A name for God used frequently in the Hebrew Bible

Elohim, is not a name, it is a title like sir or lord. it means god/gods. many people think it is the name of god. Elohim has plural morphological form in Hebrew, but it is used with singular verbs when it refers to the God of Israel. nevets, why do you ask this question, i think you know it better than anyone els.

Elohim is a substantive adjective--that means it is an adjective that is almost always used as a noun. "Almighty" is an adjective, "The Almighty" is a substantive adjective, and Elohim (pronounced ell oh HEEM) means "mighty" or "almighty." When used about false gods or people who act in the place of God, it takes a plural verb. When used of God, it usually takes a singular verb, but a major new book--The Jewish Trinity by Yoel Natan, which you can get at Amazon.com--points out numerous instances when it takes a plural verb but refers to the one God, therefore must refer to the persons of the Trinity. However, this never shows up in any translation because until "The Jewish Trinity" was written, nobody understood it. In Genesis 20:13, Abraham said, literally, "Gods, {they] caused me to wander..." In Genesis 35:07 Jacob said "The Gods were revealed..." This and other examples are on page 119.

Essentially, there isn't a clear cut answer for this question. The 'him' ending is the ending for masculine plural nouns in the Hebrew language; so, in form, it is plural. However, the Hebrews, when applied to YHWH, use it as a singular noun. This is allowed because, just as with any other language, their are exceptions to the rules in Hebrew. Christians would read it as a plural noun, but referencing one God; indicating the three parts of the Trinity. It is also the same word when talking about the polytheistic gods of other nations (for example in the book of Jonah, the sailors are praying to 'elohim', just as Jonah is praying to 'Elohim' (the caps on the E is only in english and added only for clarification of who is being talked about). Islam would hold that it is a royal usage of the plural noun, where the One God refers to himself in the plural since; ie. "We are Allah". The way you translate it will be based on your previous beliefs, and, although other religions will debate how you translate it, either plural or singular can be correct.

The Hebrew word ’elo·him′ (gods) appears to be from a root meaning “be strong.” ’Elo·him′ is the plural of ’eloh′ah (god). Sometimes this plural refers to a number of gods (Ge 31:30, 32; 35:2), but more often it is used as a plural of majesty, dignity, or excellence. ’Elo·him′ is used in the Scriptures with reference to Jehovah himself, to angels, to idol gods (singular and plural), and to men. When applying to Jehovah, ’Elo·him′ is used as a plural of majesty, dignity, or excellence. (Ge 1:1) Regarding this, Aaron Ember wrote: “That the language of the O[ld] T[estament] has entirely given up the idea of plurality in . . . [’Elo·him′] (as applied to the God of Israel) is especially shown by the fact that it is almost invariably construed with a singular verbal predicate, and takes a singular adjectival attribute. . . . [’Elo·him′] must rather be explained as an intensive plural, denoting greatness and majesty, being equal to The Great God.”—The American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures, Vol. XXI, 1905, p. 208. The title ’Elo·him′ draws attention to Jehovah’s strength as the Creator. It appears 35 times by itself in the account of creation, and every time the verb describing what he said and did is in the singular number. (Ge 1:1–2:4) In him resides the sum and substance of infinite forces. ELOHIM = GOD. It is a TITLE. NOT GOD'S PERSONAL NAME. This is found at (Exodus 6:3) And I used to appear to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as God Almighty, but as respects my name Jehovah I did not make myself known to them.

Eloihm is a singular noun means God/Father.

At times the Hebrew Scriptures employ the term for God, ’elo·him´, with reference to mighty creatures. At Psalm 8:5, for example, we read: “You also proceeded to make him [man] a little less than godlike ones.” (Hebrew, ’elohim´; “a god,” New English Bible, Jerusalem Bible) The Greek Septuagint Version renders ’elo·him´ here as “angels.” The Jewish translators of this version saw no conflict with monotheism in applying the term for God to created spirit persons. (Compare Hebrews 2:7, 9) Remember that “God” and “Father” not distinctive. The title “God” is neither personal nor distinctive (one can even make a god of his belly; Php 3:19). In the Hebrew Scriptures the same word (’Elo·him´) is applied to Jehovah, the true God, and also to false gods, such as the Philistine god Dagon (Jg 16:23, 24; 1Sa 5:7) and the Assyrian god Nisroch. (2Ki 19:37) For a Hebrew to tell a Philistine or an Assyrian that he worshiped “God [’Elo·him´]” would obviously not have sufficed to identify the Person to whom his worship went. In its articles on Jehovah, The Imperial Bible-Dictionary nicely illustrates the difference between ’Elo·him´ (God) and Jehovah. Of the name Jehovah, it says: “It is everywhere a proper name, denoting the personal God and him only; whereas Elohim partakes more of the character of a common noun, denoting usually, indeed, but not necessarily nor uniformly, the Supreme. . . . The Hebrew may say the Elohim, the true God, in opposition to all false gods; but he never says the Jehovah, for Jehovah is the name of the true God only. He says again and again my God . . . ; but never my Jehovah, for when he says my God, he means Jehovah. He speaks of the God of Israel, but never of the Jehovah of Israel, for there is no other Jehovah. He speaks of the living God, but never of the living Jehovah, for he cannot conceive of Jehovah as other than living.” Edited by P. Fairbairn, London, 1874, Vol. I, p. 856 Sources cited.

