God’s Plural Title

One of the most common Hebrew words translated as “God” in English is Elohim. This is a very curious word. Its root is the Semitic word El, which also is usually translated as “God.” Elohim, however, includes a Hebrew plural ending. For this reason, it agrees well with God’s memorable words in Genesis 1: ” ‘Let Us make man in Our image.’ ” But how are we to understand a plural word for “God”?

Not surprisingly, this word has sparked considerable debate throughout church history. For instance, in the nineteenth century, critics of Biblical religion said this title indicated that Judaism, like all other religions around the world, developed from the simple to the complex. According to this theory, all religions begin as animism (the belief that inanimate objects are inhabited by spirits) and move to polytheism (the belief that there are specific gods for specific purposes, such as in Greek and Roman mythology), then to henotheism (a type of polytheism in which each nation is thought to have its own god—Yahweh for the Hebrews, Dagon for the Philistines, and so on), and finally to monotheism (the belief in one god who is over all). Critics said the presence of the word Elohim in Genesis indicated that the Jews were polytheists at one time. Thankfully, this idea is largely discredited now—Old Testament religion clearly does not follow this developmental pattern. Besides, even when the Bible uses the word Elohim, it uses singular verbs. Clearly the Jews were committed to monotheism. Why, then, did they use this word?

The use of Elohim was intended to show that while God was one (Deut. 6:4), He was not one-dimensional. The Jews perceived a richness within the nature of God, a richness they tried to communicate through this title. Many scholars believe that the Hebrew writers of the Biblical books used the word Elohim as a grammatical device known as a “plural of majesty,” putting the word in the form that would point most clearly to the superiority and transcendent greatness of the Most High God. Thus, the simple word Elohim, simply by its grammatical structure, communicates something of what the entirely of Scripture tells us—that all of the fullness of deity dwells in Yahweh, and He is higher than angels, demons, people, or any other created thing. Reality itself reaches its fullness in Him.