By the time we get to Isaiah—one of the last writings before the time of Jesus—we read almost contradictory statements like, “I am the LORD [Yahweh], and there is no other; apart from me there is no God.”34 Now, in context this is hyperbole, and poetry at that—not an academic essay on the difference between Yahweh and all the other spiritual beings. The prophet’s point is that the gap between Yahweh and the other “gods” is so chasmic, so uncrossable, that these other beings aren’t really even worthy of the title “gods.”
