Making Sense of Genesis 6:1-4: The Nephlilim are Coming! The Nephilim are Coming!

Before we get to Noah, I want to address that curious little story in Genesis 6:1-4. It is one of those passages that leaves most people scratching their heads. Here’s what it says:

¹When people began to multiply on the face of the ground, and daughters were born to them, ²the sons of God saw that they were fair; and they took wives for themselves of all that they chose. ³Then the LORD said, “My spirit shall not abide in mortals forever, for they are flesh; their days shall be 120 years.” ⁴The Nephilim were on the earth in those days– and also afterward– when the sons of God went in to the daughters of humans, who bore children to them. These were the heroes that were of old, warriors of renown.

Okay….so, the “sons of God” take whomever among the “daughters of men” they wanted, and then they “go into them,” and their children were the “Nephilim,” who were “heroes men of old, and men of renown”? What the heck is going on?

The Sons of God and the Daughters of Man
Needless to say, these four verses have been the subject of some pretty wild speculation. Here are some of the more common interpretations of these verses:

• The “sons of God” are fallen angels and the “daughters of man” are human women—and these verses tell about the sexual union of angels and woman, and the subsequent race of giants.
• The “sons of God” are the descendants of Seth and the “daughters of man” are the descendants of Cain—and these verses tell about how the descendants of Cain eventually corrupted all humanity.
• The “sons of God” are tyrannical kings who use their power to abuse the “daughters of man” (i.e. the rest of humanity).

I believe the interpretation that best fits into the storyline of Genesis 1-11 as a whole is that of the “sons of God” being tyrannical kings, and the “daughters of man” representing the common people who are abused by tyrants. Now that being said, we need to be clear that there are some unusual, dare I say, mythological, overtones in this story, but I believe they can be teased out and understood.

Although it is true that the term “sons of God” does sometimes refer to angels (especially in the later apocalyptic writings of the Jewish Intertestamental Period), it is also true that the phrase refers to kings. In the ancient world, kings and rulers were often seen as divine (i.e. as sons of the gods). In addition, because they held absolute power, that, along with their claims of divinity, kings would often have large harems (think of Solomon and his 700 wives and 300 concubines)—clearly, they were able to take any woman they wanted. Most of these were the result of political alliances, but history is full of rulers who were so corrupt and evil that they used their absolute power to positively abuse women. Simply put, men with power often use their power to do whatever they want (think about Caligula, and even Uday Hussein).

***NOTE: Since I first wrote this post, I’ve done more reading (particularly Michael Heiser’s “The Unseen Realm”) and have come to see that “sons of elohim” probably do refer to fallen divine beings who corrupted mankind…at least within the context of this mythology. I still think, since ancient rulers often claimed to be sons of the gods/divine beings, that we still can see the behavior of those tyrants reflected in the behavior of these “sons of elohim.”

When seen in light of Genesis 1-11, most notably God’s creation of Adam in Genesis 2, this interpretation makes the most sense, at least to me. God created mankind in His image, to rule over His creation, to be priests of His creation, and to serve His creation. In Genesis 2, we have the creation of the woman to be an equal partner to the man in this task. Yet, as a result of Adam and Eve’s sin in Genesis 3, one of the consequences was that Eve would be ruled over by Adam—i.e. that men would use their power over women and would rule over them. And this is precisely what we see going on in Genesis 6:1-4. It becomes even more obvious when read in Hebrew—what our English translations have as the daughters of man actually reads in Hebrew as the daughters of Adam (“Adam” meaning “mankind” or “humanity”).

Too often we tend to read certain passages in the Bible in isolation from the surrounding context and through our own modern worldview lens. The result is we tend to ask the wrong questions and end up missing the point of the passage because we forget to read in within the larger context of the surrounding text. And I think, when read in light of the previous five chapters, it is pretty clear that Genesis 6:1-4 is a picture of rulers, using their power and position to use and abuse women—it is the outgrowth of the consequences of sin from Genesis 3. Instead of using their power to care for God’s creation and serve humanity, tyrants use their privilege to do the exact opposite. Instead of ruling God’s creation as His image-bearers, rulers try to set themselves up as gods themselves, and they end up abusing God’s creation and the rest of humanity.

That picture is something that is as true today as it was in ancient times.

In any case, there is a reason why this story is placed where it is, right before the account of the flood. Essentially, the picture of Genesis 6:1-4 depicts the polar opposite of God’s purposes for humanity and gives us the reason why God decided to wipe things out and start over.

Who are the Nephilim?
One more thing about Genesis 6:1-4 has to be discussed though: Who are the Nephilim? Unfortunately, most translations actually muddy the waters when it comes to understanding who the Nephilim are. What is often translated as “heroes of old, and men of renown” is literally “mighty ones who from ages past were men for a name.” That puts quite a different take on things. In addition, the name Nephilim literally means “the fallen ones.” And so, the picture is that of the people who are considered “fallen ones” who are, not “heroes,” but “mighty ones,” and who are, not “men of renown,” but rather “men for a name.”

