Greetings to all my brothers and sisters in Christ.
My apologies for this post being so long. I thought is necessary for a proper treatment. That being said, I’d like to present a natural reading of Genesis 6:4. In the end, I find only two reasonable paths that might be of dispute if one uses a natural reading of the text.
(Gen 6:4 ESV) 4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
(A) The [Nephilim] were on the earth →
(B) in those days →
(C) and also afterward →
“On the earth” (A) is a reference to location and “in those days” (B) is a reference to time. The author goes on to give us the answer the time reference when he explains the “when”, or in what days these Nephilim were on the earth. The author writes.
(D) when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. →
The entire construction of (D) by the author is one complete whole, i.e., an event (Gen 6:2) of the Nephilim’s contemporaries that is designating the “when” in time the Nephilim were on the earth. In other words the author is telling the reader in what days the Nephilim were on the earth by giving a companion event of contemporaries of the Nephilim. Those contemporaries of the Nephilim being, the sons of God, the daughters of man, and their children.
But not only were the Nephilim on the earth when the event took place, i.e., the sons of God took wives from the daughters of men and then had children. The author also tells us that the Nephilim were on the earth after the event as well (referring to (C) above).
So the Nephilim were on the earth at the same time that (i) the sons of God took daughters of man as their wives, and also when (ii) that union started baring children, and also (iii) after the events of both (i) and (ii) had taken place. But how can we make sense of the statement “and also afterward” (C) which means that the Nephilim were on the earth after the event of the sons of God having children with the daughters of man?
Making sense of “also afterward”
E. Those were the [mighty men] who were of old, men of renown.
The only question that remains is... to which subject does [E] refer? Is [E] referring all the way back to [A], the Nephilim? Or is [E] referring to the closest subject, the [children]. For the [children] are the subject that immediately precedes [E] in the line of thought. In other words, should it be read like this…
(i) …the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. ← These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
Possibility (#1) means:
(ii) The Nephilim were on the earth in those days…← These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
Possibility (#2) means:
1. [sons of God] = godly men and contemporaries of Nephilim
2. [daughters of man] = ungodly women and contemporaries of Nephilim
3. [children] = become ungodly men and are contemporaries of Nephilim.
4. [Nephilim] = “fallen” “mighty men…men of renown”
If it is the case that possibility #1 is the truth, then who are the [Nephilim]? Whose root naphal means “fallen”, “to fall”, “to fall away”, or some say “to cause to fall” and is described in Numbers 13:33 in terms of being very large, i.e., giants? Some important things to note about Numbers 13:32-33 before we draw any conclusions.
(Num 13:32-33 ESV) 32 So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, "The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. 33 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."
It seems most reasonable to conclude that the spies, after invoking the name of the han·nə·p̄i·lîm, were giving commonly known details of what the cultural belief of the han·nə·p̄i·lîm might have been. That is, it is reasonable to think that it was common cultural lore that the han·nə·p̄i·lîm were “of great height” and made common people look like “grasshoppers”. It seems reasonable to conclude that the common cultural lore was that these han·nə·p̄i·lîm were also known for their bloodshed and could “devour” their foes in battle. Whether this was true descriptors of who the Nephilim would be or simply fables of a spiritually compromised Jewish culture is unclear. It seems reasonable to think that at the very least many in the Jewish camp believed such things to be true descriptors otherwise the spies wouldn’t have used them.
Regarding possibility #2 (previously outlined), If [E] refers all the way back to the [Nephilim] and not the [children] then the [Nephilim] are the violent warriors, men of renown. Emphasis on the word “men” and big emphasis on the fact that the Nephilim [A] are not related to their contemporaries of [C] in any way (that includes the children) other than time on earth according to the natural reading of the text.
After the author describes what was taking place on the earth in those days (Genesis 6:1-4), the author then writes…
(Gen 6:5 ESV) 5 The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
It is important to understand that Genesis 6:5 is a summation of what the author just wrote in Genesis 6:1-4. That summation is that “The LORD” saw that “the wickedness of man was great”. Further, that “every intention of the the thoughts of his heart” ("his" refers to human beings), “was only evil continually”. In other words, it's all about man.
Keep seeking God's truth as if it were hidden treasure (Prov 2:1-6)
My apologies for this post being so long. I thought is necessary for a proper treatment. That being said, I’d like to present a natural reading of Genesis 6:4. In the end, I find only two reasonable paths that might be of dispute if one uses a natural reading of the text.
(Gen 6:4 ESV) 4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
(A) The [Nephilim] were on the earth →
(B) in those days →
(C) and also afterward →
“On the earth” (A) is a reference to location and “in those days” (B) is a reference to time. The author goes on to give us the answer the time reference when he explains the “when”, or in what days these Nephilim were on the earth. The author writes.
(D) when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. →
The entire construction of (D) by the author is one complete whole, i.e., an event (Gen 6:2) of the Nephilim’s contemporaries that is designating the “when” in time the Nephilim were on the earth. In other words the author is telling the reader in what days the Nephilim were on the earth by giving a companion event of contemporaries of the Nephilim. Those contemporaries of the Nephilim being, the sons of God, the daughters of man, and their children.
But not only were the Nephilim on the earth when the event took place, i.e., the sons of God took wives from the daughters of men and then had children. The author also tells us that the Nephilim were on the earth after the event as well (referring to (C) above).
