BIBLIOTHECA SACRA 158 (January-March
2001): 52-74
[Copyright © 2001 Dallas
Theological Seminary; cited with permission;
digitally prepared for use at
DEUTERONOMY 32:8 AND
THE
SONS OF GOD
Michael
S. Heiser
MOSES'
FAREWELL SONG IN DEUTERONOMY 32:1-43 is one of
the more intriguing portions of Deuteronomy and has
re-
ceived much attention from
scholars, primarily for its po-
etic features, archaic
orthography and morphology, and text-
critical problems.1 Among the textual variants
in the Song of
Moses,
one in verse 8 stands out as particularly fascinating. The
New
American Standard Bible renders the verse this way: "When
the Most High gave the nations their inheritance,
when He sepa-
rated the sons of man, He set the boundaries of the
peoples ac-
cording to the number of the sons of
The last phrase, "according to the number
of the sons of Is-
rael," reflects the
reading of the Masoretic text lxerAW;yi yneB;,
a reading
also reflected in some later revisions of the Septuagint:
a manu-
script of
Theodotion.2
Most witnesses to the Septuagint in verse 8, however,
read, a@ggelw?n
qeou? ("angels of God"), which
is interpretive,3 and
Michael
S. Heiser is a Ph.D. candidate in Hebrew and Semitic
Studies at the Uni-
versity of Wisconsin-Madison.
1 For a recent overview of the scholarship
on the Song of Moses, see Paul Sand-
ers's thorough treatment in The Provenance of Deuteronomy 32 (Leiden: Brill, 1996).
See
also Frank M. Cross and David Noel Freedman, Studies in Ancient Yahwistic
Poetry (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997); William F. Albright, "Some Remarks on
the Song of Moses in Deuteronomy XXXII," Vetus Testamentum 9
(1959): 339-46;
and D. A. Robertson, Linguistic Evidence in Dating Early Hebrew Poetry (
MT:
Scholars, 1972). .
2 Fridericus
Field, ed., Origenis Hexaplorum, Tomus I: Prolegomena, Genesis-
Esther (Hildesheim:
Georg Olms, 1964), 320, n.
12.
3 This is the predominant reading in the
Septuagint manuscripts and is nearly
unanimous. See John William Wevers,
ed., Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum
Graecum, Auctoritate Academiae
Scientiarum Gottingensis Editum, vol. 3.2: Deuter-
onomium (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1977), 347; and idem, Notes on the
Greek Text of Deuteronomy
(Atlanta:
Scholars, 1995), 513. Wevers refers to this
majority reading as "clearly a later attempt
to avoid any notion of lesser deities in
favor of God's messengers" (ibid.).
Deuteronomy 32:8 and the Sons of God 53
several others read ui[w?n qeou? ("sons of God").4 Both of these Greek
renderings presuppose a Hebrew text of either Myhlx ynb or Mylx ynb.
These
Hebrew phrases underlying a@ggelw?n
qeou? and ui[w?n qeou?
are
attested in two Hebrew manuscripts from
(conflated) manuscript of Aquila.6
Should the verse be rendered "sons of
The
debate over which is preferable is more than a fraternal spat
among textual critics. The notion that the nations of
the world
were geographically partitioned and owe their
terrestrial identity
to the sovereign God takes the reader back to the
Table of Nations
in Genesis 10-11. Two details there regarding
God's apportionment
of the earth are important for understanding
Deuteronomy 32:8.
First, the Table of Nations catalogs seventy
nations, but
not included.7 Second, the use of the
same Hebrew root (draPA) in
both Genesis 10 and Deuteronomy 32 to describe the
"separation"
of the human race and the nations substantiates
the long-
recognized observation that Genesis 10-11 is the
backdrop to the
statement in Deuteronomy 32:8.8 Because
Israel alone is Yahweh's
portion, she was not numbered among the seventy
other nations.
The reference to seventy "sons of
text), initially seemed understandable enough, for
both Genesis
46:27 and Exodus 1:5 state that seventy members
of Jacob's family.
4 Wevers,
ed., Septuaginta,
347.
The Gottingen Septuagint has adopted ui[w?n
qeou?
as the best reading, despite its having fewer
attestations.
