reverence, is an only being, Deut. 6: 4. In the ninety-sixth Psalm, the inspired author says, "For the Lord is great, and greatly to be praised; he is to be feared above all gods." Hebrew, "For Jehovah is great, and greatly to be praised; he is to be feared above all elohim :" which implies that all elohim are objects of fear, but none of them in the same degree, nor with the same propriety and justice, as Jehovah. The distinctive titles and Elohim chajim, and Elohim chai, living God, and Jehovah Elohim, Jehovah our Elohim, etc., are of frequent occurrence in the Old Testament.

The tropical use of elohim, as a title of kings and other rulers, was founded in the profound and superstitious veneration with which the people regarded the ruling powers. Rulers in ancient times were always of the nobility, whom the common people were accustomed from their childhood to consider a superior order of men, possessing a portion of divinity, and naturally and necessarily above them; and kings, abounding in riches, invested with absolute power, and glittering in splendor, were considered so near the gods, that they were esteemed worthy of honors that differed but little from religious adoration. The title elohim, which was often given to them in common with the objects of worship, designated them as beings that inspired veneration and awe similar to that which was inspired by the gods themselves. So the ancient Greeks derived both the authority of their kings, and their ability to administer the government; their bodily strength, stature, and beauty; their courage, enterprise, and wisdom, from Jupiter, and dignified them with the titles of theoeides Drosions, isotheos iooos, godlike, and diogenes dioyevs, heaven-born, born of Jupiter. Creutzer's Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Voelker. Vol. 3. B. 3. Cap. 1.

See

The customary use of the plural elohim, and the extensive application of it, seems to have had its origin in the polytheism of the people who spoke the language. The Hebrew was not exclusively the language of the Israelites; neither was it even originally theirs. It was one of the dialects of a common language which was spoken by the nations that inhabited the countries of western Asia, between Persia and the Mediterranean, and between Armenia and the Indian ocean. The other dialects were the Chaldean, the Syriac, and the Arabic. Hebrew was the dialect of the Canaanites, including the Phenicians. All these nations were polytheists. Abraham was a native of Ur in

Chaldea, and was seventy-five years of age when he went into the land of Canaan. In his time these several dialects might differ but little; but if there was any difference, he spoke the Chaldean, and not the Canaanitish. During their long residence in Canaan his descendants acquired the language of this country, and, of course, learned it as it was. They did not originate its usages, but adopted them as they found them already settled. It was the language of polytheists. So, indeed, were all the dialects. In the time of Moses, when the first of the sacred books were written, all these countries were immersed in the grossest idolatry. They had not only their Eloah, but their Elohim; and these were found in every thing in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, which was adapted to excite fear, dread, or hope, or could create astonishment or admiration. A polytheistic language was now used to express monotheistic ideas.

I will now examine the texts in which the term elohim, or bne elohim, designates celestial spirits, distinct from Jehovah, and superior to man.

Ps. 8: 3-8, "When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: all sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field; the fowl of the air, and the fishes of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the sea." "For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels," is in the Hebrew text, "For thou hast made him a little lower than the elohim." By elohim the ancient as well as the modern translators understood those spirits whom we call angels. So also the author of the epistle to the Hebrews understood the word. The connection, moreover, demands this interpretation. We have in the text God, the Creator, distinguished from all his works; who is addressed, in the first verse, as Jehovah our Lord, whose name is excellent in all the earth, whose glory is above the grandeur of the starry heavens, and in comparison with whom man is as nothing. We have next the noblest of his creatures in the visible world, man, whom he has crowned with glory and honor, and has placed over the works

of his hands in the earth, the air, and the seas. We have lastly the elohim, whom man resembles, but does not equal. They must therefore be an order of intelligent beings above him: if they are not such, what are they? What can be higher than man, but a more perfect intelligence? Man was made a little lower than the elohim. There cannot, therefore, be a great chasm between him and them; as there is between him and the Deity. There may be many orders of elohim, or many genera and species of the same order, some of which may be immeasurably above humanity, and may approach much nearer to the Deity; yet as a class of superior beings, there is among them a point of comparison in which man is but a little lower than they.

Genesis 3: 1—5, "Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made: and he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of any tree of the garden? And the woman said, we may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: but as to the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die; for God knoweth, that in the day ye eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened and ye shall be as gods knowing good and evil."

