Charles Voysey on John 10:33 (Makest Thyself a god)

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From: An Examination of Canon Liddon's Bampton Lectures 1871

They answered 'for a good work we stone thee not, but for blasphemy, and because thou, being a man, makest thyself a god' (QEOS; without the Article. Observe the use of the Article with QEOS in the immediate context, and compare its use in v. 18). The sense would perhaps be more accurately conveyed to an English ear, by, because thou, being human, makest thyself Superhuman or Divine. Certainly the Jews did not mean that Jesus affirmed Himself to be individually, in His own person, the Almighty One. They did not, even with their stimulated insight, detect His saying to be in effect; 'I am Jehovah, the God of Israel.' Such depth of penetration was a stage in the unfolding of Christian discernment. "Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said ye are gods? If he called them gods unto whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be made void), say ye of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent unto the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am a Son of God?"

Psalm Ixxxii. has in verse 1, God judgeth among gods; in verse 6, I said ye are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High (comp. Luke i. 32). The Septuagint Version, of course, marks the distinction between the God and gods, by prefixing and omitting the Article. The reasoning, such as it is, in connection with the quotation ascribed to our Lord, seemingly turns upon the fact that gods are synonymous with sons of the Most High, and that the words cited would inevitably recall to Jewish minds the more apposite words left uncited. If unjust judges could be called gods and sons of the Highest, He whom the Father had consecrated and sent, could not justly incur the imputation of blasphemy by calling Himself a son of God. The reasoning implies that Christ would not have blasphemed had He called Himself QEOS, since in official dignity and mission He was superior to those who were in Scripture called QEOI. He did not, however, employ that title, but the humbler and more customary designation, son of God, which could then only be equivalent to QEOS;, when, as in the instance quoted, the appellation was applied in some lower, relative, representative sense.

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