Help with today's Gospel reading

[datritle]

“We are not stoning you for a good work but for blasphemy.
You, a man, are making yourself God.”
Jesus answered them,
“Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, ‘You are gods”‘?
If it calls them gods to whom the word of God came,
and Scripture cannot be set aside,
can you say that the one
whom the Father has consecrated and sent into the world
blasphemes because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?

Can you explain this? “you are gods”?!?

 

[po18guy]

From the Haydock Commentary:

Ver. 31. Then took up stones, &c. because, said they, being a man, thou makest thyself God. The Jews, says St. Augustine, understood well enough what the Arians will not understand, that from Christ’s words it followed that he was one and the same God with the eternal Father. (Witham) — The Jews, in opposition to our Saviour’s doctrine, took up stones to destroy him, in order that he might preach no more to them. So heretics at the present time exercise the odium of their impiety against the same Lord, by perverting his holy doctrines, and, as much as in them lies, pulling him and his servants down from the glorious seats of heavenly bliss. (St. Augustine)

Ver. 34. This is addressed to princes established to govern the people of God. They are the image of God on earth by the authority they exercise, and which they have received from Him. — Is it not written in your law, (under which were also comprehended the Psalms) I have said: you are Gods? &c. Christ here stops the mouths of the Jews, by an argument which they could not answer, that sometimes they were called Gods, who acted by God’s authority. I have said: you are Gods. (Psalm lxxxi. 6.) But then he immediately declares, that it is not in this sense only that he is God. 1st, Because he has been sanctified by the Father, which St. Augustine and others understand of that infinite sanctification, which he has necessarily by always proceeding from the Father. Others expound it of a greater sanctity and fulness of grace above all other saints, given to him, even as he was man. But 2ndly, he adds at the same time, and confirms what he had often told them, that he was the Son of God, sent into the world: that his works shew that he was in the Father, and the Father in him. by this they saw that he was far from recalling or contradicting what he had said before. And therefore (ver. 30.[39.?]) they sought to apprehend him, and put him to death for blasphemy. (Witham) — Eloim, which name of God was so called from judging, and may be interpreted judges. (Menochius)

 

[PatriciusRex]

“We are not stoning you for a good work but for blasphemy.
You, a man, are making yourself God.”
Jesus answered them,
“Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, ‘You are gods”‘?
If it calls them gods to whom the word of God came,
and Scripture cannot be set aside,
can you say that the one
whom the Father has consecrated and sent into the world
blasphemes because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?

Can you explain this? “you are gods”?!?

Jesus is referencing Psalm 82 which is often interpreted as referring to the judges over the people of Israel appointed according to the Mosaic law.

In the psalm these judges are being chastised for judging unjustly. And God reminds them that though they are called “gods” (because their judgement was set in the Torah as being that of God himself) they are still mere men and will have to answer to Him. This passage seems to indicate that in ancient Israel it may have been common to speak to a judge passing judgment as “god” in order to give authority to the ruling.

Jesus confirms this interpretation by identifying these “gods” with those “to whom the word of God came.”

In the specific context of the Gospel reading, he was simply showing the hypocrisy of the pharisees, who sought to accuse him of blasphemy on being called “Son of God” (even though he actually was!) by citing that the law which they propounded as their source of authority even allowed humans to be called “gods.”

 

[datritle]

Thank you both!