4.0 Ps 82:6 in Judean Midrash
The emphasis in
John 10:35 is not on Jesus, the preexistent Word, but on “those to whom the
word of God came,” who are called “gods.” Who were these people? Although it is
not the only stream of interpretation of Ps 82:6–7 in Israelite literature,
there is a clear sense that Ps 82:6–7 was understood in terms of Israel at the
Sinai theophany. A second-century midrash goes as follows:
it were possible to do away with the Angel of
Death I would. But the decree has long ago been decreed. R. Jose says: It was
upon this condition that the Israelites stood up before Mount Sinai, on the
condition that the Angel of Death should not have power over them. For it is
said: “I SAID: YE ARE GODS” (Ps
82:6). But you have corrupted your conduct. “SURELY
YE SHALL DIE LIKE MEN” (Ps 82:7).
Commentary: the
occasion is Sinai (“Israel stood up before Mount Sinai”), when God descended on
the mountain to give the Torah. According to Exod 20:18–19, when the Israelites
saw the mountain blazing with lightning and heard the thundering, they said to
Moses: “You speak to us, and we will hear; but let not God speak to us, lest we die.” In light of this, the Mekilta indicates that God restrained
the Angel of Death, so that Israel did not die. And so because Israel became deathless, that is, beyond the power of
the Angel of Death, Ps 82:6 applied to them, “I said ‘You are gods.’ ” Gods, then, because deathless. But with the worship of the golden calf, Israel sinned,
and suffered once more the penalty for sin, which is death: “You shall die like
men” (Ps 82:7).
An important variation of this midrash occurs in b. ʿAbod. Zara 5a. The context is a discussion of Deut 5:25–26
where Israel received the revelation at Sinai. The author comments that they
have seen God and yet still live (recall the discussion of Exod 20:18–19 above);
“therefore,” they ask, “why should we die?” This question becomes the occasion
for comment about the fluctuating power of the Angel of Death.
R Jose said: The Israelites accepted the
Torah only so that the Angel of Death should have no dominion over them, as it
is said: “I SAID: YE ARE GODS AND ALL OF
YOU SONS OF THE MOST HIGH” (Ps 82:6). Now that you have spoilt your deeds, “YE SHALL DIE LIKE MORTALS” (Ps 82:7).
Commentary: the
occasion is Sinai once more; Israel is once again called god because deathless.
But now we find the explicit note that being called god and being deathless
are linked to the reception of Torah. In fact, Israel chose God’s Torah for the
express purpose that the Angel of Death should not have power over it.
Something else, then, is operative here which suggests that receiving God’s
word (Torah) makes one holy, and if holy, then sinless, and if sinless, then
deathless.
A third early midrash can help to clarify the basic lines of this
interpretation of Ps 82:6–7. The context is a reflection on Deut 32:20, “I will
see what their end will be,” which refers to the fickleness and perfidiousness
of Israel.
You stood at Mount Sinai and said, “All that
the Lord hath spoken will we do, and obey” (Exod 24:7), (whereupon) “I SAID: YE ARE GODS’ (Ps 82:6); but when
you said to the (golden) calf, “This is thy god, O Israel” (Exod 32:4), I said
to you, “NEVERTHELESS, YE SHALL DIE LIKE
MEN” (Ps 82:7).
Commentary: at
Sinai Israel received God’s word of Torah (“all that the Lord hath spoken”) and
as a result became holy and sinless (“… we will do and obey”), for which reason
they are called gods. Although it is
not explicitly stated here, this argument assumes that holiness leads to deathlessness, which is a godlike
quality, for which reason Israel is called god.
Yet with Israel’s new sin comes death, the typical fate of sinful mortals (“ye
shall die like men”).
The basic lines of the midrashic understanding of Ps 82:6–7, then, are
clear. When Israel at Sinai received God’s Torah and obeyed, this resulted in
genuine holiness which resulted in deathlessness; hence, Israel could be called
god because holy and so deathless.
But when disobedient and sinful, Israel deserved the wages of sin, that is,
death; hence, Israel could be called man.
Yet this type of argument presumes some biblical understanding of death
and deathlessness as well as of the nature of humanity and God. In short, the
link between obedience-holiness-deathlessness lies back in the Genesis
exposition of Adam in God’s “image and likeness,” an implicit scenario made
explicit in the following midrash. The segment is somewhat long, but because of
its importance and the complicated argument in it, it deserves to be cited as
fully as possible.
