In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

Genesis 1:1

You may have heard it claimed by a non-Christian that the Creation story in the Book of Genesis, when read in the original Hebrew, actually says that multiple gods created the heavens and the earth. They’ll argue that the Hebrew term “elohim”, which we translate as “God” in this passage, is in fact a plural term, and so it denotes multiple gods, rather than just one.

But this argument is based on an ignorance of the ancient Hebrew language. While they are partially correct — the word “elohim” is indeed plural — where they go wrong is in the assumption that this implies a plurality of quantity.

Here is a quote by Jeff A. Benner, a longtime scholar of ancient Hebraic language and culture, from his book His Name Is One:

The English language, as well as other Western languages, uses the plural to identify quantity, such as two “trees.” The ancient Hebrew language, on the other hand, uses the plural to identify quality as well as quantity.

For instance, the Hebrew language can say “two trees” identifying the quantity, as well as “one trees” identifying its quality as being larger or stronger than the other trees.

He then provides a clear example of this principle from the Book of Job:

The Hebrew word בהמה (behemah) is a “land animal.” Hebrew is a gender sensitive language; therefore every word is identified as either masculine or feminine. The suffix ים (iym) is used for masculine words while the suffix ות (ot) is used for feminine words. The word בהמה (behemah) is feminine and would be written as בהמות (behemot) in the plural form. Notice the use of this word as it is found in the book of Job.

“However, please ask the animals and they will teach you, and the birds of the sky and they will tell you.” (Job 12:7)

“Please look at the behemoth which I made with you.” (Job 40:15)

In the first verse, the word בהמות (behemot) is used in a quantitative manner identifying more than one animal. The second verse uses the same plural word, which most translations transliterate as “behemoth”, as some unknown excessively large animal. In this instance, the plural identifies the animal as qualitatively larger than the average בהמה (behemah).

The Hebrew word אלהים (elohiym) is used in the same sense. It can be used to identify more than one אלוה (eloah) or one אלוה (eloah) that is qualitatively stronger, more powerful than the average אלוה (eloah).

Fair enough, you may say, but how do we determine whether elohim was meant to denote a plurality of quantity (multiple gods) or a plurality of quality (the greatest God) in Genesis 1:1?

Benner explains:

The verb in this verse is ברא (bara) and would be literally translated as “he created”, a masculine singular verb. If the subject of the verb, אלהים (elohiym), was in fact a plural, the verb would have been written as בראו (baru) and would be literally translated as “they created”, a masculine plural verb. Since the verb is singular, the word אלהים (elohiym) is singular in number, but is understood as being qualitatively plural rather than quantitatively plural.

[. . .]

The God who created the heavens and the earth is not just a god, but the all-powerful God, mightier than any other god.

“For the LORD your God (אלהים-elohiym), he is God (אלהים-elohiym) of the gods (אלהים-elohiym), and Lord of lords, the great God (אל-el), mighty and awesome.” (Deuteronomy 10:17)

So, if you ever see someone claiming that Genesis says multiple gods created the world, kindly correct them in their error, and/or direct them to this post.

I’ll be diving deeper into what we can learn about God by looking at the ancient Hebrew words used to describe Him, in my upcoming post, “What Is God?” — so stay tuned.

God love you.