Didn’t the paper say that polytheism is the most common definition, even among mainstream scholars, and then argue for a better term, even over your preferred term which was implied to also be a minority view?
No, it does not say that. It states that many see in Psalm 82 an intentional rhetorical appeal to Israel’s polytheistic origins, but this makes no reference to the actual theology of the authors. The only consensus the paper mentions is the following:
The data apparently informs us that Israelite religion evolved from polytheism to henotheistic monolatry to monotheism. While this viewpoint dominates scholarly discussion of Israelite religion, the question ought to be asked whether it is lucid.
It concludes that rather than worry about Yahweh’s relationship to other gods, we should be worrying about his nature in comparison to other deities:
“Henotheism” and “monolatry,” while perhaps better, are inadequate because they do not say enough about what the canonical writer believed. Israel was certainly “monolatrous,” but that term comments only on what Israel believed about the proper object of worship, not what it believed about Yahweh’s nature and attributes with respect to the other gods.
Note that Heiser points out “Israel was certainly ‘monolatrous.’”