5 The words lx ynb
are not an option for what was behind the Septuagint reading,
as demonstrated by the
vised Septuagint. First,
manuscript 4QDtq has spaces for additional letters follow-
ing the l of its [ ] lx
ynb. Second, 4QDtJ clearly reads Myhvlx ynb
(Sanders, The Prove-
nance of Deuteronomy 32, 156). See also Emanuel Tov,
Textual Criticism of the He-
brew Bible (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992), 269.
6 Wevers, ed., Septuaginta, 347;
and Field, Origenis Hexaplorum, Tomus I: Prole-
gomena, Genesis-Esther, 320. The manuscript of
7 As Allen P. Ross notes, "On
investigation the reader is struck by a deliberate
pattern in the selection of names for the Table.
For example, of the sons of Japheth,
who number seven, two are selected for further
listing. From those two sons come
seven grandsons, completing a selective list of
fourteen names under Japheth. With
Ham's
thirty descendants and Shem's twenty-six, the grand total is seventy"
("Studies
in the Book of Genesis; Part 2: The Table of Nations in Genesis 10--Its
Structure,"
Bibliotheca Sacra 137
[October-December 1980]: 342). Some scholars,
Ross
observes, arrive at the number of seventy-one for the names, depending on how
the counting is done (ibid., 352, n. 18). Ross and Cassuto agree that the accurate
count is seventy (cf. Umberto Cassuto,
A Commentary on the Book of Genesis: From
Noah to Abraham [
8 Cassuto, A Commentary on the Book of Genesis,
174-78; Albright, "Some Re-
marks on the Song of Moses in Deuteronomy
XXXII," 343-44. A Niphal form of drp
is used in Genesis 10:5 (Udr;p;ni), and the Hiphil
occurs in Deuteronomy 32:8 (Odyrip;haB;).
54
BIBLIOTHECA SACRA / January-March
2001
went to
however, to the logic of the correlation: How is
it that the number
of the pagan nations was determined in relation to
an entity (Is-
rael) or individuals (Jacob
and his household) that did not yet ex-
ist? Even if one contends that
the correlation was in the mind of
God
before
possible point would there be behind connecting
the pagan Gentile
nations numerically with the Israelites? On the
other hand what
could possibly be meant by the notion that a
correspondence ex-
isted between the number of
the nations in Genesis 10-11 and
heavenly beings?
Literary and conceptual parallels discovered in
the literature
of
the number seventy in Deuteronomy 32:8 and have
furnished sup-
port for textual scholars who argue against the
"sons of
reading. Ugaritic
mythology plainly states that the head of its pan-
theon, El (who, like the God
of the Bible, is also referred to as El
Elyon, the "Most High") fathered seventy
sons,10 thereby specifying
the number of the "sons of El" (Ugaritic, bn il).
An unmistakable
linguistic parallel with the Hebrew text underlying
the Septuagint
reading was thus discovered, one that prompted
many scholars to
accept the Septuagintal
reading on logical and philological
grounds--God (El Elyon
in Deut. 32:8) divided the earth according
to the number of heavenly beings who existed from
before the time
of creation.11 The coherence of this
explanation notwithstanding,
some commentators resist the reading of the
Septuagint, at least in
part because they fear that an acceptance of the Myhlx ynb
or Mylx ynb
readings (both of which may be translated
"sons of gods") somehow
9 There is a textual debate on this
passage in Exodus as well. Although space
prohibits a thorough discussion of Genesis 46:27
and Exodus 1:5, they do provide
examples, in conjunction with Deuteronomy 32:8,
of the primary guiding principle
in textual criticism: The reading that best
explains the rise of the others is most
likely the original. In the case of Genesis 46:27 and
Exodus 1:5, the Septuagint and
seventy-five people went to
five additional descendants from Ephraim and
Manasseh. This example from these
verses features the same textual alignment as with
Deuteronomy 32:8 (the Septua-
gint and
Masoretic reading is to be preferred. The point is
that one cannot be biased in favor
of either the Masoretic
or the Septuagintal readings; instead, the reading
that best
explains the rise of the others is the preferred
reading, regardless of the text-type.
10 Manfried
Dietrich, Oswald Loretz, and Joaquin Sanmartin, eds., The Cuneiform
Alphabetic Texts from
ster:
11 Job 38:7 states that the heavenly host
was present at creation.