R. Eleazar the Galilean remarked: The Angel
of Death complained to the Holy One, blessed be He: “I have then been created
in the world to no purpose!” The Holy One, blessed be He, replied: “I have
created you in order that you shall destroy idol-worshipers, but not this
people, for you have no jurisdiction over them.” That they should live and
endure for ever; as it says, “But ye that did cleave unto the Lord your God are
alive every one of you” (Deut 4:4). In the same strain it says, “The writing
was the writing of God, graven (haruth)
upon the tables” (Exod 32:16). What is the signification of “haruth”? R. Judah says: Freedom (heruth) from foreign governments; R.
Nehemiah says: From the Angel of Death; and Rabbi says: From suffering. See
then the plan the Holy One, blessed be He, had made for them! Yet forthwith
they frustrated the plan after forty days. Accordingly it says, “But ye have
set at nought all my counsel” (Prov 1:25). The Holy One, blessed be He, said to
them: “I thought you would not sin and would live and endure for ever like Me;
even as I live and endure for ever and to all eternity; I SAID: YE ARE GODS, AND ALL OF YOU SONS OF THE MOST HIGH (Ps
82:6), like the ministering angels, who are immortal. Yet after all this
greatness, you wanted to die! INDEED, YE
SHALL DIE LIKE MEN (Ps 82:7)—Adam, i.e. like Adam whom I charged with one
commandment which he was to perform and live and endure for ever”; as it says,
“Behold the man was as one of us” (Gen 3:22). Similarly, “And God created man
in His own image” (Gen 1:27), that is to say, that he should live and endure
like Himself. Yet [says God] he corrupted his deeds and nullified My decree.
For he ate of the tree, and I said to him: “For dust thou art” (Gen 3:19). So
also in your case, “I SAID YE ARE GODS”; but you have ruined yourselves like
Adam, and so “INDEED, YE SHALL DIE
like Adam.” (Num. Rab. 16.24)39
The typical
features of the midrashic understanding of Ps 82:6–7 are clearly evident: 1)
Sinai and the giving of the Torah, 2) Israel’s obedience (“cleaving unto the
Lord”), 3) deathlessness or immortality (“freedom from the Angel of Death” …
“live and endure for ever like Me”), and hence 4) Israel being called god (Ps 82:6). This midrash makes
explicit the generally assumed doctrine of the relation of sin and death found
primarily in Genesis 1–3, for it points out that God created Adam “in His image
and likeness,” that is, deathless.
Adam was deathless because holy and obedient (“I charged with one commandment
which he was to perform and live and endure for ever”). Adam died precisely
because he sinned and lost God’s holiness and “image.” This midrash also makes
clear that interpreters of Ps 82:6–7 saw Sinai as a new creation, when the
obedience, holiness, and deathlessness of Adam were restored to Israel, thus
linking the Adam myth with the Sinai myth, as the following diagram suggests.
|
Adam in
Paradise
|
Israel at Sinai
|
|
1. created in holiness
|
1. reconstituted in holiness
|
|
2. and so deathless
|
2. and so deathless
|
|
3. yet sinned (ate fruit)
|
3. yet sinned (worshiped calf)
|
|
4. and so died
|
4. and so died
|
The midrashim we
are examining all presume a complex yet traditional explanation of the source
of death. Good biblical doctrine states that God created Adam in a state of
holiness. He was, moreover, created in God’s “image and likeness,” which Wisdom
2:23 explains as a state of deathlessness:
God made man for incorruption
and made him in the image of his own
eternity.
Deathlessness (or
“eternity”) was conditioned upon holiness. God said, “On the day you eat it you
shall die” (Gen 2:17; 3:3). The tempter deceived Eve by saying that if she
broke God’s commandment “You shall not
die” (Gen 3:4), which was a lie. To the sinful Adam God said, “You are dust and
to dust you shall return” (Gen 3:19).
Although we have surveyed only four instances of the midrashic
understanding of Psalm 82, many more can be found in Israelite literature. Yet
as we investigate those other citations of Psalm 82, they only confirm what has
just been shown. In general, it can be stated that when Psalm 82 is cited in
Judean midrash, writers generally understand that Israel is called god because
of its holiness and/or its deathlessness.
