Is Deification Taught in the Bible?

While the Bible does not make use of the technical terminology for deification (for example, “deify” or “divinize”), it serves as the foundation for the concept of deification and provides warrant for the identification of Christian believers as “gods” and “partakers of the divine nature.”

The biblical witness to deification is of three kinds. First, there are individual texts that serve as important foundations for key aspects of deification (e.g., Gn 1:26–27; Ps 82:6; 2 Pt 1:4). Second, there are biblical themes that comprise important facets of deification and are exemplified by clusters of biblical texts (e.g., divine filiation, mutual indwelling, etc.). Third, there is an overarching biblical narrative of salvation, running from Adam to Christ and then to the eschaton, that portrays deification as the final goal and outcome of God’s plan for the human race and the world.

I. Where Is Deification Indicated in the Old Testament?

The Old Testament has no terms equivalent to deification, but instead points toward deification through the use of key terms and through the revelation of human likeness to, and communion with, God.

1. Image and Likeness (Gn 1:26–27).

The first foundational text for deification occurs in the opening chapter of Genesis: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.... So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Gn 1:26, 27, RSV2CE). It would be hard to overestimate the importance of this text for Christian anthropology generally and for the doctrine of deification specifically. Though referenced only sparsely in the Old Testament (Gn 5:3; 9:6; Sir 17:1; Wis 2:23; 7:26), the terminology of image and likeness figures prominently in the New Testament and provides the underpinning for the idea of the human race as created and destined for a special role in relationship to the Lord God.

2. The “gods” of Psalm 82. A perplexing verse from Psalm 82 (v. 6) proved to be an important catalyst for Jewish and Christian speculation on the identification of humans as “gods”: “I say, ‘You are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, you shall die like men, and fall like any prince.’” The link between “gods” and “sons of the Most High” in v. 6 led to speculation on human beings as “gods” and provided the initial warrant in Christian tradition for identifying believers as “gods.”

3. Israel as God’s Son (sons and daughters). Though references in the Old Testament to the Lord God as “Father” and to Israel as God’s “son” are relatively infrequent (e.g., Ex 4:22; Ps 68:5; 89:26; Wis 14:3; Is 63:16), they supply an important element for the notion of deification, namely, that God intended from the beginning to be in a Paternal-filial relationship with the human race. 

4. Israel as the Covenantal Spouse of the Lord. The special spousal relationship that God established with His people Israel (e.g., Is 54:4–8; Hos 2:14–20) opens outward so that the entire human race is called to be in a special, intimate relationship of love and friendship with God Himself. The invitation to an intimate, nuptial relationship with God then appears in the New Testament (2 Cor 11:1) and figures prominently in the final vision of God dwelling with His people forever (Rev 19:6–8; 21:9).

5. Participation in Divine Wisdom. The gradual unveiling in the Old Testament of the “wisdom” of God as a personified power and being (e.g., Prv 8:22–35; Wis 7:27–28) not only prepares the way for recognizing the incarnation of the Logos (Word) of God as the incarnation of divine wisdom (1 Cor 1:21–24, 30; Col 2:3), but also opens the way for human beings to be friends of God through partaking of divine wisdom (Wis 7:27; Eph 1:17).

6. Heavenly Ascent and Reigning with God. The scenes depicting the translation of Enoch and Elijah to Heaven (Gn 5:24; 2 Kgs 2:11–12) provided the basis for the notion of human ascent to Heaven (to where God Himself dwells) in Second Temple Jewish literature, especially in 1 Enoch. In addition, the prophet Daniel, through his visions of heavenly realities, not only portrays the reign of the luminous figure of the Son of Man (Dn 7:12–13), whom Jesus identifies with Himself at His trial before the Jewish Sanhedrin (Mk 14:62), but also describes the reign of the “holy ones” (the saints) in terms strikingly parallel to the reign of the Son of Man. This co-reign with the Son of Man, seated at the right hand of God, points to a human share in God’s own reign.

II. Where Do We Find Deification in the New Testament?

In the New Testament, we encounter key texts and general themes that point to deification in the context of an overall narrative of redemption.

1. The Graced Exchange: 2 Cor 8:9. A single verse from the Apostle Paul provides an important foundation for deification: “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.” This is the biblical foundation for what is known as the exchange formula (admirabile commercium), whereby Christ became a human being so that we might have some share in His “riches,” that is, His divinity.

2. The “gods” of Jn 10:33–36. John the Evangelist records a dialogue between Jesus and those who seek to kill Him because, as they say to Jesus, “you, being a man, make yourself God” (Jn 10:33). Jesus does not deny the claim, but cites Ps 82:6 as His response: “If he called them gods to whom the word of God came... do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’”? (Jn 10:35–36). Importantly for deification, Jesus identifies human beings as the “gods” to whom God’s word came. Jesus’ citation of Psalm 82:6 and His application of it to human beings contributed to the earliest references in the second century to human beings being made “gods” through Baptism into Christ.

