PSALM 82: CRITIQUE OF MICHAEL S. HEISER"S INTERPRETATION

Michael S. Heiser, in his books Supernatural and The Unseen Realm, uses this psalm as the springboard to develop a detailed view of the inhabitants of the heavenly realm. The following is a critique of his interpretation.

Heiser's reasoning, some of which is not explicitly stated by him and most of which is presented in a rather random matter in his books, can be outlined according to the following steps:

1. Psalm 82 represents a real historical event.

2. In verse 1, God assembles his heavenly council, a group which takes part in divine decision-making processes.

3. The court consists of 70 heavenly beings called sons of elohim (“gods”). They also go by other names in the Bible.

4. These gods are to be distinguished from mere angels, who are only messengers.

5. These gods were placed in charge of the 70 nations resulting from the Tower of Babel incident.

6. In verses 2-5, God criticizes the gods for the way they have led these nations astray.

7. In verses 6-7, He condemns these gods to a human death but apparently delays the punishment until the resurrection of Christ or later, leaving them in charge of the other nations in the meantime. At the same time, God takes Israel as his own responsibility.

The above can be recognized as a chain of reasoning in which each step must be correct in order for the final conclusion to hold together. However, even assuming a generous 80% probability that each step is the correct, that probability drops below 50% by the fourth step and to only 21% by the last step. Granted, the probability of a given step can be bolstered up by finding valid parallels elsewhere in the Bible that state the same idea. And that is what Heiser attempts to do in his various writings although his “parallels” are far from perfect. However, as demonstrated below, not a single one of the seven assertions given above is without its serious flaws. And that actually reduces the probabilities considerably below 80% each. Let's take each one in turn before considering the alternative understandings of Psalm 82 and Heiser's rebuttal of one of those interpretations.

Step 1: Psalm 82 describes an historical event

Heiser nowhere states this obvious underpinning to his whole thesis. And actually, he goes out of his way to show how this psalm, as well as much else in the OT, borrows ideas taken from the pagan nations around Israel, primarily during the period of Babylonian Exile. This overwhelming emphasis on outside influences certainly does nothing to inspire confidence in Ps. 82 as being divinely inspired or representing factual events. It also completely contradicts the traditional attribution of this psalm to Asaph, a member of King David's court who lived hundreds of years before the Exile.

And finally, and most importantly, it is obviously a grave hermeneutical error to take any poetic passage in the OT in a strictly literal manner. The Psalms are replete with figurative language used to primarily express emotions rather than factual material. And Heiser leans heavily on the poetic portions of the OT to make his points. As John Oswalt points out, the passages relating to a Divine Council are in “settings that do not necessarily constitute statements of belief...but are descriptive or polemic in nature.” (The Book of Isaiah, Chapters 40-66, p. 60)

Step 2: God assembles His divine council

This is the most likely of the seven steps outlined above to be correct. But even this understanding is not without its challenges. In the first place, Heiser prejudices his view by using the term “council” in place of the more general meaning of the Hebrew word edah as “assembly.” He describes them as a decision-making body and uses I Kings 22 as proof of that contention. He says that in that passage, the council discusses a matter proposed by God and comes up with a solution. In fact, no such discussion ever takes place. God outlines exactly what he wants done and merely asks for a volunteer to carry it out. When one comes forth, he asks that spirit precisely how he will carry it out to make sure he has his marching orders correct. This hardly represents any sort of group council decision. In fact, Isaiah 40:13-14 (quoted by Paul in Romans 11:34-35) denies that God ever needs to consult anyone.

As additional proof of the council's decision-making powers, Heiser references Daniel 4 in which he notes the parallel between a decision being made by “the holy ones” (a supposed synonym for the elohim in the Council) in verse 17 while the same decision is ascribed to “the Most High” in verse 24. But Goldingay points out (Daniel, p. 88) that since the first description of events is given by King Nebuchadnezzar himself using his pagan understanding, Daniel may simply be correcting the king in verse 24 by attributing the decree to the one God instead. Heiser makes a similar leap of logic in comparing “the Most High” in verse 24 with “heaven(s)” in the following verse when he says that “heaven(s)” must refer to the Heavenly Council. This is despite the well accepted fact that the word often occurs in the OT and NT as a euphemism for God Himself.