Deuteronomy 32:8 and the Sons of God 55
means that Yahweh is the author of polytheism. This
apprehension
has prompted some text-critical defenses of the Masoretic text in
Deuteronomy
32:812 based on a misunderstanding of both the
tual history of the Hebrew
Bible and text-critical methodology, a
prejudiced evaluation of non-Masoretic
texts, and an unfounded
concern that departure from, the Masoretic reading results in "Isra-
elite polytheism." The goal of this article is
to show that viewing
"sons of God" as the correct reading in Deuteronomy 32:8
in no way
requires one to view Israelite religion as
polytheistic.
TEXTUAL CRITICISM AND THE "SONS OF
GOD"
IN DEUTERONOMY 32:8
A
WORD ABOUT TEXT-CRITICAL METHOD AND PREJUDICES
The
textual evidence cited above presents a situation in which one
reading (that of the Septuagint) is supported by
very ancient
manuscript evidence (notably
soretic reading) has a
preponderance of the support, thereby cre-
ating an
"oldest-versus-most" predicament. As in similar New Tes-
tament cases the correct
reading can be verified not by counting
manuscripts but by weighing them. Hence it matters
little that the
Septuagint
reading is "outnumbered," especially since the more
numerous sources are much later, and in fact are
interdependent,
not independent, witnesses. When considering the
evidence, it is
wrong to assume that the Masoretic
text is superior at every point
to other texts of the Old Testament. It is equally
fallacious to pre-
suppose the priority of the Septuagint. Simply
stated, no text
should automatically be assumed superior in a
text-critical investi-
gation. Determining the best
reading must be based on internal
considerations, not uncritical,
external presumptions about the
"correct" text.
Unfortunately the notion of the presumed
sanctity of the Ma-
soretic text still persists.
The dictum that the Masoretic text is to
be preferred over all other traditions whenever it
cannot be faulted
linguistically or for its content
(unless in isolated cases there is
good reason for favoring another tradition) is all
too enthusiasti-
cally echoed.13
The idea seems to be that whenever a Masoretic
12 For example David E. Stevens, "Does
Deuteronomy 32:8 Refer to 'Sons of God' or
'Sons of
writing his article Stevens has repudiated this
view and has accepted the reading
"sons of God" (David E. Stevens, "Daniel 10 and the
Notion of Territorial Spirits,"
Bibliotheca Sacra 157 (October-December
2000): 412, n. 9.
13 Ernst Wurthwein,
The Text of the Old Testament, trans. Peter
R. Ackroyd (New
56
BIBLIOTHECA SACRA /
January-March 2001
reading could
be accepted it should be accepted.
Such an approach,
however, hardly does justice to non-Masoretic readings that also
could be acceptable on their
own linguistic and contextual terms.
Put
another way, the above view seldom addresses why the Ma-
soretic text should be held in
such esteem. Where there are wide
and significant textual divergencies
between the Masoretic text
and the Septuagint, many textual studies have shown
that the
of the Hebrew text underlying the Septuagint. For
example it is
well known that the Masoretic
text of 1 and 2 Samuel is in poor
condition in a number of places and includes
instances of signifi-
cant haplography.14 First and 2 Kings are
riddled with both short
and lengthy pluses and minuses, transpositions, and
chronological
differences.15 Also portions of the Masoretic text of Ezekiel, espe-
cially chapters 1 and 10,
could serve as a veritable digest of textual
corruptions.16
Judging by the survival in Old Testament textual
criticism of a
"textus receptus"
approach like the one that once held sway in New
Testament
textual criticism, more consideration is needed as to
how the Masoretic text
came to be considered the "received text."
Just
because the Masoretic text was the received text of
the medie-
val Masoretes
does not mean that it merits textual priority among
today's extant witnesses, or even that it had
textual priority in
biblical times. The Masoretic
text rose to prominence only after
centuries of textual diversity and not, as noted
above, by "intrinsic
factors related to the textual transmission, but
by political and so-
cioreligious events and
developments."17
The evidence from
14 P. Kyle McCarter, I Samuel (New York: Doubleday, 1980); and idem, Textual
Criticism: Recovering
the Text of the Hebrew Bible (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986), 38.
15 Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible,
142.