Evidently some midrashim contain a fully developed exposition of the
Psalm, while others have but fragments of an explanation. Yet even the earliest
midrash cited above, the Mekilta,
implies as much as it states, probably because it reflects a very common
tradition which is presumably well known. Not all of the elements of the
midrash, moreover, need be explicitly mentioned when the Psalm is interpreted,
for midrash is like an iceberg. As much is implied as is visible. With this
survey of midrashic interpretation of Ps 82:6 in mind, we return to John
10:34–36. Does the Fourth Gospel interpret Ps 82 in a midrashic manner, and, if
so, how much of the midrash does it know?
5.0 Midrash in John 10:34–36
If the Fourth
Gospel understands Psalm 82 in a midrashic manner, we would want to see where
John 10:34–36 stands in regard to three issues which regularly arise in the
midrashim. First, the historical occasion of Psalm 82 is regularly seen to be
Israel’s reception of God’s word at Sinai. Second, the midrash does not call
Israel god for purely extrinsic
reasons, but links godlikeness with holiness and so deathlessness. Finally,
even the simple midrash assumes some biblical notion of death and
deathlessness, which implies an understanding of Genesis 1–3 or some popular
myth of the origin of death in the world. With these points in mind let us
return to John 10.
As we noted above, the Fourth Gospel seems to understand Psalm 82 in a
midrashic sense as referring to Israel at Sinai. For the Evangelist interprets
the psalm “I said, ‘You are gods’ ” as addressed to “those to whom the
word of God came” (10:34–35). People, then, are not called god gratuitously, but with extreme qualification, gods because the word of God came to them. Although deathlessness is not
explicitly mentioned in 10:34, I would argue that it is evident in two ways.
First of all, Jesus and God both are said to have power over death: to give
life and to protect people from being snatched. The disciples then are deathlessness because of the favor of
God and Christ to them; we assumed that such benefaction is given to disciples
who are holy. Hence deathlessness is
linked with holiness. We know that it
is not the mere physical hearing of the Word of God, but hearing in obedience
which constitutes holiness. Such is the hearing that is celebrated in John
5:24; 8:37; 9:27. This Gospel, moreover, clearly sees an intrinsic link between
hearing in faith and passing to eternal life.
The focus on holiness, moreover, continues in the application of Ps 82:6
to Jesus himself in 10:36. If Israel, who became holy, may be called god, then it is not blasphemy if Jesus,
whom God consecrated and sent as his agent into the world, is called god and Son of God. Holiness or sinlessness again serves as the ground for
calling someone Israel, or in this case, calling Jesus god.
Throughout the Fourth Gospel. Jesus’ holiness or sinfulness has been a
formal topic of debate. As regards his alleged sinfulness, the author of the
Gospel repeatedly takes note of the popular judgment of Jesus as a sinner
(9:16, 24), a judgment based on his two healings on the Sabbath (5:1–17;
9:1–7). His enemies, moreover, charge him with being thoroughly evil, that is,
possessed of a demon (7:20; 8:48; 10:20). Here in 10:33 and 36 he is charged
with a new sin, blasphemy, for claiming to be “equal to God.”
Yet the Fourth Gospel denies any sin on Jesus’ part. John 10:36 represents
but the most recent evidence of this defense, as it proclaims that God consecrated Jesus. After all, God’s
judgment of Jesus must surely have greater weight than that of his peers (see
5:16; 7:12, 20; 8:48; 10:33; 18:29–30). We have heard, moreover, of God’s
evaluation of Jesus elsewhere, that “The Father loves the Son” (3:35; 5:30).
Sinners, of course, find no place in God’s presence, yet Jesus was “face to
face” with God (1:1–2) and in God’s “bosom” (1:18). And Jesus will return to
God’s presence at the completion of his mission (13:3; 17:5, 24). God, then,
judges Jesus to be sinless and worthy to stand in the divine presence. Nor
could anyone convict Jesus of sin (8:46). Even his working on the Sabbath must
be perceived precisely as obedience to God’s will (5:30; 7:21–23). In fact,
Jesus’ very ability to open the eyes of the blind testifies to his closeness to
God (9:31–33). Jesus’ holiness (6:69) and his consecration (10:36) attest to
his preeminent sinlessness.
Divine consecration of Jesus, moreover, suggests a picture of him as one
totally set aside for God’s purposes and completely obedient to God’s will.