The second problem is that of the 148 other places that edah is employed in the OT, all refer to assemblies of human beings, most often of Israel or her leaders. That would make Psalm 82 the sole outlier if it refers to supernatural beings. Also, the New International Commentary on the Old Testament volume on Psalms confirms that the whole term translated “divine council” here only appears four other times in the OT (Numbers 27:17; 31:16; Joshua 22:16-17; and Psalm 74:2), all referring to Israel. Heiser presents several other passages to prove the existence of a Heavenly Council, but although they are indicative, they are by no means exact parallels. For example, Psalm 89 is said to represent another example of the Council. But the Hebrew word for “council” employed there (sod) is different from the one in Psalm, 82. This particular word appears nine other times in the OT, again mainly to refer to groups of human beings. And no group decision making occurs in this passage either, or in Job 1-2 where no word for “council” appears at all.

In addition, different terminology is used in each of these passages to describe the “members of the council.” Psalm 82 calls them gods (and only possibly “sons of the Most High”); Psalm 89 calls them heavenly beings or hosts; I Kings 22 calls them all the host of heaven; Job 1-2 calls them sons of God; Ezekiel 28 refers to them as the stars of God; and they are called “watchers” in Daniel 4. Heiser has no trouble in confidently stating that these terms and more all refer to the same elect group even though he complains that the language in the NT for heavenly beings is too imprecise when it doesn't happen to fit into his scheme.

Step 3: There are 70 members of the Council

This presupposes Step 5, which connects this council with the governing of the nations arising from the Babel incident together with the fact that there are 70 nations listed in Genesis 10. Heiser here has to lean heavily on pagan near-Eastern parallels to make this point. However, his biblical evidence consists of the fact that Moses appointed 70 men to help govern the people (Numbers 11) and Jesus sent out 70 followers as evangelists (Luke 10). In the first place, the ubiquity of the number 70 in the Bible as the product of two symbolically perfect numbers 10 and 7 is not at all surprising and it occurs in a number of different settings. As just two examples, in Zechariah 1:12 it stands for the number of years between the destruction and rebuilding of the temple, and in Jeremiah 15:11 it refers to the normal human lifespan.

Next, note that his examples of Numbers 11 and Luke 10 involve human beings, not “gods,” and both utilize these leaders in the strict context of the nation of Israel only, not that of any pagan nations. It is also instructive that the most detailed description of God's throne room in heaven, Revelation 5, describes several categories of assembly members: four living creatures, the Lamb with 7 horns, etc., 24 elders, and myriads of myriads of angels. The number 70 does not appear there at all. This is especially surprising considering the plethora of symbolic numbers found elsewhere in Revelation.

Step 4: The “sons of gods” in the Council are to be distinguished from a lower class of supernatural being, the angels.

Heiser bases this contention solely on the organization of the Ugaritic heavenly court. This must be a weak point even in Heiser's eyes. And he also admits, when writing in a more scholarly venue (Dictionary of OT Wisdom, Poetry & Writings, p. 114), that “Evidence for exactly the same structures in the Israelite council is tenuous.” In fact, Heiser shows how it departs in at least three ways: absence of a craftsman class, no wife for the chief deity, and a vice-regent (Jesus) who is actually equal with Elohim.

In spite of this, Heiser holds on to the distinction between angels and the elohim even in the absence of any biblical justification. But his reasoning, some of which is buried in footnotes, is somewhat fluid and a bit hard to follow:

Elohim can refer to any inhabitant of the spiritual world (Supernatural, p. 20).

