The biblical worldview presents a supernatural realm far richer than the simplified categories that became common in later Christianity. Most readers are familiar with angels and demons, yet these labels represent only a portion of the spiritual landscape described in the Hebrew Bible. The Old Testament uses the word elohim to refer to all inhabitants of the spiritual realm. This includes Yahweh Himself, the loyal members of His heavenly court, rebellious spiritual beings, and even the spirits of the dead. Understanding elohim as a place of residence term rather than a description of divine nature restores the complexity the biblical authors assumed.
The Meaning and Scope of Elohim
Elohim identifies any being whose primary mode of existence is spiritual. It does not denote power level, moral status, or role. Yahweh is called Elohim because He is spirit, yet He is utterly unique among the elohim. He is uncreated, sovereign, and the source of all life. The biblical writers never confused Yahweh with other elohim, even though they used the same word.
The Old Testament applies the term to Yahweh, to the divine council, to the territorial powers over the nations, to hostile beings, and to the spirits of the dead. This wide usage shows that elohim functions the way the word human does for embodied beings. Human tells you what realm a being belongs to, not what that being’s character or rank might be. Elohim functions the same way for spiritual beings.
Clarifying the Hebrew Word Elohim and Its Implications
Elohim is the standard Hebrew word that English Bibles translate as god. This creates confusion because English speakers instinctively associate the word god with the supreme Creator alone. Hebrew does not work that way. Elohim is a category term for any inhabitant of the spiritual realm. It does not describe a being’s level of power or moral character. It simply identifies the sphere in which that being exists.
The biblical writers use the word elohim for Yahweh, for the members of the divine council, for the territorial spirits over the nations, for the spirits of the dead, and even for hostile powers. These beings are real. The biblical authors never treat them as imaginary or symbolic. When Scripture speaks of the gods of the nations, it is referring to actual spiritual beings who have authority and influence, not carved idols.
The distinction between Yahweh and the other elohim is qualitative, not categorical. They belong to the same realm, but they are not the same kind of being. Yahweh alone is uncreated. Yahweh alone is the Most High. Yahweh alone is called the God of gods and the Lord of lords in Deuteronomy 10. He is the source of life, the Creator of all other elohim, and the only one who rightfully receives worship.
This is why the first commandment prohibits Israel from placing any other elohim before Yahweh. The command assumes their existence. It is not denying other spiritual beings. It is prohibiting allegiance to them. Psalm 82 likewise speaks of Yahweh judging other elohim for corruption and injustice. The text treats their existence as a given and their rebellion as real.
Understanding elohim in this way restores the biblical worldview. It removes the modern habit of treating elohim as a synonym for deity in the philosophical sense. It shows that elohim is a realm word, not a statement about divine nature. Yahweh is the God of gods, and the other elohim are real spiritual beings who operate under His ultimate authority.
The Divine Council and the Loyal Elohim
The Hebrew Bible describes Yahweh ruling over a host of spiritual beings who participate in His governance of creation. These scenes are not symbolic. They describe intelligent beings who deliberate, obey, and carry out assigned tasks. Passages such as 1 Kings 22, Job 1 and 2, and Psalm 82 all point to a structured heavenly court.
These loyal elohim are called the sons of God, the host of heaven, and the holy ones. They serve as messengers, warriors, guardians, and administrators. Their activity reflects the pattern built into Scripture where Yahweh works through delegated authority in both the spiritual and human realms.
Rebellious Elohim and the Origin of Demons
The biblical text records multiple rebellions among the elohim, but demons come from one source. They are the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim described in Genesis 6. This is affirmed in the major Second Temple period sources that shaped the worldview of Judaism and the early church, including 1 Enoch, Jubilees, and several Qumran texts.
Genesis 6 describes the sons of God crossing the boundary between their realm and the human realm and producing hybrid offspring. These beings were violent, corrupt, and under judgment. When the Nephilim died, their spirits were not permitted to return to the divine realm. They remained on earth as hostile, predatory spirits. These are the beings the New Testament calls demons.
The New Testament never identifies demons as fallen angels. It assumes the Second Temple understanding that demons are the spirits of the giants created by the Watcher rebellion. Early Christian writers such as Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, and Irenaeus affirm the same. Later theological developments that describe demons as fallen angels do not reflect the biblical or historical framework.
Demons originate from the dead Nephilim and nothing else.
Angels in the Hebrew Scriptures
The Hebrew word malak describes a function rather than a type of being. A malak is a messenger. Humans can be malakim when they carry messages from human authorities. Spiritual beings can be malakim when they carry messages on behalf of Yahweh. The term does not identify the nature or rank of the being. It simply identifies the job being performed at that moment.
Beings commonly called angels in Christian vocabulary are loyal elohim performing messenger work. Scripture describes other roles such as guardians, council members, and watchers. These roles do not create separate categories. They simply show the variety of tasks assigned to Yahweh’s spiritual servants.
How the Greek Language Flattened the Landscape
The simplification of the spiritual world did not occur because Greek lacked vocabulary. Greek was fully capable of expressing a wide range of spiritual categories. The collapse happened because the translators of the Septuagint made intentional translational choices, and later Christian usage adopted those choices as normative.