This radical image of commissioning evoked for Rudolf Schnackenburg the sense
of a person sealed with the Holy Spirit, a comment that makes us recall the
testimony of the Baptizer in 1:30–31. John testified that he saw God’s Spirit
not only descend on Jesus but “remain on him” (1:32–33), which suggests that
divine power and holiness were no passing phenomenon for Jesus. Because of the
dwelling of the Holy Spirit on Jesus, John testifies that he is “the Son of
God” (1:34), a figure whose task was to purify others with the Spirit which
remained in him (1:33). Jesus, then, is no sinner, but God’s Holy One.
Thus far we have noted that 10:34–35 understands Ps 82:6 to attest that
obedience to God’s word leads to holiness and godlikeness. As we saw with the
midrashim, this interpretation presumes some notion of deathlessness linked
with holiness. Yet it is important to pay attention to where and how Ps 82:6
functions in the forensic structure of 10:28–36. The Fourth Gospel uses Psalm
82 as a refutation of part of a charge. Jesus’ judges judged wrongly when they
accused him of making himself God or
equal to God, because God Himself makes
Jesus Son of God, just as God made
Israel “god” by delivering the Torah to it. At a minimum, then, Jesus
refutes the essence of the charge by maintaining that God makes him what he is,
namely, a consecrated servant, agent, and apostle, a person totally set apart
by God for sacred duty. The apology based on Psalm 82, then, argues two things:
it refutes the charge that Jesus makes
himself “Son of God,” even as it affirms that he is “on a par” with God in
power over death, both that of disciples and his own. But if it confounds his
accusers (10:31–33), does it explain or support the claims made in 10:28–30
which precipitated the forensic controversy in the first place?
We claimed above that Jesus is “equal to God” because of his “power over
death.” In regard to this, Ps 82:6 supports that claim in such a way that Jesus
is rightly called god.
Claim: Equal to God; power over death: “I give them eternal life, and they will never
perish. No one will snatch them
out of my hand” (10:28)
Judgment: Blasphemy: you, a man, make
yourself a god (10:33) = radical sinfulness
Defense: Charge refuted: it is God who makes
Jesus “Son of God” because of his holiness (Ps 82:6//John 10:34–36) =
radical holiness
Ps 82:6, then,
functions to prove that the judges’ judgment is false. Jesus’ claim to extraordinary
power (to give life, to keep from perishing and protect from snatching) is
defended because Ps 82 has already declared that some holy people were
acclaimed god, and Jesus himself is
one of those people. The very claim by Jesus that this power has been given
Jesus in 5:21–29 was contested then (5:17–18) even as it is now. But in both
cases Jesus defends himself against the charge that he is a sinful person
deserving of death for blasphemy. He never claimed that they never die and are
laid in tombs (11:38–44). But he claims power over ultimate death, which is the
basis for the claim that “I and the Father are ‘equal’ or ‘on a par.’ ”
Jesus, then, is holy and God-favored and God has given him power over death,
his own (10:17–18) and that of others (10:28–30). Thus the full import of the
claims made in 10:28–30 argue that Jesus is himself deathless and acts with
power over disciples (“my sheep”). In this sense Ps 82:6 can illuminate the
claims to power over death with Jesus’ implication that “I said, you are gods”
indeed refers to him. The issue is power over death, in which regard Jesus is
“god” or “equal to God.” The citation of Ps 82, then, is a very satisfactory
explanation for Jesus’ “equality with God.” according to the Fourth Gospel. Ps
82:6 may function to prove the judges’ judgment wrong (he does not “make himself” anything; God makes
him “Son of God”), but it is not exploited as an adequate explanation for the
Johannine assertion that Jesus has power over death (10:28–30). Ps 82:6
functions only to prove that the judges’ judgment is false.
What then of the forensic claims themselves? Jesus and God are “equal” in
terms of power over death. Yet is Jesus himself deathless? Whence comes his
power over death? Friend and foe both know that he died on the cross. Friends
proclaim that his death was God’s will and plan (Acts 2:23; 4:28) and that he
was fully obedient to God, even unto death (Phil 2:8; Mark 14:35–36). The
Fourth Gospel, moreover, proclaims a more remarkable thing about God’s
involvement in Jesus’ death. In 10:17–18 Jesus asserts that God loves him
precisely because he dies: “For this reason the Father loves me, that I lay
down my life, that I may take it again” (10:17). Death is usually a sign of
God’s wrath, not love. Jesus’ death, then, is clearly not the result of sin, as
the midrash on Ps 82:7 argues. Nor is Jesus the helpless victim whose life is
taken from him, either by men or the Angel of Death. For, as he declares, “No
one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord” (10:18a).