Angels are elohim (Unseen, p. 30, footnote 4).

Angels are not “sons of elohim” (Unseen, p. 24).

But his proof includes Revelation 12:1-9 in which the stars swept to earth are actually called Satan's angels. (Unseen, p. 24, footnote 3)

Then he says that “sons of elohim” may mean all spiritual beings or a particular higher rank in the council than angel (Unseen, p. 33 footnote).

If the latter is true, then how can he so confidently say that “sons of elohim” never refers to angels?

Assuming that Heiser is correct in his two-level organization, then a few contradictions stand out immediately. If God specifically chose 70 of his elite heavenly forces for special service (advising God and ruling the nations), it doesn't say much for God's management abilities that all 70 failed miserably in their duties. By contrast, in the OT the supposedly lower order of “angels” appear to carry out their assigned duties to the letter. Also, it is a bit unusual that Heiser would identify the pre-incarnate Christ with “the angel of God” if angel is a somewhat menial title. He even sees Christ in one passage (Exodus 23:20-22) as “an angel” (Supernatural, p. 60). Heiser realizes this problem and makes an attempt to explain it in a footnote (Unseen, p. 33), but needs to depart from his usual reliance on near-Eastern parallels to do so.

Also inexplicable is why the Bible would call all supernatural beings elohim, but then identify a higher rank of the elohim as only sons of elohim.

This last point brings up an interesting observation. One of Heiser's followers, Douglas Van Dorn, has written a companion Q&A book to Heiser's The Unseen Realm put out by the same publisher with a matching cover design in which he uses Heiser's contention to go a logical step further and agree with the Jehovah Witnesses that the angel Michael is another name for the pre-incarnate Christ (see Part 1, Q7). Heiser, to give him credit, does not endorse that particular heretical idea but hides his objections in a small-print footnote on p. 121 of his book. It is unfortunate that he didn't correct Van Dorn's contention before the Q&A was published. And Heiser compounds his confused presentation by equating Christ with the commander of God's army (Joshua 5:13) who also appears in I Chronicles 21:15-16,27 in which he is described as an angel who takes orders from YAHWEH. Christ is, he says, also the destroying angel of Zechariah 1:12 who has to plead with YAHWEH to stay His hand. And if that is not enough, he ignores the fact that it is the angel Michael who is said to be the commander of God's army in Revelation 12:7. Does that indicate that the Jehovah Witnesses are correct after all?

Finally, on page 164 of The Unseen Realm, Heiser tries to address the problem posed by the NT references (Acts 7:53; Hebrews 2:2) to the presence of “angels” at Mt. Sinai during the giving of the law since he feels it is the Divine Council instead. He attributes this contradiction by saying that “the New Testament language for divine beings is less hierarchically precise than the Old Testament.” That is a strange comment to make in light of the fact that he claims, with virtually no discussion, that at least six different OT terms all refer to the same group within the Council.

Step 5: The “gods” were placed in charge of the 70 nations.

Within Psalm 82 itself, only the appearance of “nations” in the final line even gives a hint that Heiser's interpretation is correct, and there are better understandings of that word's presence which will be discussed below. His main evidence is based on Deuteronomy 32:8-9. However, as even Heiser recognizes, there is much textual uncertainly in this verse. The Hebrew says that the boundaries of the nations were fixed “according to the the number of the sons of Israel” while the alternative reading found in a fragment from Qumran and in the LXX translation reads “the number of the sons of God.” Modern translations are divided as to the proper reading. Heiser rejects the “sons of Israel” reading since the nation of Israel was not even in existence when the nations were divided after the Babel incident. But as J. A. Thompson (Deuteronomy, p. 299) explains, this merely states that God's plan from the beginning was to “fix the boundaries of the peoples in relation to Israel's numbers.” That this is the correct reading is confirmed by the only other appearance of “70” in Deuteronomy, namely in 10:22 where it refers to the number of children of Jacob when he entered Egypt (also in Exodus 1:5 and Genesis 46:27). This is the number of the sons of Israel being referred to instead.

