How Christ Is God, and How Men Are Called Gods

For believers, the name of God alone would be quite enough to show the glory of his divinity. But by adding “over all, God blessed,” the apostle shuts out a blasphemous and perverse reading of it. He does this in case some ill-disposed person, wanting to belittle Christ’s full divinity, should point out that the word God is sometimes given to men by grace, for a time, as part of God’s dealings with them, and so apply it to God by unworthy comparisons. God says to Moses, for example, “I have given you as a god to Pharaoh,” and in another passage, “I said, you are gods.” There the word plainly has the force of a title granted by condescension. Since it says “I said,” it is not so much a name that shows power as a title given by the one speaking. And the other passage too, where it says, “I have given you as a god to Pharaoh,” shows the power of the giver rather than the divinity of the one who receives the title. For when it says “I have given,” it certainly points to the power of God who gave it, not to a divine nature in the person who received it. But when it is said of our God and Lord Jesus Christ that he is “over all, God blessed forever,” the words themselves prove the fact, and the name given shows what the words mean. For in the case of the Son of God the name of God does not denote an adoption by favor, but what is truly and really his nature. [a]