Other Religion Commons^™

Monotheism, Polytheism, Monolatry, Or Henotheism? Toward An Assessment Of Divine Plurality In The Hebrew Bible, Michael Heiser

Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary (1973-2015)

Israel’s view of God and his relationship to other divine beings in the Hebrew Bible has long been the subject of scholarly debate. The dominant critical consensus since the late nineteenth century holds that Israel’s faith evolved from polytheism or henotheism to monotheism. Passages in the Hebrew Bible that assume the existence of other gods are compared to other passages that put forth the declaration that “there are no other gods besides” the God of Israel as proof of this view. Other scholars who reject this evolutionary paradigm tend to assume passages evincing divine plurality actually speak of human beings, …