Elohim is the plural form of "el" but can be used for an individual in which case it is a plural of majesty. Kind of like when a king or queen says "we" even though they are one person. This word in itself does not hint to a Triune God or any other "man made" concept of him. This word is translated in the Bible as gods, god, God, and even angels! The pagan gods Baal and Dagon are also called "elohim" and they are singular gods! I think people try to put more into the word than it was intended to mean at times.

It is a Hebrew word for God and is plural yet describes One Being. I believe that this is one of the many things in the Bible that supports the Trinity. -In the service of the Master. Thank you and God bless you!

Many Hebrew words use the plural form to denote majesty, superiority, superlative, ect. While ELOHIM is plural in form, when used in singular setting it beomes singular with a superlative, or superior emphasis. Many scholars call this the "plural intensive". ELOHIM is also used in the plural. Its plurality does not mean "persons", but "gods" or "mighty ones". So whether it is plural or not is determined by the context. http://reslight.net/forum/index.php?topic=138

i do not recall at what point elohim was employed instead of the divine name. however, this was due to a superstition that began. suppposedly it was disrespectful to use God's name. so instead of using Jehovah in their texts they started using this title. how very sad! also what a conspiracy to cooperate with Jehovah's enemy and decide to hide his name from the world. for this reason many in the past have refused to acknowledge that Jehovah is the name of the true God. it is not lord, elohim, God, or jesus. exodus 3:15 says "then God once more said to moses:"this is what you are to say to the sons of israel. 'Jehovah the God of your forefathers, the God of abraham, the God of isaac, the God jacob, has sent me to you. this is my name to time indefinite,.." also isaiah 42:8 says "I am Jehovah. that is my name; and to no one else shall I give my own glory, neither my praise to graven images."

The Hebrew word Elohim might find resonance amongst Arabic speakers as both languages are Semitic and have many words that sound similar. I think in Hebrew the suffix 'im' is added to words to make them plural or for respect. When used for God, in the OT, it would represent respect and obviously NOT plural as Judaism is a strictly monotheistic religion. The Hebrew ‘Eloh’ is very close to the Arabic ‘Elaah’ which also means god and ‘Allah’ which means the God. So Elohim is Eloh + im. Eloh is very similar to the Arabic Ilah which means god (I've put capitals in both Eloh and Ilah, although neither Hebrew nor Arabic has any upper/lower case distinction in its alphabet).

