Elohim N Stuff
There must have been Torah scholars who said, "Well, 'Elohim' can't mean 'gods' because we only believe in one GOD, so it must be using a nonliteral plurality to imply GOD'S magnitude and majesty."
I wonder what Moses himself would tell us if we could ask him.
For the few places where the word Elohim is treated as a plural form, there are various explanations as to why. The most well known example is from the story of creation: "We shall make man in our image..." (I freely translated this from memory, to lazy to go look for any official translation...). The most well known answer in this case is that god was consulting his angles. There are many more explanations which I don not remember offhand. I can look it up if you like.
It occurs in The Qur'an too.
It's certainly not refering to the Trinity, or to multiple aspects of God, and it's also not a pluralis majestatis, as Hebrew lacks such a construction. It's one of those quirks in language, just like English 'series' or 'sheep' can be both singular and plural. My (rather uneducated) guess is that Elohim at first did refer to a pantheon, back when the Hebrews were still polytheistic, just like their neighbours (the singular El is attested as the name of a god in the Ugarite pantheon). By the time the bible was written down, the word and the meaning had already become singular.
(edit: ninja-ed by Lytrigian)
And GOD (ELOHIM) said, "Let US make man in OUR image."
?
1) God is speaking to members of his heavenly council.
2) God is speaking to himself, in self-deliberation ("Let us do this" = "I've decided I will do this").
3) God is using the "royal we," as ancient monarchs did when issuing divine decrees. This occurs in the Qur'an when Allah speaks as "we": "To Jesus, son of Mary, We gave clear evidence of the truth" [2:87].
4) The plural pronouns match the plural noun Elohim (God) in what some call a "plural of majesty." Earthly monarchs do this all the time.
5) The plurals are a vestige of polytheistic belief that the Israelites borrowed from their pagan neighbors. God is speaking to a pantheon of fellow deities.
6) God the Father is speaking to other members of the Trinity: either to God the Spirit or to God the (preincarnate) Son, or both.
Take your pick. I'm going for option 5, which also ties in with option 1.