Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?
This verse comes during a heated confrontation between Jesus and religious leaders in Jerusalem who are accusing him of blasphemy — claiming to be God. In response, Jesus quotes Psalm 82:6, where God addresses Israel's human judges, calling them "gods" because they held divine authority over matters of life and death. Jesus is making a pointed legal argument: if God himself used the word "gods" to describe ordinary people entrusted with divine authority, why is it blasphemy for him — someone God set apart and sent — to call himself the Son of God? He's challenging his opponents to reconsider their assumptions using their own scriptures.
God, I confess I often forget the dignity of the lives around me — and my own. Remind me that you have placed something of yourself in each person I encounter. Help me treat that as the sacred thing it is, and give me eyes to see others the way you do. Amen.
Here's a moment that shows Jesus as a sharp, quick-witted thinker who didn't shy away from a difficult argument. His opponents had stones in their hands. And instead of stepping back, he stepped forward — with a question, with logic, with scripture they couldn't dismiss. What strikes me is the implication underneath his argument: the category of "divine" isn't as tightly bounded as we like to think. Humans, created in God's image, are capable of carrying something genuinely sacred — authority, responsibility, a kind of reflected glory. That doesn't make you God. But it does mean you are not nothing. Your words carry weight. Your choices echo further than you know. Jesus isn't just winning a debate here. He's reminding us that human life is freighted with a meaning we can barely comprehend — and that perhaps we should start treating it that way.
What was Jesus actually arguing in this passage, and why was quoting Psalm 82 a meaningful response to the charge of blasphemy?
How does it affect your sense of self-worth to sit with the idea that God's image is in you — that you were made to carry something of the divine?
Does this verse challenge any assumptions you hold about who Jesus is, or about the relationship between the human and the divine?
If every person bears the image and dignity of God, how should that reshape the way you treat someone you find genuinely difficult to respect?
Is there an area of your life where you've been treating yourself — or others — as if human beings are just ordinary and inconsequential? What might shift if you genuinely believed otherwise?
For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the LORD.
Exodus 12:12
As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:
Romans 3:10
But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.
Matthew 9:13
I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High.
Psalms 82:6
Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your Law, 'I said, you are gods [human judges representing God, not divine beings]'?
AMP
Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’?
ESV
Jesus answered them, 'Has it not been written in your Law, 'I SAID, YOU ARE GODS '?
NASB
Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are gods’?
NIV
Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, “You are gods” ’?
NKJV
Jesus replied, “It is written in your own Scriptures that God said to certain leaders of the people, ‘I say, you are gods!’
NLT
Jesus said, "I'm only quoting your inspired Scriptures, where God said, 'I tell you—you are gods.'
MSG