16 Daniel Block, "Text and Emotion: A
Study in the 'Corruptions' in Ezekiel's Inau-
gural Vision (Ezekiel
1:4-28)," Catholic Biblical
Quarterly 50 (July 1988): 418-42.
17 Emanuel Tov, "Textual Criticism (OT)," in Anchor Bible Dictionary, ed. D. N.
Freedman
(New York: Doubleday, 1992),6:395,407. Tov summarizes the historical
situation as follows: "By the end of the 1st
century A.D. the Septuagint had been
accepted by Christianity and abandoned by Jews.
Copies of the Samaritan Penta-
teuch were available, but in
the meantime that sect had become an independent
religion, so that their texts were considered
Samaritan, not Jewish any more. The
struction of the temple.
Therefore the sole texts that existed in this period were the
ones that were copied and distributed by the central
group in Judaism. . . .This
situation gave rise to the wrong conclusion that
the MT had 'ousted' the other texts"
(ibid., 407).
Deuteronomy 32:8 and the Sons of God 57
fiable textual plurality among Jews in
tween the third century B.C.
and the first century A.D.18 Precursory
forms of the Masoretic
text, the Septuagint, and the Samaritan
Pentateuch
existed and are attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls. As
further proof of textual diversity the
tains "independent"
or "unaligned" texts, which exhibit both
agreement and disagreement with the textual
traditions of the Ma-
soretic text, the Septuagint,
and the Samaritan Pentateuch.19 The
reading, 4QDeutj,n, are among the
unaligned texts.20
Two points derive from this review of the
textual plurality in
the
data that the Jews held a negative view of Hebrew
texts not
grouped among those that later received the
appellation "Ma-
soretic." Second, the
undeniable textual diversity at
gues against any suggestion that the Qumranites
altered a text
ultimately used by the Septuagintal
translators as their Vorlage.
Besides
the chronological and logistical difficulties of such an idea,
this question remains: If the
altering texts to reflect allegedly strange
angelic views or Gnostic
tendencies, why did they leave so many texts within
each of the
major textual strains unaltered? Stated another way,
why did the
that point to God's uniqueness, omnipotence, and
sovereignty to
stay in the texts they deposited in the nearby caves?
It hardly
makes sense to sneak one alteration into Deuteronomy
32:8 while
letting hundreds of other "nondualistic" texts remain.
EVALUATING
THE INTERNAL TEXT-CRITICAL EVIDENCE
FOR
DEUTERONOMY 32:8
Those
who assume the priority of the Masoretic text might
offer
two explanations as to why Deuteronomy 32:8 reads
"sons of God"
in some manuscripts, including the
is that this reading should simply be regarded as
an intentional
error reflecting the theological predilections of
Septuagintal
translators.
However, this theory has already been
called into question. The other explanation suggests
that the vari-
ant arose unintentionally; that is, the consonants rWy were acciden-
18 Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible,
116-17. See also S. Talmon, "The
Old Testament Text," in
F.
Evans (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963); 1:159-99.
19 Tov,
"Textual Criticism (OT)," 395, 402, 404, 406.
20 Ibid., 402.
58
BIBLIOTHECA SACRA /
January-March 2001
tally omitted (by parablepsis)
from the word lxrWy leaving lx
ynb in
the text in the place of lxrWy
ynb.
This second explanation is less than
satisfactory for at least
two reasons. First, one could just as well argue
that rWy was added
to the text. This is hardly a satisfying response,
however, for it is
as much of a speculation as the competing
proposition. The real
problem with the parablepsis
proposal is that, while it accounts for
the consonants lx in the text, it fails
to explain adequately how the
consonants Myhv would have come to be
added after lx to the text
underlying the Septuagint reading. It is
particularly significant in
this regard that the texts from
gint do not read the
consonants lx ynb as this explanation
would
postulate, for in one text, 4QDeutq,
there are spaces for additional
consonants after the l of the word lx. The other
supports the Septuagintal
reading, 4QDeutj, unambiguously reads
Myhlx
ynb.21
Second, and perhaps even more damaging to the
proposed
parablepsis explanation that an
original "sons of
tentionally corrupted to "sons
of God" in Deuteronomy 32:8, is that
there exists another text-critical problem in
Deuteronomy 32 in
which heavenly beings--"sons of Myhlx / Mylx"--are the focus
(v.