To the point, if I call someone a “hero,” and a “man of renown,” that obviously has positive connotations, like Indiana Jones or Superman. But if I point to someone and say, “He is a ‘fallen one,’ and is a ‘mighty one’ who is out to ‘make a name’ for himself,” well, that doesn’t sound too positive, does it? Being “mighty” doesn’t necessarily mean one is a hero—Stalin and Hitler were obviously “mighty.” And normally, the person who is “out to make a name for himself,” is the sort of person who is willing to step over anyone he has to in order to get famous, gain power, or just gain recognition for himself.

With that, the picture set forth in Genesis 6:1-4 acts as not only a depiction of the polar opposite of what God had originally purposed for humanity, but it also serves as the reason for the story of the flood that comes next.

The Nephilim Elsewhere in the Old Testament

There is one more interesting thing to note about the identity of the Nephilim: this is not the only place they are mentioned in the Old Testament. To the point, they are associated with the Promised Land, the land of Canaan. The first instance after Genesis 6:4 comes in Numbers 13:33, in the account the twelve spies give regarding Canaan. After Joshua and Caleb give a positive account of Canaan, the other ten come back with news that the land is unconquerable because there were giants living in the land: “And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”

As a result, the people of Israel refuse to trust in YHWH and take the land, and they end up wandering in the wilderness for 40 years. This event is recorded in Deuteronomy 1:28 as well, when Moses reminds the Israelites, 40 years later, about what had happened the first time: (“Where are we going up? Our brothers have made our hearts melt, saying, “The people are greater and taller than we. The cities are great and fortified up to heaven. And besides, we have seen the sons of the Anakim there“‘). And, in Deuteronomy 9:1-2, Moses reminds the Israelites that they are about to go into the land of Canaan, where the Anakim live: “Hear, O Israel! You are about to cross the Jordan today, to go in and dispossess nations larger and mightier than you, great cities, fortified to the heavens, a people great and tall, the sons of the Anakim, whom you know, and of whom you have heard it said, ‘Who can stand before the sons of Anak?’”

After the conquest of the land under Joshua, we are then told, in Joshua 11:22, “There was none of the Anakim left in the land of the people of Israel. Only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod did some remain.” Later on, in Joshua 14:12, we find that Caleb (the other spy who along with Joshua gave a positive report about Canaan 40 years earlier), asked Joshua for the hill country around Hebron for his inheritance. Caleb said, “So now give me this hill country of which the LORD spoke on that day, for you heard on that day how the Anakim were there, with great fortified cities. It may be that the LORD will be with me, and I shall drive them out just as the LORD said.”

These Anakim, the descendants of the Nephilim, make still a few more appearances in the story of David. You already know of one of them—everyone knows this one: it is the account of David and Goliath. Remember, Joshua 11:22 said that the only Anakim who were left lived in Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod—that’s the territory of the Philistines. And what do you now? In I Samuel 17:4, we find out that Goliath, the giant who was the Philistine champion, was from Gath. (“And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span”). The rest of that story is history: David, the newly anointed king of Israel defeats Goliath, the Philistine champion, the giant of the Anakim who had descended from the Nephilim.

Believe it or not, there are actually four other mentions of these giants—they are all found in II Samuel 21:15-22: Ishbi-benob, Saph, Goliath the Gittite, and a nameless giant who had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. In II Samuel 21:22, we are told: “These four were descended from the giants in Gath; they fell by the hand of David and his servants.”

Conclusion
Here’s the point: biblically-speaking, the identity of the Nephilim is not some mystery. In the original context of ancient Israel, they would have seen Genesis 6:1-4 as giving a description of the tyrannical rulers of Canaanites (and the Philistines in particular). If we realize that the purpose of Genesis 1-11 is not to describe actual history, but rather to provide the “mythological worldview lens” through which ancient Israel was to interpret history, this makes sense. Simply put, Genesis 6:1-4 puts the Israelites’ battles with the Canaanites into perspective.

This actually is yet another reason why we should not read Genesis 1-11 as literal straightforward history. If it were, then the Nephilim would have been wiped out in Noah’s flood. How did their descendants then end up in the land of Canaan during the time of Moses and Joshua? Why is David still going out killing these giants during his lifetime? I suppose you might try to argue that the Nephilim’s DNA was transmitted through Noah’s family, or something like that, but let’s be honest—when you start coming up with those types of explanations, you are starting to read into the biblical text a whole mess of scientific knowledge that the original audience would have no clue about.

Furthermore, you’d be getting off into the speculative weeds and would probably miss the actual inspired message that is being conveyed within the literary structure of Genesis 1-11 itself. But if you read Genesis 1-11 as mythological literature that “sets the stage” for understanding biblical history, you’re not going to be forced to try to come up with speculative pseudo-scientific answers to questions that are being forced onto the text of Genesis 6:1-4.