The translators aimed for functional equivalence that would communicate clearly to Greek-speaking Jews rather than preserving the entire taxonomy of the Hebrew spiritual world. They used ‘angelos’ to translate ‘malak’, even though ‘malak’ refers to a task and not a type of being. They used daimon to describe hostile spirits, which made sense to Greek readers but did not preserve their Old Testament origin as the spirits of the Nephilim. They used theos for references to elohim even in passages where elohim refers to lesser spiritual beings, judges, or members of the divine council.
These translational decisions compressed many distinct Hebrew categories into a small number of familiar Greek terms.
The early church inherited this simplified system. Most Christians in the first centuries read Scripture in Greek, not Hebrew or Aramaic. As a result, angelos and daimon became the default labels for all spiritual beings. Loyal elohim became angels, and the spirits of the giants became demons. The internal Hebrew structure disappeared behind the Greek vocabulary.
The collapse of categories was therefore not due to limitations in Greek. It was the outcome of translation strategy and the linguistic environment of the early Christian world.
Restoring the Biblical Categories
Recovering the original vocabulary clarifies the structure of the spiritual realm in Scripture. Elohim names a kind of being based on its realm. Malak describes a task. Terms like sons of God and host of heaven describe identity and role. The biblical picture is coherent, structured, and much richer than the later two-category system.
This restored framework also highlights the importance of Christ’s authority. In His resurrection and ascension, He takes back the nations from the rebellious elohim. He disarms the powers and subjects all spiritual rulers under His command. The New Testament assumes the Old Testament’s supernatural landscape and shows how Christ brings it to its appointed conclusion.
Conclusion
The biblical use of the word elohim opens a window into the complex spiritual world that lies behind the text. The Hebrew Scriptures present a populated supernatural realm with loyal servants, corrupt powers, and beings who operate across the boundary between the seen and unseen worlds. Later traditions often reduced this diverse landscape to the narrow categories of angels and demons, but the original vocabulary reveals a far richer and more coherent structure.
Restoring the biblical categories provides clarity. It shows that elohim describes membership in the spiritual realm rather than divinity. It distinguishes the loyal heavenly host from the rebellious powers without collapsing them into a single label. It places the origin of demons squarely within the Genesis 6 rebellion, consistent with the data preserved in Second Temple literature and reflected in early Christian thought. It also clarifies the role of malak as a task rather than a type of being.
Seeing the spiritual world through the lens of the Hebrew Bible also highlights the work of Christ. His resurrection and ascension reassert His authority over every spiritual being, loyal or hostile. The nations that were once placed under rebellious elohim are reclaimed under His rule. Understanding elohim ensures that this victory is seen in its full scale and that the biblical story retains the supernatural depth the original authors assumed.
Discussion Questions
- How does recognizing elohim as a category word for all spiritual beings reshape the way we interpret passages where the Bible refers to the gods of the nations, and how does this clarify the distinction between Yahweh as the God of gods and the lesser elohim who exist under His authority?
- In what ways does the divine council framework help make sense of biblical scenes where Yahweh interacts with other elohim, such as in 1 Kings 22 or Job 1 and 2, and how does this framework avoid both polytheism and the oversimplification common in later Christian interpretations?
- How does grounding the origin of demons in the Genesis 6 rebellion, as affirmed in Second Temple literature and reflected in early Christian writers, change our understanding of the forces that oppose Christ in the New Testament?
- What difference does it make to understand malak as a task rather than a type of being, and how does this affect the way we read Old Testament encounters with spiritual messengers or guardians who are performing different roles?
- How did the translation choices of the Septuagint contribute to the collapse of Hebrew spiritual categories into the simplified Greek terms angelos and daimon, and why is recovering the original Hebrew framework important for understanding the scope of Christ’s victory over the hostile spiritual powers?
Want to Know More
- Michael S. Heiser, The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible.
Heiser demonstrates how elohim functions as a realm term rather than a statement of divine nature. His work explains the divine council, the rebellious elohim, and Yahweh as the God of gods in a way that aligns with the biblical text rather than later theological simplifications. - Michael S. Heiser, Demons: What the Bible Really Says About the Powers of Darkness.
This is the most thorough and academically grounded treatment of the origin of demons as the spirits of the Nephilim. Heiser traces the concept through Genesis 6, 1 Enoch, Jubilees, Qumran, and the New Testament and shows how later Christian tradition drifted away from the biblical framework. - Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst, eds., Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (DDD).
This scholarly reference work examines the biblical language for spiritual beings, including elohim, malakim, and territorial spirits. It demonstrates that the ancient Israelites believed in a populated spiritual realm with real beings who held authority under and in opposition to Yahweh. - George W. E. Nickelsburg and James C. VanderKam, 1 Enoch: A New Translation.
This translation of the Book of the Watchers provides primary source material for understanding the Second Temple origin of demons, the rebellion of the sons of God, and the worldview assumed by Jesus and the apostles. It places the Genesis 6 event at the center of the biblical understanding of evil spirits. - John H. Walton, The Lost World of Genesis One.
Walton clarifies how ancient Near Eastern context is essential for understanding the worldview of the biblical authors. His work helps frame the concept of ordered and unordered realms, which complements the lesson’s explanation of the spiritual world, cosmic geography, and the role of the elohim.
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