Elohim Does Not Mean “God in Two Persons”

Ex-members of the Worldwide Church of God (founded by Herbert Armstrong) are often victims of a seriously misleading piece of information. This has to do with the vitally important meaning of the Hebrew word for God — Elohim. Without any lexical authority, former WCG’s have been taught that Elohim (God) in Genesis 1:1 is “uniplural,” meaning that “two persons make up the one God family.”

A number of tricks are played on the mind, when that proposition is advanced as a responsible way of explaining the Bible and the nature of God. Firstly, there is no such word as “uniplural.” And even if there were, it would be misleading as a description of the God of the Bible, of Jesus and of Christians. Elohim is never a collective noun.

The recognized facts of the Hebrew language will not support the theory that Elohim tells us that the God of Israel is more than one Person. It is wise for us all to “prove all things” and consider the lexical fact that Elohim is probably a “plural of majesty,” or, as others think, an honorific plural, a “plural of fullness,” or of “intensity.” Elohim cannot possibly mean that two beings (or three) make up the one God.

Many have not been told of other Hebrew plural forms which certainly do not tell us of more than one person:

Can the word “Lord,” also found in the plural form in Hebrew, refer to a single individual?

The word for Lord (adon) regularly appears with a plural ending when its meaning is singular. So it is with Elohim when it refers to God. God in the Hebrew Bible is described thousands upon thousands of times by singular personal pronouns. Yahweh, His personal name, is invariably accompanied by singular pronouns and verbs. On each of these occasions we have a testimony to the grand truth that there is One and only One Person in the eternal Godhead. Grasping this foundational truth and holding it fast will bring a new and brilliant light to Bible study — and to an understanding of the human Messiah, Son of God. It also frees the brain from the contortions involved in trying to make two or three into one!

Try this: If you were on a trip alone in the mountains what would you say to describe the fact that you were all by yourself? You would say, “I was alone, the only person on the trip. There was no one besides me.” You would continue with personal pronouns in the singular, “I” and “me.” That is exactly the language constantly used by the God of the Bible. He could not have done more to ensure His identity as a single divine Person. Isaiah 44:24: “Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer and He who formed you from the womb, ‘I am the LORD who makes everything, who stretched forth the heavens alone and by Myself. Who was with Me?’”

This and thousands of other verses were meant to build a hedge against anyone ever imagining that God was two or three! Language has no other way of expressing that great defining fact of the universe — that God is a single Person. (If, of course, one introduces into the discussion non-Biblical meanings for concepts like “person,” or unbiblical terms such as ousia [being, essence] the result is a considerable muddle and loss of revealed truth.)

Back to the issue of what Herbert Armstrong called a “uniplural” word. Consult any standard Hebrew lexicon or consult a rabbi or Old Testament scholar. The Gesenius Hebrew Grammar is a recognized authority worldwide. On p. 298 we read:

“The plural of majesty...sums up the characteristics belonging to the idea, besides possessing the secondary sense of an intensification of the original idea...That the language has entirely rejected the idea of a numerical plurality in Elohim (whenever it denotes one God) is proved especially by its being almost invariably joined with a singular attribute.”

The Plain Truth of February, 1984 tells us that in “Gen. 1:1, God (Hebrew, Elohim — Gods) means God and the Word.” Readers should be alerted to the obvious polytheism implied by The Plain Truth. Note also the complete absence of any support from grammars or lexicons. This failure to benefit from the wisdom of scholars and language experts has been the blight of much misguided theology amongst “worldwiders.”

A leader like Herbert Armstrong, who had no formal education in biblical languages, was an unreliable witness in the field of biblical exegesis.

“Worldwiders” have sometimes proceeded in the theological enterprise rather like someone investigating the English language and deciding on his own that Webster’s Dictionary is in error. No one can afford to “do theology” on an island. He must take note of the work of experts in the field of Biblical Studies. “Proving all things” may mean consulting others with a greater technical expertise than one has oneself. (It is worth remembering that many errors in Bible understanding go back to the failure to deal with words and grammar. America is anyway often not strong in language, since many have not even a working knowledge of a language other than their own. They are ill-equipped to deal with Hebrew and Greek.)

