How many sons does God have?

Come now--you don't really believe this simplistic answer any more than I do.Many words are occassionally used in a very broad or figurative sense to make a point. If we defer to the broadest usage as the "real" meaning or let this color all other uses, the word meaning will grow until the word loses its meaning.The frequency of usage is a major factor. We've got to identify the rare and figurative uses. It would be better to take the most common usage as the "real" meaning, but even this is too simplistic.The truth is that there is no one "real" meaning, no one single biblical meaning of "son of God". There are multiple biblical meanings. The phrase is used differently by different biblical authors at different times and places.

Unless He only used it in this broad sense once or twice, and generally used it in a narrower sense. We should probably take the phrase in its most common usage unless other factors indicate for us to take it differently.And note that you are asking a different question. "Who are Jesus' brothers" is a different question than "Who are God's sons". While they are logically the same, they may normally be used in different senses (e.g. one may tend to be used more figuratively than the other).

It is only "filled with contradictions" for someone who approaches it in a very simplistic fashion. If you approach science in the same way you will think that wave-particle duality is a contradiction. A more sophisticated approach will assume that maybe these things are not contradictory, but reflect a more complex reality.

True for "established science", but that's not very interesting. (Theology likewise has established positions where there is little to no debate, such as "Does God exist?")Scientists focus their research on the "unestablished science" where there are many unanswered questions (e.g sources of dark matter, origins of life, etc.). Here there are also a vast number of theories, and arguments just as passionate as any in theology. I don't think so. I think it's for pretty much the same reasons as in science. There is incomplete data which may be suggestive of contradictory conclusions, but the data is not definitive and not truly contradictory.

And we do the same in science. But usually in theology we don't have to invent a whole new theory of reality to deal with the apparent contradictions, as we've had to do with particle-wave duality in physics. You are probably rigbht; I think we are at an impasse on this issue.One group in this thread claims:
1) "creation of God" and "son of God" are essentially synonymous, and everyone is a "son of God".
2) biblical authors who use the phrase "son of God" differently (e.g. John in Jn 3) are anomolous.
3) the Bible is full of contradictions, and it is useless to try to reconcile them.The other group claims:
1) "creation" and "son" are different words and concepts.
2) "son of God" is overwhelmingly used in a restrictive sense, NOT including all mankind
3) biblical contradictions are only apparent, and can be reconciled in numerous ways.These two groups work from two different sets of presuppositions. Each is viewing the details through their own lenses. We're not really discussing the presuppositional differences, so will not resolve these differences.(But frankly, I don't understand why the first group is even bothering to participate in a forum which asks "What does the Bible really mean?", because they don't really seem to care about this question.)