Throughout this and the preceding chapter, whilst the historian speaks, the name of God, in the Hebrew text, is Jehovah Elohim; in the conversation only between the woman and the serpent, it is simply Elohim, in the pluralis excellentiae, with the verb or the participle in the singular:-" hath Elohim said? -"Elohim hath said"-" Elohim is knowing that." In the last sentence," Ye shall be as elohim, knowing good and evil," the participle knowing is plural, which, according to the common usage, makes elohim, with which it is in agreement, a common plural. The authors of the English version very justly considered it such, and translated keelohim, DN, by as gods, The Greek version of the Seventy also rendered it in the same sense oi theoi, oi ui, as gods.

Eve, in all her simplicity, could not be so stupid as to imagine, that, by eating of the fruit of a tree which God had created, she could become like him; but she might conceive it possible that she could attain to the state of other created beings, who were then advanced above her. It is implied in the text, that she had a knowledge of the existence of such an order of

beings; and this is, doubtless, in itself very probable. In that state of innocence, when they were accustomed to the sound of God walking in the garden, and so familiar an intercourse subsisted between heaven and earth, it is certainly not unlikely, that the first human pair were favored with angels' visits, and therefore knew what angels were: they saw their coming and their departure, and perceived that they were intelligences of a higher order.

The superiority of the elohim, to which the tempter directed Eve's attention, consisted in this, that their eyes were open, and they knew good and evil. The latter is the consequence of the former; if their eyes were open, then they knew good and evil.

The phrase, to know good and evil, means to know all things, and to know them in such a manner as to be able to distinguish one thing from another. A similar phraseology occurs 2 Sam. 14: 7, where the woman of Tekoah says to David, "The word of my lord, the king, shall now be comfortable; for as an angel of God, so is my lord, the king, to discern good and bad." And again in verse 20, "And my lord is wise, according to the wisdom of an angel of God, to know all things that are in the earth." All things that are in the earth include both the good and the evil things. To know good and evil, is therefore to know all things, and to be able to discern good and bad among them. Of this knowledge the tree in the midst of the garden seems to have been a symbol ; and the prohibition of its fruit to our first parents may have signified, that there were things which it would not be safe for them to know; and they must therefore restrain their curiosity, and be content with such knowledge as God would choose to teach them. It was an idea of antiquity that knowledge had introduced vice and misery into the world; and Solomon says, "Lo, this only have I found, that God made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions," Ecc. 7: 29; by which he means, that their discoveries had injured their virtue, and marred their happiness. But the tempter represented, that the elohim, possessing the knowledge of good and evil, were, by virtue of it, happier than man, and solicited Eve to aspire to an equality with them in this higher felicity.

Genesis 3: 22, "And Jehovah said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat,

and live forever; therefore the Lord God (Jehovah Elohim) sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken."

"The man is become like one of us ;" i. e. like one of the elohim; certainly not like Jehovah, nor like one of the three in the Godhead. As yet the likeness was only in the attribute of knowledge, in which they had made an advance that was, however, fatal to their happiness. Another, in which it might be attained, if they should be permitted to continue in the garden, was immortality; and this was prevented by sending them forth to till the ground. All this is symbolical language, adapted to the simplicity of a primitive age; and its literal sense must not be closely pressed. What we learn from it, so far as our present purpose is concerned, is, that there is an order of celestial beings, dwelling with God, who possess superior knowledge and are immortal.

Ps. 97: 7, 9, "Confounded be all they that worship graven images, that boast themselves of idols; worship him, all ye gods," (Hebrew all ye elohim.)-"For thou Lord, (Heb. Jehovah,) art high above all the earth; thou art exalted far above all gods," (Heb. all elohim.) The Greek version of the Seventy renders, elohim in verse 7 by angelloi autou, ayyedot autou his angels; and in verse 9, by theoi voi Gods. The epistle to the Hebrews cites the last clause of verse 7 thus, "Let all the angels of God worship him." Heb. 1: 6. These authorities show that the ancient Jews, and the inspired writers of the New Testament, understood the term elohim to include angels. In this text they took it to mean angels only; because they considered the gods of the Gentiles dead things and nullities, and could not conceive that an exhortation to worship Jehovah should be addressed to them. In verse 9, the Seventy appear to have taken elohim in its widest sense as meaning whatever is an object of reverence to man; so that the text might read thus: "For thou, Jehovah, art high above all the earth; thou art exalted far above every object of reverence."

Genesis 1: 26, 27. Retaining the Hebrew appellation, the text reads thus: "And Elohim said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion, etc. So Elohim created man in his image; in the image of elohim created he him, etc." Throughout this chapter, and the first three verses of the second chapter, the name of God is uniformly Elohim, in the plural of excellency, having the verb and pro