Psalm 8 · a question people ask
"What is the son of man, that you care for him?" (8:4). Is "the son of man" here Jesus?
In the psalm, the son of man stands beside man in one question asked twice: "what is man, that you think of him? What is the son of man, that you care for him?" (8:4). In Hebrew it is ben adam, with the word for man of "Let’s make man in our image" (Genesis 1:26). Bildad uses the same two words together: "How much less man, who is a worm, and the son of man, who is a worm!" (Job 25:6). In the Gospels Jesus calls himself "the Son of Man" (for example Mark 2:10), and no verse says that his name for himself comes from this psalm. Hebrews brings the psalm to Jesus another way. It quotes the psalm's words (Hebrews 2:6-8), then says, "But now we don’t yet see all things subjected to him" (Hebrews 2:8), and "But we see him who has been made a little lower than the angels, Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor" (Hebrews 2:9). These notes set the verses side by side, and go no further than they go.
The verses
“what is man, that you think of him? What is the son of man, that you care for him?”
“God said, “Let’s make man in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.””
“Then Bildad the Shuhite answered,”
“How much less man, who is a worm, and the son of man, who is a worm!””