43a)!
Deuteronomy 32:43 reads differently in the Masoretic
text,
the Septuagint, and a
The Masoretic text has
one line:
"O nations, rejoice His people."
4QDeutq has a bicolon:
"O heavens, rejoice with Him
Bow to Him, all divinities."
And the Septuagint has two bicola:
"O heavens, rejoice with Him
Bow to Him, all sons of the divine.22
O nations, rejoice with His people
And let all angels of the divine strengthen themselves in
Him."23
21 Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible,
269. Also see note 5 in this article.
22 The translation of the Septuagint
provided by Tigay could reflect Mylx instead of
Myhlx since
"divine" rather than "God" is chosen as the translation
(Jeffrey H. Tigay,
Deuteronomy, JPS Torah Commentary [
1996],516).
23 The translations are from Tigay, Deuteronomy,
516.
Deuteronomy 32:8 and the Sons of God 59
It is significant that the Masoretic text lacks a second line in
what should be the first pairing. Even more striking
is the fact that
this missing colon is the one in which reference is
made to divie
beings in the
texts each colon has its partner. This argues
strongly that the Ma-
soretic text originally had a bicolon, a pairing that was deliberately
eliminated to avoid the reference to other
"divine beings."24 While
the other Masoretic
omissions can be explained by haplography,
the absence of the line that would have made
reference to heavenly
beings cannot be so explained.25
What does this imply? It suggests,
for one thing, that those
who defend the priority of the Masoretic
text would have to argue
for accidental changes in Deuteronomy 32:8 (the
missing rWy) and
in 32:43--changes that produced false readings in
favor of angelic
beings in both cases, while simultaneously accounting
for all the
consonants in Myhlx in 4QDeutj.
Such a coincidence is possible, but
it stretches credulity to argue that the Masoretic text of Deuteron-
omy 32:8 and 43 best
represents the original text when (a) the ex-
clusion of heavenly beings in
verse 43 is so obviously a textual mi-
nus and (b) its conceptual
parallel in verse 8 cannot coherently ac-
count for how the Septuagintal
reading for verse 8 may have
arisen. It is far more likely that both texts were
intentionally al-
tered in the Masoretic text for the same reason, namely, to elimi-
nate a reference to heavenly
beings in order to avoid allegedly poly-
theistic language. It is inconceivable that a
scribe would have done
the reverse, that is, altering an innocuous lxrWy ynb ("sons of
to a potentially explosive Myhlx ynb ("sons of
God"). Therefore the
reading in the Septuagint sufficiently explains
how the Masoretic
reading could have arisen, but the alternative
does not.
DEUTERONOMY
32:8 IN LIGHT OF GOD'S DIVINE COUNCIL
IN THE HEBREW BIBLE
Although
some may fear that adopting the Septuagintal reading
for Deuteronomy 32:8 amounts to embracing the
notion that Yah-
weh is the author of
polytheism, this is not the case at all. In fact a
proper understanding of the concept of the
"divine council" in the
Old
Testament provides a decisive argument in favor of the Sep-
tuagint/Qumran reading.
The Old Testament often reflects
literary and religious contact
24
Ibid.
25 Ibid.,
516-17.
60
BIBLIOTHECA SACRA /
January-March 2001
between
dence of such contact
concerns a "divine council" or "divine assem-
bly" presided over by
a chief deity.26 Of particular interest to the
study at hand are the Ugaritic
texts, since that language bears a
close linguistic affinity to biblical Hebrew.27
THE DIVINE COUNCIL IN THE OLD
TESTAMENT
An
example of the divine council assembled for deliberation is in 1
Kings
22:19-23 (cf. 2 Chron. 18:18-22).28 First
Kings 22:1-18 in-
troduces the political alliance
forged between Jehoshaphat of
Judah
and the king of Israel for invading Ramoth Gilead,
the ap-
proval of the plan by four
hundred prophets of
hoshaphat's insistence on hearing
from a true prophet of Yahweh
concerning the matter. The king of Israel revealed
that there was
indeed a prophet of God, Micaiah
ben Imlah, whom they could
con-
sult, but that Micaiah never prophesied anything favorable about
him. Micaiah was
summoned, and at first he mockingly prophesied
blessing for the inva