1. Judaism insists with unrelenting severity on the absolute unity and incomparability of God, so that no other being can be placed beside Him. Consequently, every mention of divine beings (_Elohim_ or _B’ne Elohim_) in either the Bible or post-Biblical literature refers to subordinate beings only. These spirits constitute the celestial court for the King of the World.(531) All the forces of the universe are His servants, fulfilling His commands. Hence both the Hebrew and Greek terms for angel, _Malak_ and _angelos_, mean “messenger.” These beings derive their existence from God; some of them are merely temporary, so that without Him they dissolve into nothing. Although Scripture uses the terms, “God of gods” and “King of kings,” still we cannot attribute any independent existence to subordinate divine beings. In fact, Maimonides in his sixth article of faith holds that worship of such beings is prohibited as idolatry by the second commandment.(532) Thus the unity of God lifts Him above comparison with any other divine being. This is most emphatically expressed in Deuteronomy: “Know this day, and lay it to thy heart, that the Lord He is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath; there is none else,”(533) and “See now that I, even I, am He, and there is no god with Me; I kill and make alive; I have wounded and I heal, and there is none that can deliver out of My hand.”(534) The same attitude is found in Isaiah: “I am the Lord that maketh all things, that stretched forth the heavens alone, that spread abroad the earth by Myself” “I am the Lord and there is none else; beside Me there is no god.”(535) Such conceptions allow no place for angels or spirits.