The logic between connecting Psalm 82 with the events in Genesis 10-11 is a little vague in Heiser's presentations. And that may explain his endless repetition of the words punishment, disinheritance, forsaken, etc. in relation to the “nations” throughout his books (64 times in Unseen over the 196 pages following the introduction of the idea on page 188, an average of once every three pages) to drive the point home by sheer repetition. “When in doubt, shout.” Since the 70 nations only came into being at that point, Heiser deduces that was the time when they were given over to the 70 “gods” of the Heavenly Council as some form of punishment. There is a far better explanation for God's action in scattering the people at Babel than that, as Heiser should well know. Each time God limits mankind in Genesis it can be seen as a means of limiting the damage they can do and ultimately return them to reliance on God, whether it is by eliminating the possibility of an endless, godless existence for Adam and Eve by removing them from the Tree of Life, declaring a 120-year maximum on man's lifetime to limit the evil he/she can do (Genesis 6:3), or confusing the languages of the people to put them back on the path to accomplish God's stated goal of filling the whole earth rather than settling in one place to make a name for themselves (Genesis 10-11). Acts 17:26-27 clearly shows that punishment was the last thing God had in mind when he scattered the nations at Babel. Heiser even quotes this passage in Supernatural, p. 50.

As mentioned above, Heiser constantly repeats the contention that the pagan nations were totally rejected by God for their actions at Babel. However, as has been pointed out (NIDOTTE,Vol. 5, 969), “Although Yahweh had established a special relationship with Israel as his people...God welcomed the veneration of non-Israelites. Indeed, the prophets proclaimed him to be the universal God (Isaiah 54:5; Jeremiah 32:27).” In addition, this source notes on p. 972: “In Is. 19:25 Yahweh speaks specifically of Egypt as 'my people' and Assyria as 'my handiwork,' while in the same breath referring to Israel as 'my inheritance.'”

Heiser says that the 70 special council members, called sons of God, were each assigned to one of the nations arising from the Babel incident. However, these nations began to worship these beings as gods. But then why does he then state (Unseen, pp. 150-151) that one of these nations, Egypt, possessed a number of gods who had been given to them by God?

As an aside, Heiser makes at least three more highly problematic assertions in trying to establish Step 5 (Unseen, ch. 14). He inexplicably states that the purpose for building the Tower of Babel was to bring the gods down to earth rather than the obviously stated purpose of them trying to reach up to heaven. Then he misinterprets Deuteronomy 4:19-20 to say that God purposely gave the nations over to worship of other gods. An impartial reading of that passage shows that it refers back to Genesis 1:14-15, which merely states that God gave the literal heavenly bodies in the sky as lights and time indicators for the use of all mankind. But the pagan nations chose to worship these “things” (not beings or powers) instead. Lastly, Heiser uses the common word “name” to link the tower builders somehow with the renown men of Genesis 6:1-4, who in turn are supposedly perpetrators of the Babylonian religion that God attempted to wipe out in the flood. The logic of this one escapes me entirely.

Step 6: In verses 2-5, God criticizes the gods for the way they have led these nations astray.

There are two iffy assertions made here: (1) the identification of those being criticized with the council members in verse 1 and (2) stating that those being criticized were in charge of the pagan “nations” (a word only appearing in the last verse of Psalm 82). Both assumptions will be challenged below. In addition, there is the strange logic of God punishing nations for obeying divine council members that God Himself appointed over them.

Also, look at the specific nature of the complaint in verses 3-4. They are God's repeated complaints made elsewhere in the Bible through the prophets against the leaders of Israel, especially the judges, for perverting justice and ignoring the needs of the poor (see Isaiah 1:17; Jeremiah 5:28; Jer.emiah 22:1-3; Ezekiel 22:29; Micah 3:9-11; and Zechariah. 7:8-10, for example). By contrast, the condemnation of the pagan nations in the OT almost always centers around their arrogance, abandoning the true God, and attacks on Israel.

