"In the A[ncient ]N[ear ]E[ast], a common metaphor for describing the world of the divine was the 'divine assembly' or 'divine council.' These descriptions of gods and goddesses gathered together under the leadership of a senior deity were derived, in all probability, from the activities of the royal court. The O[ld ]T[estament] provides a number of descriptions of this heavenly assembly that closely resemble descriptions in the literature of the surrounding cultures. . . ."
E. Theodore Mullen, Jr., "Divine assembly," in The new interpreter's dictionary of the Bible (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 2007), vol. 2, p. 145 (pp. 145-146).