If Elohim means “Gods” in Genesis 1:1 (where the verb is singular, “He,” not “they created”) how will we explain Psalm 45:6 where the Messianic king, a singular person, is addressed as Elohim? Why is Moses Elohim (Ex. 7:1)? Was he a plural person? Is Dagon more than one god? He is called Elohim (I Sam. 5:7). So is Chemosh (Jud. 11:24) and Baal in I Kings 18:24.

The fact is that where the New Testament translates the Hebrew word Elohim into Greek it does not render it as a plural (except where pagan gods or the judges of Israel are referred to). As a reference to the One God of Israel and of Jesus, Elohim is invariably rendered by the singular form of the Greek for God — o theos (the [One] God). On a rare occasion Jesus, the Messiah, is addressed as “God” (Ps. 45:6, cited in Heb. 1:8). This is rendered “God” in Greek, not “Gods.” Note carefully that Jesus is never called “the (one) God,” absolutely, in the New Testament. That title is reserved exclusively for the Father who is called the One God some 1320 times. The judges were also called “gods” (Elohim — here the word is used as a real plural) in Psalm 82:6, and Jesus claimed to be the supreme example of the perfectly obedient Son of God (see John 10:33-36), representing God, as His agent on earth. “Son of God” in the Bible never means God Himself. To be Son of God means you are not God! “Son of God” is the Messianic King and Jesus is just that — the Messiah of Israel. The fact that on a rare occasion he is addressed as “my Lord and my God” indicates that the Messianic titles of Psalm 45: 6, 11 are being used of him. The New American Bible wisely translates Psalm 45:6 “Thy throne, O god” (note the absence of the capital letter). When Thomas finally grasped who Jesus was, the Messiah (John 20:31), he articulated that faith by addressing the Savior as “my Lord and my God” (John 20:28). In an earlier conversation at which Thomas was present, both Thomas and Philip had not comprehended the stupendous fact that “he who has seen Jesus has seen the Father” (John 14:9). The Son perfectly reflects his Father, who worked in Christ (II Cor 5:19), but that does not mean of course that the Son is God.

The fact that Jesus is “worshiped” proves in no way that he was or is the Supreme Deity. As is well known the word “worship” can be used of God and man in both the Old Testament and the New. Note that the people “worshiped the Lord and the King” (I Chron. 29:20, KJV). Note also that the saints will be “worshiped” by former antagonists (Rev. 3:9). Does this mean that the saints or David are coequal with the eternal God? The argument that Jesus is God because he is “worshiped” collapses on the plain evidence of the biblical usage of the word “worship.”

“The ambiguity of the word proskuneo (worship), which can be used of oriental obeisance as well as actual [divine] worship makes it impossible to draw any certain conclusions from the evidence” (Arthur Wainwright, The Trinity in the New Testament, p. 104). In other words, as this Trinitarian author concedes, the word “worship” applied to Jesus does not in any way prove that he is Deity, rather than the Messianic Son of God. And Son of God is a vastly different notion from “God the Son” of later church tradition.

Psalm 45:11 describes the Messianic King as your “lords” (the form is plural, but the meaning is obviously singular and correctly so translated by all versions as a singular “lord”). In the phrase “a cruel lord” (Isa. 19:4) the Hebrew actually has a plural form “lords.” But the proper translation is in the singular. Isaiah 26:13 correctly renders adonim as “masters.” So we see that there is an ambiguity in some Hebrew words which only context will resolve. False systems of interpretation are sometimes able to work out of that ambiguity (cp. the well-known grammatically ambiguous texts in the NT which some Trinitarians claim refer to Jesus as “God” — Titus 2:13 and I John 5:20. Others deny that the reference is to Jesus here).

It is clear that The Plain Truth did not always give you all the facts. It is entirely arbitrary to say that Elohim (Gen. 1:1) means two persons. This simply disregards the characteristics of the Hebrew language. And where God says, “Let us...” the plural can perfectly well be explained, as Gesenius says, as “communicative,” i.e., God was talking to His attendant angels, as elsewhere in Scripture He is seen talking to His divine council (Isa. 6:8; see for confirmation the note to Gen. 1:26 in the NIV Study Bible). The Word Bible Commentary, Gen 1-15, (p. 27) certainly no anti-Trinitarian publication, admits that “it is now universally admitted that the author of Gen. 1:26 did not intend [by ‘us’] a reference to Christ” or a second member of the Godhead.

