John 10:34

10:34 Jesus answered, ¹  “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, you are gods’? ² 

John 19:36

19:36 For these things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled, “Not a bone of his will be broken.” ³ 

Luke 24:44

Jesus’ Final Commission

24:44 Then ⁴  he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me ⁵  in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms ⁶  must be fulfilled.”

Romans 3:19

3:19 Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under ⁷  the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

[10:34]  ¹ tn Grk “answered them.”

[10:34]  ² sn A quotation from Ps 82:6. Technically the Psalms are not part of the OT “law” (which usually referred to the five books of Moses), but occasionally the term “law” was applied to the entire OT, as here. The problem in this verse concerns the meaning of Jesus’ quotation from Ps 82:6. It is important to look at the OT context: The whole line reads “I say, you are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you.” Jesus will pick up on the term “sons of the Most High” in 10:36, where he refers to himself as the Son of God. The psalm was understood in rabbinic circles as an attack on unjust judges who, though they have been given the title “gods” because of their quasi-divine function of exercising judgment, are just as mortal as other men. What is the argument here? It is often thought to be as follows: If it was an OT practice to refer to men like the judges as gods, and not blasphemy, why did the Jewish authorities object when this term was applied to Jesus? This really doesn’t seem to fit the context, however, since if that were the case Jesus would not be making any claim for “divinity” for himself over and above any other human being – and therefore he would not be subject to the charge of blasphemy. Rather, this is evidently a case of arguing from the lesser to the greater, a common form of rabbinic argument. The reason the OT judges could be called gods is because they were vehicles of the word of God (cf. 10:35). But granting that premise, Jesus deserves much more than they to be called God. He is the Word incarnate, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world to save the world (10:36). In light of the prologue to the Gospel of John, it seems this interpretation would have been most natural for the author. If it is permissible to call men “gods” because they were the vehicles of the word of God, how much more permissible is it to use the word “God” of him who is the Word of God?

[19:36]  ³ sn A quotation from Exod 12:46, Num 9:12, and Ps 34:20. A number of different OT passages lie behind this quotation: Exod 12:10 LXX, Exod 12:46, Num 9:12, or Ps 34:20. Of these, the first is the closest in form to the quotation here. The first three are all more likely candidates than the last, since the first three all deal with descriptions of the Passover lamb.

[24:44]  ⁴ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.

[24:44]  ⁵ sn Everything written about me. The divine plan, events, and scripture itself are seen here as being one.

[24:44]  ⁶ sn For a similar threefold division of the OT scriptures, see the prologue to Sirach, lines 8-10, and from Qumran, the epilogue to 4QMMT, line 10.

[3:19]  ⁷ tn Grk “in,” “in connection with.”