-----THIS IS EXCERPT FROM----- http://heshallgovern.com, from: http://heshallgovern.homestead.com/radioshow-21.html "..........What I am about to tell you, I will try to keep real simple, according to proverbs 30 verse 4, ...."Who hath ascended up into heaven, or descended? who hath gathered the wind in his fists? who hath bound the waters in a garment? who hath established all the ends of the earth? what [is] His name, and what [is] his son's name, if thou canst tell?" .....and other places, the Jewish moshiach/christ is thee actual son of the God of Israel. And according to biblical Judaism he is a separate being as all sons are. Like all offspring of whatever specie, the son or child of whatever specie we are talking about has the exact same attributes as his parents, but this doesn't mean that we should then foolishly jump off the deep end by saying that the parents and the children are one and the same, that's utter rubbish. Jesus denied that he was the God of Israel and constantly said that he was sent by him and that he prayed to him all the time, proving in and of itself the very fact that he is not the God of Israel. Examples: 1. "Why do you call me good, there is no one good but God alone?" Mattthew 19:17. 2. And when he was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit.... ....And cried with a loud voice, and said, "What have I to do with thee, Jesus, [thou] son of the Most High God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not." ---- So we clearly see that the demon does not consider him [Jesus] as "the God of Israel in the flesh," but a seperate person. 3. Even Paul says, "For He [The God of Israel] “has put everything under his [the Christ]feet.” Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ." - 1 Cor 15:27-28 4. Jesus saith unto her [Mary], Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and [to] my God, and your God." - John 20:17 But because he is the very son of the only and living God, this son has similar attributes to his Father, thus it should not be very hard for you to conceive the notion that if the Father can create so can the son. In fact it was the son that created all things during the days of creation, because out of the two, only he can get weary and tired, whereas the God of Israel cannot get weary or tired, because He cannot die even if He wanted to, because he is the only one that is Eternal. So, when we see someone resting and getting refreshed on the seventh day of creation in Gen ch 2 it is clear that this tired person is not the God of Israel, yet we see him in Chap 1 having the power to created because in Gen ch 1:26 it says "let us make." When all of this is said, it is very clear that our Jewish narrator is speaking of non-other than the messiah, not the God of Israel. In the faith of the Jewish bible, that is Judaism, There are different classes of spirits in the world of the unseen, like Cherubs, seraphs, even horses as we see those that take Elijah to heaven in 2 Kings 2 or as we see again in 2 Kings 6, and the most famous class are the angels. Well, in these classes I just mentioned I failed to mention the class that the God of Israel is in as well as His son, this class is called the Elohim, in this class there are just two, no more and no less, one is Eternal and one is made. The son, as all sons are, is younger than his Father - which tells you in and of itself that he is not Eternal because he has a beginning point. In fact, according to proverbs 8:22, Micah 5:2, and the apostles, Jesus was the very first of all that has come into being, being the very firstborn of all creation. ---Proverbs 8:22 Yehowah made as the first or beginning of His way, before His works of old. I was brought into existence during the days of eternity, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.... Blessed [is] the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my doors. For whoso findeth me findeth life, and shall obtain favour of Yehowah. But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul: all they that hate me love death. ---Micah 5:2 But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, [though] thou be little among the thousands of Judah, [yet] out of thee shall he come forth unto me [that is] to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth / birth / orgins occurred long ago, during the days of eternity. -- NOT THAT HE IS ETERNAL!!! ---Rev 3:14 And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God *****Jesus is the first or beginning of all creation**** ---Col 1:15 Who is in the image of the invisible God, he is the firstborn of every creature: ***Paul admits he is a part of creation, calling him a creature like us humans, for as we are made in the image of the God of Israel, so is he. Keep in mind Genesis says, "Let us make mankind in our image" - meaning those two makers have the same features to each other and we humans to them!!!" I am NOT tainting the scriptures to make it sound the way I want, rather the moshiach/messiah/christ of Judaism is not the God of Israel but is His greatest servant. Here is another quote, YHWH said to Moses - "I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him." - Deut 18 ****So for hundreds of years the prophets always taught that the moshiach is a servant of HaShem, not that he is HaShem. For as you can see here that the prophet is subject to HaShem and does not utter his own words. Likewise, in the context of this verse it is clear that the YHWH and the prophet are seperate individuals!!!**** ---Isaiah 53:11 "My righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities." So we see that Jesus is NOT the God of Israel in the Flesh, NO he is the literal and actual son or child of Yehowah in the flesh, who has his own seperate throne in the heavens, "Yehowah said to my master, "Sit thou at My right hand." - Psalm 110 When I am on the street talking to people, I usually flabbergast them by the real truth that they are receiving, whether they be preachers, or laymen or someone that might be well versed yet, still tainted by this so called "bible belt." As I talk - you can see their wheels turning in their mind and also Satan at work to cause doubt in all that I say, even though I can clearly back everything up, whereas the other preachers can't. They only have worthless, denominational creeds, even if they claim to be quote-unquote non-denominational. People simply don't know how deceived they are. If someone actually knows a little bit of scripture, yet Satan is whispering to them lies, they will ask me a few questions like, "Well, if Jesus is 'not God in the flesh' as you say, how do you explain Isaiah 9:6 where it says, 