Belief in two eternal beings contradicts the straightforward creedal statements of John 17:3 — the Father is “the only true God,” or “the only one who is truly God.” This description of God from the lips of Christ should be relied upon as a definitive statement about who God is. Jesus addressed the Father as “the only one who is truly God.” We can with confidence approach the God of the universe with that unitarian understanding, which reflects the mind of Christ himself and ensures that our worship is “in spirit and truth” (John 4:24).

How rightly J.A.T. Robinson of Cambridge spoke when he pointed out that “John [and Jesus whom he reported] is as undeviating a witness as any New Testament writer to the unitary monotheism of Judaism” (John 17:3; 5:44) (12 More NT Essays, p. 175).

Jesus is the Messiah, distinct from the One True God. All Bible students should prayerfully consider the tremendous implications of John 17:3. The Trinitarian church father Augustine was baffled by these words and resorted to the completely unwarranted violence of actually altering the order of the words in John 17:3 to make them include Jesus in the Godhead! (See his Homilies on John.) He disregarded also John 5:44 which likewise states that the Father is “the one who alone is God,” “the only one who is God.” (This differs from what The Plain Truth taught). I Corinthians 8:4-6, in an expressly creedal statement, says that the Father is the One God, that there is none besides Him, and that Jesus is the One Lord Messiah (see Luke 2:11). Ephesians 4:4-6 likewise describes the Father as the One God as distinct from the Messiah Jesus. And the critically important text in I Timothy 2:5 again defines the Father as the One God and Jesus as the one mediator between God and man. He is the “man Messiah Jesus.” When proper attention is paid to these fundamental creedal statements the Jewish/Christian monotheism of the Bible is crystal clear.

This evidence should carry the greatest weight in our Bible study and devotional life. One ex-WCG Bible teacher asserted that Psalm 110:1 (“The Lord [Yahweh] said to my lord”) ought to be read “God said to my God.” This is quite inaccurate. The text simply says that Yahweh speaks to my (David’s) lord, i.e. the Messiah. The word lord in “my lord” emphatically does not mean here the One God. The word for the first LORD in Psalm 110:1 is YAHWEH (6,800 times the personal name of the One God) while the word for David’s lord is adoni. Adoni occurs 195 times in the Hebrew Bible and never refers to God. It is a title for a human or angelic superior. Adoni (“my lord”) is the promised Messiah who is the supreme human being, i.e., the perfect, sinless Son of God. The Lord Messiah is clearly distinguished in Psalm 110:1 from the One God, Yahweh, who is “the Only True God” (John 17:3; 5:44). Adoni is a title which deliberately tells us that the one who bears it is not God, but God’s Son.

The Bible says that God alone is the Creator:

II Kings 19:15, “Thou art God, even Thou alone...Thou hast made the heaven and the earth.”

Nehemiah 9:6, “You are God, even You alone...You have made the heaven and the earth.”

Job 9:8, “God...who alone spreads out the heavens.”

Isaiah 44:24, “I am the Lord that makes all things, who stretches forth the heavens alone...who spreads abroad the earth by myself.” The RV has “Who is with me?” Malachi 2:10 ascribes the creation to the One God who is the Father.

This clear evidence should be accepted by Bible students and the contrary notion of “two persons in One God” abandoned in favor of the strict and pure monotheism of Jesus (Mark 12:28ff.) and the Bible. Jesus never usurped the position of his Father as Creator. It would be quite untrue to say that “Jesus was the Yahweh of the Old Testament.” What role would that leave for the Father? If the Father was not the Creator, why was it God, not Jesus, who rested after creation (Heb. 4:4)? God spoke through a Son only after that Son began to exist (Luke 1:35) and never in Old Testament times (Heb. 1:1-2).

Jesus himself fully endorsed the Jewish view that God is One Person (Mark 12:28-34). He aligned himself with the Jewish view of God. “We know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22). No Jew thought that God was a “family of two” or three or a Trinity of divine, coequal “Persons.” Jesus agreed with the Jewish theologians about who God was. To interfere with that Jewish understanding of the nature of God is something of a slap in the face for the saints of the Hebrew Bible and the Apostles.

Christians should begin to follow Jesus in this crucially important matter. For too long they have been lured into subtle forms of polytheism — and polytheism breaks the first commandment. The fragmentation we now witness amongst believers could be healed if they returned to the great, cardinal Truth that God is One Lord (Deut. 6:4, affirmed by Jesus in Mark 12:28ff.).²