JOHN 10:34; PSALM 82

Q:  “Is it not written in your law, 'I said, you are gods?'” (see Psalm 82:6)

The scene in Psalms is the council of the gods. God judges them because they have been ignoring the rights of the needy. They will lose their divine status. (NICOT, pp. 641-4)

It applies to the divine pantheon, but one whose existence God will take away. (NCBC, p. 595)

These are the pagan gods whom God will destroy (Halladay, p. 22)

Possible renderings as judges or angels avoid any polytheistic overtones. Justification for both translations can be found elsewhere in the Bible. (Tyndale, Psalms, pp. 296-7)

“You gods” means “you who sit in God's place, exercising judgment.” Evidence = interchangeability of terms “before God” and “before the priests/judges” in Exodus 21:6; 22:8-9; Deuteronomy 17:8-13. (NBC, p. 487)

God are angels who were entrusted with the nations, but God dismissed them from office. (AB 5, p. 206)

References to divine counselors “are in narrative settings that do not necessarily constitute statements of belief but are descriptive or polemical in nature.” (NICOT Isaiah, p. 60)

Jesus refers especially to parallel line in Psalm 82 (“sons of the Most High”) since he calls himself Son of God in John 10:36. The original Psalm referred to unjust judges. “First, if there was a common practice in the OT to refer to men like the judges as 'gods' and this was no blasphemy, why do the Jews object when this term is applied to Jesus? Second, if it is permissible to call men gods because they were vehicles of the word of God, how much more permissible is it to use “God” of him who is the Word of God?” (AB 29, pp. 409-10; Halladay, p. 120)

“Since even unjust rulers are called 'gods,' how much more reason for the Father's special representative to be called Son of God?” (NBC, p. 952)

Jesus employs the same flawed hermeneutic logic used by his opponents in order to refute them. (Commentary on the NT Use of the OT, p. 79)

“Gods” in Psalm 82 referred to, in order of likelihood, Israel's corrupt judges, Israel at the time the law was given and they made the Golden Calf (rabbinical teaching), or angelic powers who abused their authority. The last interpretation is unlikely since John virtually never mentions angels.

Borchart gives the same three possibilities and mentions that rabbis for centuries wrestled with this psalm. Jesus, as elsewhere, answers a criticism or comment with an unanswerable question.

Morris also lists these possibilities. One commentator cited says they were divine beings responsible for the nations – called angels by the Jews and gods by the Gentiles.