Saturday, November 18, 2023

D. Charles Pyle on Nehemiah 9:6

Critics will quote this verse to show that angels could not be brothers to Jehovah because Jehovah created them. Actually, the term “host of heaven” often refers to the sun, moon and stars. In Genesis 2:1 (this verse refers to the creation just made—not to angels, because the angels already were created long before the earth and its sidereal heaven ever existed)—which objects later (for many) came to become objects of worship (Deuteronomy 4:19; 17:3; 2 Kings 17:16; 21:3, 5; 23:4-5; Jeremiah 8:2; 19:13; Daniel 8:10). Thus, it is entirely probable that this idea is what was had in mind when the person made this statement now found in scripture.

 

Objection that this verse only could have reference to angels (because of the fact that the word “worship” is used in the text here) if itself negated and obviated by the fact that, elsewhere, a number of inanimate objects, as well as animals, are said to praise the Lord, along with angels, as Psalms 148:3-13. Even if it still could be proven without any shadow of a doubt that the “host of heaven,” here referred to literally are angels, there is a possibility that Jehovah was being referred to as if he were the Father. Also, the name Jehovah is a title that equally could be applied to either the Father or the Son, or collectively to both . . .

 

D. Charles Pyle, I Have Said Ye Are Gods: Concepts Conducive to the Early Christian Doctrine of Deification in Patristic Literature and the Underlying Strata of the Greek New Testament (Revised and Supplemented) (North Charleston, S.C.: CreateSpace, 2018), 350