Step 7: In verses 6-7, He condemns them to a human death but delays the punishment until the resurrection of Christ or later, leaving them in charge of the other nations in the meantime (God takes Israel as his own responsibility).

Although Heiser connects the punishment of the nations at the Tower of Babel with the fact that they are left with his chosen council members at the same time, he nowhere faces up to the implication that this can hardly be equated with God totally abandoning them (a fact that he repeats no less than 64 times in Unseen – a common Big Lie technique) for millennia afterward. In fact, the NT specifically denies that God left them without a witness (see Acts 17:22-31; Romans 1:18-20; 2:12-16).

He also skips over the fact that the incipient nation of Israel was part of this supposedly unforgivable sin (which Cain had committed much earlier without any negative consequences – see Genesis 4:17) although Abraham himself was taken from that sinful group. In fact, it is obvious that Heiser (Unseen, p. 113) is almost certainly incorrect when he points out that Israel is nowhere represented in the Table of Nations (Genesis 10). As many scholars point out, Eber (v. 21) is probably the progenitor of the Hebrew nation. And here we see an obvious contradiction in the way Heiser treats Scripture. In his discussion of Deuteronomy 32:8-9 (Step 5) he denies the alternative reading “the sons of Israel” because that would be an obvious anachronistic reference since the nation of Israel had not yet been founded. And yet when he looks at the Table of Nations, he expects to see Israel there (and can't find it) even though its inclusion would be just as out of place time-wise as there. He can't have it both ways.

A final difficulty with this scheme is that the only punishment these erring council members will eventually suffer is physical death. This seems to be at odds with God immediately consigning the straying sons of God in Genesis 6 to “eternal chains in deepest darkness until the judgment.” (2 Peter 2:4 // Jude 6). This may also be the temporary fate of Satan who is imprisoned in a locked pit until the final days (Revelation 20). (see footnote to Revelation 21:1-6, The New Oxford Annotated Bible)

Alternative Interpretations of Psalm 82

Although there are other scholars who agree at least partially with Heiser's exposition, there are several alternative proposals, only the first of which is addressed by him in his writings. As an aside, it is typical of Heiser's approach to only offer one alternative view to his own and then summarily dispose of it. Several other possibilities for understanding this psalm are listed by A. A. Anderson (Psalms 73-150) and Derek Kidner (Psalms 73-150).

A. It is the leaders of Israel who are being chastised for the way they have perverted justice in the land.

B. It is the pagan gods who have led the nations astray.

C. It is the human pagan rulers who are at fault.

D. It is the evil principalities and powers of darkness in heavenly places who are being addressed.

Interpretation A is the traditional view, based partially on the close identification of human judges with God Himself in Exodus 21:6; 22:8-9; 22:28, and it can have several variations, as we shall suggest. In addition, Baigent and Allen (The International Bible Commentary) feel that the psalm “concedes the concept of a polytheistic pantheon – that it may ultimately be denied.” In that way, the psalm can be seen as a polemic against pagan religious ideas.

Let us first deal with Heiser's objections to Interpretation A since that is the only alternative to his own view that he recognizes. Although Heiser doesn't mention the fact, he (and others) are obviously influenced by the fact that the psalm proceeds directly from mention of the Divine Council in v. 1 to the accusations in vv. 2-5. He thus assumes a continuity of thought that may in fact not be there once one considers the changes in speaker and overall literary structure of the psalm (discussed below).

Next, Heiser complains that the comment “all the foundations of the earth are shaken” seems to be overkill if it is only the leaders of Israel who have sinned. He thus does not take into account the usual hyperbolic language present throughout Hebrew poetry. As Jacques Ellul points out in regard to this psalm (Apocalypse, p. 164), “when man ceases to be man, when he ceases to practice justice, when he is no longer 'there' as sons of God, then the pillars of the earth are shaken.” This is especially true in light of Israel's special covenant relationship with God and the fact that she is entrusted with the responsibility for helping to bring about the ultimate salvation of all peoples. Heiser's third objection is that God clearly calls the offending parties “sons of the Most High.” This issue will also be dealt with below.

