We read in Isaiah 19:4,
וסכרתי את־מצרים ביד אדנים קשה ומלך עז ימשל־בם נאם האדון יהוה צבאות
“And I will give over the Egyptians into the hand of a cruel lord(adonim); and a fierce king shall rule over them, says the Lord, the Lord of hosts.”
The word is adonim(אדנים)with the exact same masculine plural ending(-iym/ ם) as elohim yet I have not come across a single English, Arabic or Malay Bible that I do read that translates it into plural. What the plural ending does is that it acts as an amplifier or magnifier for the noun adon. This shows that the plural ending does not necessarily convey a plural concept even in intances where it is applied to words other than elohim.
In Judges 6:31 we read,
ויאמר יואש לכל אשר־עמדו עליו האתם תריבון לבעל אם־אתם תושיעון אותו אשר יריב לו יומת עד־הבקר אם־אלהים הוא ירב לו כי נתץ את־מזבחו
“And Joash said unto all that stood against him: ‘Will ye contend for Baal? or will ye save him? he that will contend for him, shall be put to death before morning; if he be a god, let him contend for himself, because one hath broken down his altar.’”
The word is elohim yet we understand that we’re dealing with a single entity namely Baal. Surely Christians do not think Baal is some kind of Trinity of a god or maybe they do?
We see in 1 Kings whose nouns are understood following the same system as discussed for Genesis 1:1 earlier,
יען אשר עזבוני וישתחוו לעשתרת אלהי צדנין לכמוש אלהי מואב ולמלכם אלהי בני־עמון ולא־הלכו בדרכי לעשות הישר בעיני וחקתי ומשפטי כדוד אביו
(leAshtoreth elohei tsidonin) לעשתרת אלהי צדנין
The above means “Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians”
(likhamosh elohei moav)לכמוש אלהי מואב
The above means “Chamosh the god of the Moabites”
(lemilkom elohei venei amon)ולמלכם אלהי בני־עמון
The above means “Milcom the god of the children of Amon”
One may ask why is the word ‘elohei’ and not ‘elohim’ which is the word under discussion. Well actually they’re the same word. The word becomes elohei(with the drop of the ‘m’) when it is grammatically associated with the next word. This grammatical phenomenon is described as “construct relationship” in the Hebrew language. So here we have a clear example of the word elohim used where it certainly means one for each of the three deities. It makes totally no sense to say that Chamosh the gods of the Moabites when Chamosh is a single entity. The same is true with Milcom and Ashtoreth. The point is that for each god(that is singular) the word elohim is designated and it does not mean more than one in any shape or form. This verse is yet another clear example that elohim can and is understood as singular. Thus Rev. Costa is wrong in his claim that elohim is “grammatically always plural.”
Let us now mention Wilhelm Gesenius’ statement one more time for better retention,
That the language has entirely rejected the idea of numerical plurality in אֱלֹהִים (whenever it denotes one God), is proved especially by its being almost invariably joined with a singular attribute (cf. § 132 h), e.g. אֱלֹהִים צַדִּיק Ps 7:10, &c.
What Wilhelm Gesenius means is that when the word elohim occurs in places where God, the Lord Creator is the subject the grammar ’signals’ that I mentioned earlier clearly determine the absolute singular nature of the noun despite the masculine plural ending. We see further evidence of this when discussing Genesis 1:26 as we see in the next verse(27) which reads,
“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”
If verse 26 denotes more than one the above would have the plural pronoun instead of the singular. This is even further proven by verse 29 which uses the first person singular pronoun “I”(which Rev. Costa has also mentioned). It is a fact that whenever Elohim occurs in the context of God, the Lord Creator it behaves as a singular noun and not some mumbo jumbo uniplural or three in one due to how it governs singular verbs, singular adjectives and singular pronouns as we have discussed thus far.
As we have seen the scholars of Hebrew corroborate our discussion. The top gun Gesenius has already been mentioned along with several other reputable sources. All of them agree that Elohim means ONE and that it stands for pluralis maestatis or the plural of majesty.
( يا أيها الناس اتقوا ربكم الذي خلقكم من نفس واحدة )
ثم وصف تعالى ذكره نفسه بأنه المتوحد بخلق جميع الأنام من شخص واحد ، معرفا عباده كيف كان مبتدأ إنشائه ذلك من النفس الواحدة ، ومنبههم بذلك على أن جميعهم بنو رجل واحد وأم واحدة وأن بعضهم من بعض ، وأن حق بعضهم على بعض واجب وجوب حق الأخ على أخيه ، لاجتماعهم في النسب إلى أب واحد وأم واحدة وأن الذي يلزمهم من رعاية بعضهم حق بعض ، وإن بعد التلاقي في النسب إلى الأب الجامع بينهم ، مثل الذي يلزمهم من ذلك في النسب الأدنى وعاطفا بذلك بعضهم على بعض ، ليتناصفوا ولا يتظالموا ، وليبذل القوي من نفسه للضعيف حقه بالمعروف على ما ألزمه الله له (تفسير الطبرى)
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