High
and -- so Jesus can call himself an as
well, since hes a Jew, too.

My view /
Jesus strategy assumes are divine
The word of God that came = the utterance itself
in Psalm 82:6 the pronouncement from God
to whom the word of God came = the of
the divine council in 82:1

Result = The Jews are not , and Jesus reminds

his enemies that their Scriptures say there are
other who are divine sonsand this on the
heels of declaring himself one with the Father (John
10:30) puts him in the position of not only claiming
divinity as a son of the Most High, but by claiming
to be above the sons of God since he is one with
the Father.

Nowhere in Psalm 82 do we have any hint of the Mosaic Law, Sinai, a Jewish nation, or the canonical
revelation given to the Jews. Every element in the commonly held view must be inserted into the
passage. My view is that Jesus is quoting Psalm 82:6 to put forth the idea that he was more than

human. He reminds his Jewish audience that there were in fact other besides the God of Israel,

and those were Gods sons. Because he calls himself the son of God and has in fact just claimed

to be one with Yahweh, not only puts himself in the class of the sons of the Most High of Psalm 82:6

divine but implies that he is Lord of the council. This particular son of the Most High is one

with the Father. The Jewish authorities got the message, toothey charged him with blasphemy. Now
ask yourself, why would they do that if all Jesus was saying was you mortal Jews get to call yourselves
sons of God, and , so I can, too. That makes no sense at all.
CONCLUSION
The net result of this investigation is that, to hold the view that the plural of Psalm 82 are
humans requires ignoring some very clear items:
(1) that five figures are called in the Hebrew Bible, which means the word cannot speak to one
set of attributes;
(2) that Psalm 82 and Deut 32 have a council of divine beings in the clouds and set over the disinherited
nations by Yahwehauthority that no text in the Old Testament assigns to human Israelite judges;
(3) that the cannot be merely idols, since demons are called and are real;
(4) that explicit ancient Canaanite parallels for a divine council of plural spirit beings exist;
(5) that there are no texts in the Hebrew Bible that call Israels judges ;
(6) that Jesus use of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34 is only a defense of his deity when the of Psalm
82 are presumed to be divine beings.

Lets allow the text say what it says; we have no reason to fear it.