One fact almost fatal to Heiser's view and that he deals with in only a cursory manner is the way Jesus utilizes Psalm 82 later on. In John 10:32-39, the Jews are about to stone him for blasphemy when he quotes this passage and says, “If those to whom the word of God came were called 'gods,' can you say that the one whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world is blaspheming because I said, 'I am God's son?'” The problem is that if the “gods” in Psalm 82 refer to divine members of God's court and Jesus is comparing himself to them, then Jesus' argument is a complete non sequitor. On the other hand, if Psalm 82 is referring to the earthly judges and leaders of Israel, then it makes complete sense. In other words, Jesus is arguing that if God even calls those flawed human leaders of the nation “gods,” then why not apply that to Jesus and his attempts to restore the people to a right relationship to God.

Noted commentators as diverse in background as Raymond Brown (The Gospel According to John I-XII), Leon Morris (The Gospel According to John), Gerald L. Borchert (John 1-11), David J. Ellis (The International Bible Commentary), Andreas Kostenberger (Commentary on the NT Use of the OT), Edwin Blum (Bible Knowledge Commentary), and Donald Guthrie (New Bible Commentary: Revised) all agree that Psalm 82 must refer to human leaders of the nation.

There is a final related point one can glean from Jesus' words. In John 10:35 he characterizes these “gods” as “those to whom the word came.” Since we are talking about an OT legal context here, this probably refers to the giving of the law on Mt. Sinai. However, the law was given to Moses and his 70 delegated helpers to judge the nation rightly, and it was delivered by way of the angels (see Acts 7:53; Hebrews 2:2), not to the angels.

Literary Considerations

Anderson discusses the psalm type represented in Psalm 82. Among the possibilities proposed by scholars are a didactic psalm, an imitation of prophetic speech, a genuine utterance of a cultic prophet, a New Year's hymn celebrating God's rule, and a lamenting prayer to God. Only one of these genres, a genuine prophetic utterance, even claims a pretense of being an historical account describing God's judgment on any group, let alone a group of divine beings. But the stated author of this psalm, Asaph, was not a recognized OT prophet at all. Any Bible dictionary will point out that he was musician and Temple singer.

Also, one must deal with the fact that true prophetic utterances of the type found in the books of prophecy are a rarity in the Psalms. For example, consider the eleven Asaph psalms (73-83). Only one besides Psalm 82 contains any direct speech from God, and that is introduced by the specific words, “I hear a voice I had not known.” (Psalm 81:5b). By contrast, there is no tip-off in Psalm 82 that an oracle is actually being presented. And there is good reason to suspect that the voice identified as coming from God is actually that of the Psalmist. For example, the divine condemnation begins with the plea “how long?” This phrase happens to be a favorite one of Aseph himself (Psalms 74:9-10; 79:5; 80:4). Lastly, the Asaph psalms show no interest in the pagan nations unless they are negatively impacting Israel at the time; instead they deal with the Psalmist's personal issues or those he observes within Israel herself. And the same is generally true of the rest of the Psalter.

Since determining the literary genre of Psalm 82 is so decisive in determining its meaning and since it is at least cast into the form of a prophetic oracle, two specific types of prophecy spring to mind: the Divine Lawsuit and the Taunt Song. And these two categories are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

In a Divine Lawsuit, God figuratively assembles witnesses to His subsequent accusations against a third party, followed by judgment. It is usually referred to as a Covenant Lawsuit since the accused are parties who exist in a special covenant relationship to Yahweh. Most often, the witnesses are “heaven and earth” (as in Deuteronomy 4:26; 30:19; 31:28; Isaiah 1:2; and Jeremiah 2:12). However, beginning in Hosea 4, for example, the people of Israel are asked to witness the accusations against the whole land including the animals, the leaders of Israel, the cultic institutions, etc. (See discussion in Stuart Douglas, Hosea-Jonah). If this is the form of Psalm 82, then the Divine Council of v. 1 is only assembled to witness the accusations, which are not directed toward them at all, but against the errant leaders and people of Israel.