Furthermore, his death occurs in strict obedience to God, not as
punishment for sinfulness on his part: “This commandment I have received from
my Father (10:18b). In 10:28–30, moreover, Jesus claims to be equal to God in
having God’s own power over death. Jesus, then, while not literally deathless himself, has full power over death (see 8:51, 53, 58).
Indisputably Jesus dies, but the Fourth Gospel steadfastly maintains that
Jesus has power over death, both his own and that of his followers. We noted earlier
how this Gospel proclaims that Jesus has God’s eschatological power to the
full, one aspect of which is to “give life” to others (5:21; 10:28) and to
“raise the dead” (5:25, 28–29; 11:25). Yet Jesus has power over his own death,
to lay down his life and to take it back
(10:17–18); this power was received when God gave him to “have life in himself”
(5:26), just as God has life in Himself. And so Jesus is proclaimed deathless in a special way: although he
dies, he has complete power over his own death. He raises himself from death to
life and he raises his followers from death as well.
Ps 82:6 in the midrashim explains deathlessness, but in a way that is
different from the claims made in the Fourth Gospel about Jesus’ power over
death. But power over death claimed in 10:28–30 is the borrowed meaning of Ps
82. Yes, Jesus has power over death and so is deathless, and yes, Jesus is not
a sinner for claiming to be “on a par with God” because God consecrated him and
sent him into the world. Admittedly, John equates “deathlessness” with the
power given Jesus and radical holiness with his being on a par with God and
consecrated by God.
6.0 Summary, Conclusions and Further
Questions
6.1 Summary
John 10:34–36 can
be said to understand Ps 82:6 and use it in specific ways.
1. According to 10:34–35, Ps 82:6 (“I said, ‘You are
gods’ ” is understood to refer to Israel at Sinai when it received the
Torah (“to whom the word of God came,” 10:35).
2. Implied in this understanding is the intimate link
between holiness :: deathlessness :: godlikeness. The Fourth Gospel cites only
an abbreviated form of this, deathlessness :: holiness :: godlikeness.
3. Ps 82:6b (“sons of the Most High”) is cited by Jesus
when he calls himself “Son of God” (10:36), and it refers to his godlikeness in
terms of holiness (see “consecrated and sent”).
4. Ps 82:6 indeed touches the substance of the claims
made in 10:28–30 which precipitated the forensic process in 10:31–39. It
functions as an adequate refutation of the erroneous judgment of Jesus’ judges,
who charged that he, “a man, makes
himself equal to God.” This judgment is false because God makes him “Son of God.” In essence, God
has given Jesus power over death.
5. According to the apology in 10:34–36, holiness is
linked with godlikeness in ways that are appropriate to human beings. Jesus
would be a mere human being even if acclaimed “god/Son of God,” as was Israel.
But the forensic argument in John 10 claims much more. No mere human being,
Jesus is a heavenly figure who is “equal to God.” His equality rests not on
holiness but on divine powers intrinsic to him, that is, full eschatological
power.
6. Jesus’ claims in regard to power over death always
remain important in John 10. In this Gospel, his deathlessness does not
formally derive from sinlessness/holiness as in the case of the midrash on Ps
82:6, but from an appreciation of the full eschatological power which God gave
him over death (5:21–29; 10:17–18). In 5:18 and 10:30, Jesus may be called
“equal to God” for a much greater reason than ever justified calling Israel god, namely, because of powers intrinsic
to him. Power over death is the specific content of “equal to God.”
7. If we are correct that Ps 82:6 is understood in
10:34–36 in line with its basic midrashic interpretation, then the remark in
10:28–29 that “no one shall snatch them out of my hand” probably echoes what
the midrash discusses in terms of the Angel of Death whose power over God’s
people was restrained. The Angel of Death will not snatch Jesus’
followers/sheep either from his hand or God’s hand.
8. Although the midrashim studied above were written
considerably later than the Fourth Gospel, the understanding of Ps 82:6 in John
10:34–36 belongs in that same trajectory of interpretation. It might be the
earliest extant witness of that tradition is John 10, although not the most
complete example. (Jerome H. Neyrey, The Gospel of John in Cultural and Rhetorical
Perspective [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2009], 322-31)
