Risking the Cosmic Order: Echoes of Creation in Psalm 82:5

Psalm 82 has been fraught with interpretive difficulties throughout most of the history of its reception. Most of these difficulties are focused on the gods of the divine council in verses 1 and 6. The psalm has also been a favorite for comfort in knowing that God will bring about ultimate justice. The perennial problem of injustice, at least according to Ps 82, finds its foundation in the early days of the cosmos with the establishment of a divine council who had the task of exercising authority justly. Regarding v. 5, most commentators, with a few exceptions, suggest the results of injustices have an effect on the physical realm. I am suggesting that the language of v. 5 is much more than mere effects on the physical. I will show that the imagery of verse 5 (e.g., wisdom vocabulary, darkness, foundations of the earth, etc.) is the psalmist’s way of pointing out that the injustice of the gods put the very order of creation at risk. In the words of Blenkinsopp injustice has brought about “un-creation.”