'For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace? [AKJV]' " With that I say, "This is a classic trinitarian rendering as found in a King James bible, NIV, American standard and many other English versions, but this is not what our Hebrew says. In other words this passage does not have a Judaic rendering, which makes all the difference in the world. For a trinitarian will only see things from that angle, unless you give them the foundation of Biblical Judaism, which I am doing so now. A Jehovah witness does similar things, for every time he reads the word Jesus, he thinks that this is referring to Michael the archangel, even though Hebrews clearly says in Hebrews 1, "to which of the angels did God ever say, "sit at my right hand." Thus, as Jehovah witness are going to hell because of their ignorance, so too all those that believe in the trinity or that Jesus is God in the flesh. Yes, my dear friends Trinitarians have been translating the bible for centuries - so this is why you will always get a trinitarian slant to bend to their writings. Nonetheless, to answer the question I will say, "Well, let's look at it." The words "mighty god" is "el gibor" in Hebrew. Well, if you recall what I just said, the son is in the same class of spirits as his Father and that class in is plural form is Elohim. In a singular form one person is called an elohe - to say this in a short version we say "el" so that is exactly what the messiah is a mighty el or a mighty elohe, not that he is the God of Israel [READ ABOVE to see what I am talking about]. Now the words "The everlasting Father" simply do not exist in the Hebrew text or passage. Rather, there is simply a single word in Hebrew in this text, not two or three words. In Hebrew it says that this person's name shall be called "Aviad [ah-vee-odd]." In case you do not know Hebrew, let me explain what this name means. I will explain it using another way to make things easy for those of you in my beloved listening audience since you cannot see anything on the radio. Lets use the name of Abraham for a moment, Okay!? In Hebrew we say Abraham as Av-ra-ham, this name means "father of many" or "father of multitudes" Well the av in avraham means father. Keep in mind that the name we want to remember is Aviad. So as you can see - the "av" in Aviad is father. Now the ee sound in Aviad is the word "my" in English, it found in the common word of rabbi. Rabbi in Hebrew is "ravi [raw-vee]. "So Rabbi means "my master" or "my teacher." Thus, so far we have avi in Aviad. in English this would be "my father" so as we can see this literally translation is far different that the trinitarian version. To finish this word, the -ad [-odd] in Aviadmeans eternal in Hebrew. So when we read that the messiah name shall be called Aviad, we see his name as this "my Father is eternal" it does NOT say, "I am eternal", nor does it say "The Everlasting Father." Thus, this very name of Aviad points to the fact that he is NOT the God of Israel [for more proof CLICK HERE], but only his Father. The last name in this passage is prince of peace, or sar shalom in Hebrew, this translation is dead on accurate. Again as I said earlier the messiah is the literal son of the God of Israel and the God of Israel is the real King. Therefore, it is fitting to call the son the prince of peace instead of the KING OF PEACE. So you see my friends how Trinitarians tainted things for those that don't know how to speak, nor read Hebrew. This is the advantage of being able to read the original text instead of relying on some foul and tainted bible such as the 1611 King James Version, NIV, American standard version and so on. The messiah if Judaism is not the God of Israel. Never has, never will. Did I not tell you that we [http://heshallgovern.com] are a counter balance to what you get from the mainstream. This is not the bible belt, my friends, this is a tainted and deceived area, just as bad as any other society, whether that be of the native Americans, Hindus, Mormons, Buddhists and so on. All these denominations must go, if you want to be united in one faith, then follow in the footsteps of the Jewish messiah that practiced nothing but Judaism. Follow the torah and remain holy. Your salvation is not secure my friends, the preachers of today are no different than they were in Israel during the days of Jeremiah the prophet. At that time they prophesied peace and safety, now the preach secured salvation and love, where in truth the people of Fort Smith and the river valley are deceived, and shall go to eternal damnation. The laws where never done away with. Read the end of Zech 14 and you tell me if the people in the later must keep the feast of Tabernacles of not. Read Matthew 24:20, you tell me whether or not the people in the last days must still keep the sabbath, according to Jesus versus what Paul said. Preachers talk about Paul so much that you would think he was the messiah or the God of Israel. Awful!!!..................." ******* END OF EXCERPT ********* THUS "ELOHIM" is a class of spirits, in the biblical faith of Judaism there are ONLY two people in this class, 1. The God of Israel [Yehowah], Who alone is eternal 2. The son of the living God, who has a beginning point, being the very first of all creation and it was he that made all things and rested on the seventh day. He is Yehowah's faithful and greatest servant. He is not the God of Israel in any shape of fashion, but he has similar attrobutes because all children have similar attrobutes to their parents. A bear cannot do what a fish can do and a fish cannot do what a bird can do. But a fish can do all the things that most fish can do. So in the same way, this son of God can do what his Father can do, but with a high limitation because he is made. This is why he does not know the hour of his own coming [Matthew 24], why he couldn't heal everyone in Nazereth and so on... Because my Jewish brothers are soooo lost they interpret the word "Elohim," a plural word, as a singlar word, ***BECAUSE*** we only have one God in Judaism. Which is TRUE, but when they do this they distort the truth of what our ancient Jewish narrator was saying - in that there is another person like unto our God, the only God, and that is His personal son who sits at His right side!!! By the time the Greek Septuigent came out in 285 BCE my Jewish brothers already tainted the meaning of "Elohim" refering it to only the God of Israel alone - for they wrote "theos" in Genesis [which is singualr]. Where in truth, "ELOHIM" is simply a class of spirits. In other words a type of specie, but for the world of the unseen. Maregaal Ben Yaakov heshallgovern@yahoo.com 479-414-9249 Fort Smith, Arkansas