If Asaph additionally utilizes elements of the taunt song in this psalm, then the problem verses 6-7 suddenly can be seen in a new light. Instead of providing incontrovertible proof that those accused in verses 2-7 are indeed “gods, sons of the Most High” who will be cursed with a human death, there is now a close parallel with the taunt songs found in Isaiah 14:12-20 and Ezekiel 28:11, both directed to human beings who had divine aspirations but would suffer ignominious deaths. The only seeming argument against this understanding comes from the fact that in Isaiah and Ezekiel, the two rulers both declared themselves to be gods, even if God didn't. By contrast, in Psalm 82, God Himself is actually the one declaring that the accused parties are divine. But this is not an insurmountable obstacle to overcome.

Look in more detail at these two prophetic passages. In Isaiah 14:12, it is God Himself who calls the King of Babylon “Day Star, son of Dawn,” obvious angelic appellations. Similarly, in Ezekiel 28:11, God Himself calls the Prince/King of Tyre “the signet of perfection” who inhabited Eden. Both statements by God are dripping in sarcasm. There is another case of this divine Irony found in Job 38-39, an extended taunt song that God directs toward Job. At one point (38:16-21) God challenges Job to answer questions relating to the Creation of the Heaven and Earth by saying to him, “Surely you know, for you were born then!” By utilizing statements contrary to the facts, God is, in effect, employing the effective rhetorical device of over-inflating the various rulers' balloons before puncturing their egos. A. A. Anderson approaches verse 8 in a slightly different way to arrive at the same interpretation with his paraphrase “I thought once that you were divine beings and that you would act as such.” In any case, he states that “The verse has a slightly ironical tone.” Similarly, The Jerusalem Bible reads, “I once said, 'You too are gods, etc.'”

While we are on the subject of literary issues, it is next instructive to look at how Psalm 82 is organized. The psalm breaks down into three sections according who is speaking at the time. Thus, as evidenced by the paragraph divisions in NEB, JB and NIV, there is a clear ABA structure to the composition: 

    A. Asaph speaks (v. 1)

        B. God speaks (vv. 2-7)

A'. Asaph speaks (v. 8)

In Section A, the Psalmist first alludes to the complete order and obedience to God's will that exists in His heavenly realm. Section B represents the contrasting conditions present on earth. And this leads to Asaph's final plea in v. 8 for God to establish the same sort of conditions on earth as exist in heaven. The two A sections can be more concisely expressed as “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as in heaven.” Another exact NT parallel to this sort of arrangement is seen in the Book of Revelation. It begins in chapters 1-4 with scenes of Jesus and the church and heavenly throne visions, proceeds to a series of denunciations and judgments on earth, and ends up with a final throne scene and the closing plea “Come, Lord Jesus.”

Two of Heiser's errors result from improperly importing thoughts in the A sections into the B section. First, he makes the assumption that the Heavenly Council is being addressed in B just because it is present in A. As we have demonstrated, that may not be the case at all. Secondly, he assumes that since the word “nations” appears in A', that automatically excludes Israel from being the subject of B. The latter assumption ignores the facts that (1) universal realms on earth and heaven are probably in mind for A and A' due to the structural parallels between them, (2) the word goyim (“nations”) can have the meaning of all the nations on earth including Israel rather than just the pagan nations of the world (NIDOTTE, Vol. 5, p. 966), and (3) poetic parallelism between Psalm 82:8a and b indicates the most universal meaning for the term.