So the Nephilim were on the earth at the same time that (i) the sons of God took daughters of man as their wives, and also when (ii) that union started baring children, and also (iii) after the events of both (i) and (ii) had taken place. But how can we make sense of the statement “and also afterward” (C) which means that the Nephilim were on the earth after the event of the sons of God having children with the daughters of man?
Making sense of “also afterward”
- The sons of God took wives of the daughters of man (Gen 6:2).
- Then children were born to that union (Gen 6:2).
- These children then grew up apart from God, ungodly, due to the influence of their ungodly mothers (similar Judges 3:6) which is the point of the lesson to the Jews in Gen 6:1-2 (see also Gen 24:3-4, , 26:34-35, 27:46, 28:1-3).
- The implication of #3 is that these children never become “sons of God”.
- Therefore there are no more “sons of God” to take daughters of man after the original sons of God in Genesis 6:2 do it.
- So we can see how the Nephilim can be said to be on the earth when this event was taking place AND due to the children not becoming more sons of God themselves. The Nephilim can be said to also exist on the earth after the original event of Genesis 6:2.
E. Those were the [mighty men] who were of old, men of renown.
The only question that remains is... to which subject does [E] refer? Is [E] referring all the way back to [A], the Nephilim? Or is [E] referring to the closest subject, the [children]. For the [children] are the subject that immediately precedes [E] in the line of thought. In other words, should it be read like this…
(i) …the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. ← These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
Possibility (#1) means:
- [sons of God] = godly men and contemporaries of Nephilim
- [daughters of man] = ungodly women and contemporaries of Nephilim
- [children] = are contemporaries of Nephilim and become ungodly men and “mighty men…men of renown”
- [Nephilim] = ? (6:4 doesn’t say)
(ii) The Nephilim were on the earth in those days…← These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
Possibility (#2) means:
1. [sons of God] = godly men and contemporaries of Nephilim
2. [daughters of man] = ungodly women and contemporaries of Nephilim
3. [children] = become ungodly men and are contemporaries of Nephilim.
4. [Nephilim] = “fallen” “mighty men…men of renown”
If it is the case that possibility #1 is the truth, then who are the [Nephilim]? Whose root naphal means “fallen”, “to fall”, “to fall away”, or some say “to cause to fall” and is described in Numbers 13:33 in terms of being very large, i.e., giants? Some important things to note about Numbers 13:32-33 before we draw any conclusions.
(Num 13:32-33 ESV) 32 So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, "The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. 33 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."
- Numbers 13:32 tells us that the Hebrew spies gave the people a “bad report”. The Hebrew word here is dibâ [Strong’s H1681] which is from H1680; slander:—defaming, evil report, infamy, slander. In other words, the spies lied. The question is, what were the lies?
- The biblical text tells us that the spies claimed, emphasis on the word “claimed” because we are told up front that they lied, that they saw the han·nə·p̄i·lîm.
- Interestingly, the author of Numbers after telling us that the spies said the saw the han·nə·p̄i·lîm tells us that the “sons of Anak” (‘ă·nāq) were believed to come from the han·nə·p̄i·lîm (Num 13:33). In other words, the author seems to be telling us that the spies actually saw the Anak (which were Canaanites and corresponds with Num 13:28-29). But the spies lied and invoked the Jewish cultural lore of the han·nə·p̄i·lîm when describing these Canaanites (“sons of Anak”).
- The spies would appear to be playing on some common Jewish lore that han·nə·p̄i·lîm were “giants” by telling the people that these inhabitants they saw made the spies look “like grasshoppers” and that the land “devours its inhabitants” and that “all the people that we saw in it are of great height”.
It seems most reasonable to conclude that the spies, after invoking the name of the han·nə·p̄i·lîm, were giving commonly known details of what the cultural belief of the han·nə·p̄i·lîm might have been. That is, it is reasonable to think that it was common cultural lore that the han·nə·p̄i·lîm were “of great height” and made common people look like “grasshoppers”. It seems reasonable to conclude that the common cultural lore was that these han·nə·p̄i·lîm were also known for their bloodshed and could “devour” their foes in battle. Whether this was true descriptors of who the Nephilim would be or simply fables of a spiritually compromised Jewish culture is unclear. It seems reasonable to think that at the very least many in the Jewish camp believed such things to be true descriptors otherwise the spies wouldn’t have used them.
Regarding possibility #2 (previously outlined), If [E] refers all the way back to the [Nephilim] and not the [children] then the [Nephilim] are the violent warriors, men of renown. Emphasis on the word “men” and big emphasis on the fact that the Nephilim [A] are not related to their contemporaries of [C] in any way (that includes the children) other than time on earth according to the natural reading of the text.
After the author describes what was taking place on the earth in those days (Genesis 6:1-4), the author then writes…
(Gen 6:5 ESV) 5 The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
It is important to understand that Genesis 6:5 is a summation of what the author just wrote in Genesis 6:1-4. That summation is that “The LORD” saw that “the wickedness of man was great”. Further, that “every intention of the the thoughts of his heart” ("his" refers to human beings), “was only evil continually”. In other words, it's all about man.
Keep seeking God's truth as if it were hidden treasure (Prov 2:1-6)