From: Nichael Lynn Cramer (nichael@sover.net)
Date: Fri Feb 21 1997 - 08:34:28 EST
At 3:32 AM 2/21/97, ILKVM@aol.com wrote:
>The Hebrew word used for God in the Old Testament is Elohim. Elohim is
>plural. In the New Testament, the Greek word used for God is Theos. Unless
>I am mistaken, Theos is singular. Can anyone shed any light on why this is?
The quick answer is that Elohim is plural in syntactic form but singular in
meaning (possibly reflecting an earlier, polytheistic usage). Such forms
are not unusual in Hebrew (cf the words for "water" and "heaven") and other
languages. A rough parallel occurs in English in such words as "scissors"
or "glasses".
For extensive discussion of this topic, please the archives of the b-hebrew
and ioudaios mailing list.
Nichael "Pull down...
nichael@sover.net ...tear up."
http://www.sover.net/~nichael/ -D. Martin
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