3. Conformed to the Image and Likeness of Christ. Through a cluster of texts, the goal of the Christian life is described in terms of becoming, or of growing into, the image of Christ Himself. In Paul, Jesus the Word made flesh is described as the image of God (2 Cor 4:4; Col 1:15), but Christians in this life are also called to be “conformed to the image of his Son” (Rom 8:29) and to be “transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another” (2 Cor 3:18). Paul also speaks about the Christian disciple as “being renewed in knowledge after the image of his creator” (Col 3:10), here pointing to God the Father. Just as human beings were made in the image and likeness of God, so those in Christ are called to be conformed to and transformed into this image, and so participate in the “glory” of God (2 Cor 3:18).

4. Divine Adoption in Christ. The earliest accounts of deification are closely related to the theme of Christians as adopted “sons” of God. Paul coins the term “adoption” (huiothesia), applying it to men and women who have been adopted by God in Jesus the Son (Rom 8:15, 23; Gal 4:5; Eph 1:5). John uses the phrase “children of God” to describe the same reality (Jn 1:13; 1 Jn 3:2). The divine adoption occurs already in this life through incorporation into Christ but awaits its full reality in the resurrection of the body (1 Cor 15:50–53), which Paul describes as the full revelation of “the sons of God” (Rom 8:23).

5. Divine Indwelling, Mutual Indwelling, and Divine Fullness. The New Testament describes the Christian as one who is “indwelt” by God, most often through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Paul prays that Christ would dwell in the heart through faith (Eph 3:17), but for Paul it is especially through the Holy Spirit that God comes to dwell in our bodies as a living temple (Rom 5:5; 8:9, 11; 1 Cor 3:16; 6:19; 2 Cor 1:22; Eph 2:22). This indwelling is not unidirectional. John clarifies that just as the Father, Son, and Spirit come to dwell in us (Jn 14:17, 23), so we come to dwell in them (Jn 14:20; 15:4; 17:21; 1 Jn 4:13). This mutual indwelling of humans in God and God in humans communicates the divine life and so deifies those in whom God comes to dwell. Paul also presents this indwelling in terms that point to a divine fullness in the believer. Christ is the one in whom “the whole fulness of deity dwells bodily,” but believers “have come to fulness of life in him” (Col 2:9–10). Christian believers possess the “fullness” of the one in whom God’s “fullness” dwells.

6. Moral Likeness to Christ and to God. A central theme in deification is moral likeness to God, a thread that runs deeply throughout the New Testament. Jesus identifies this goal in the Sermon on the Mount: “You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Mt 5:48). It is here especially that we see the call to become like God and to imitate both Christ and God (Eph 5:1–2). Paul speaks of this moral likeness to God in terms of the fruit of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22–25), and the requirement to “put off” what is old and to “put on” what is new (Rom 13:14; Eph 4:22–24; Col 3:9–10). Peter calls the faithful to be holy in all their conduct (1 Pt 1:15–16) and to add virtue to virtue on the basis of the divine power granted to Christians (2 Pt 1:3–11). The New Testament commends in many and varied forms what the Christian tradition will refer to as “asceticism” or “ascesis” as a necessary part of the journey toward deification.

7. Partakers of the Divine Nature: 2 Pt 1:4. Finally, we see in a text from 2 Pt 1:4, the closest approximation of the formal language of deification found in the New Testament. Peter describes the divine power at work among Christian believers as directed toward the goal of them becoming “partakers of the divine nature.” There is both an ontological and moral quality to this participation: God’s power comes to dwell in us, giving us a share in His divine attributes. This yields a way of life and a quality of character that imitates God.

These key texts and themes, drawn from both the Old and New Testaments, find their home within the wider biblical narrative of salvation, grounded in the creation of the human race in the image and likeness of God, and revealed through salvation history. The overall arc of this narrative tends toward God dwelling personally and effectively with His people. In this vision, human life has its fulfillment, not just through an external cleansing or blessing from God, but through direct communion with God and a share in His divine life.

III. Why Is This Important?

If deification is not in fact deeply grounded in the Scriptures, then this notion loses its foundation and falls prey to the criticism that it is just an alien, imported idea, foreign to the Scriptures, that comes from pagan notions of apotheosis. But if deification is genuinely rooted in the Bible, then we encounter an elevated understanding of what God—from the beginning—had in store for His creation: a deep and abiding life and communion with Him, such that we become, in the apt biblical phrase, “partakers of the divine nature.”