Moral and spiritual conditions in the antediluvian world had deteriorated with the passing years, not only among the Cainites but eventually among the Sethites as well. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Then, in the days of Noah, a strange and terrible event took place, leading rapidly to such a tidal wave of violence and wickedness over the earth that there was no longer any remedy but utter destruction. [/FONT]
[FONT="]The interpretation of the passage obviously turns on the meaning of the phrase “sons of God” (bene elohim). [/FONT][FONT="]The actual phrase bene elohim is used three other times, all in the ancient book of Job (1:6; 2:1; 38:7). There is no doubt at all that, in these passages, the meaning applies exclusively to the angels. A very similar form (bar elohim) [/FONT] is used in Daniel 3:25, and also refers either to an angel or to a theophany. The term “sons of the mighty” (bene elim) is used in Psalm 29:1 and also Psalm 89:6, and again refers to angels. Thus, there seems no reasonable doubt that, in so far as the language itself is concerned, the intent of the writer was to convey the thought of angels – fallen angels, no doubt, since they were acting in opposition to God’s will. This also was the meaning placed on the passage by the Greek translators of the Septuagint, by Josephus, by the writer of ancient apocryphal book of Enoch, and by all the other ancient Jewish interpreters and the earliest Christian writers. Apparently the first Christian writers to suggest the Sethite interpretation were Chrysostom and Augustine.
[FONT="]When Jesus said that the angels of God in heaven do not marry, this does not necessarily mean that those who have been cast out of heaven were incapable of doing so. It clearly was not God’s will or intention that angels mix in such a way with human women, but these wicked angels were not concerned with obedience to God’s will.
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The fact that these creatures could take whatever women they chose further suggests a general state of profligacy which made indiscriminate sexual unions quite commonplace. This is also suggested by Christ's descriptive phrase “marrying and giving [out] in marriage” (Matthew 24:38) as characteristic of the careless attitudes of the days of Noah.
[FONT="]If, for the sake of argument at least, we assume that the bene elohim were, indeed, angels, and that angels can assume such a total human form that they actually have male reproductive systems, then a grave question would have to be posed relative to the nature of the progeny that would result from their sexual intercourse with human women.
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Fallen angels have no possibility of salvation, but fallen men and women do have at least this possibility. What, then, would be the case with “people” who were half-angel, half-men?
This seems to be such a grotesque situation that it does appear extremely doubtful that God would have allowed it at all, even if it really were physiologically a realistic possibility. And yet, as already indicated, it does violence to the actual text of the passage if we make it mean merely that the sons of Seth began to marry the daughters of Cain. (If this were what it meant, why did not the writer simply say so, and thus avoid all this confusion?) And why the giants, and why the universal violence?
The sons of Seth were surely not all godly men; so why should they be called sons of God (remember, they all perished in the Flood)? Furthermore, Adam had many sons in addition to Cain and Seth; were they spiritual “sons of God,” too? Not very likely, at this period of history. Furthermore, why stress only the union of godly men with ungodly women? What about the “daughters of God”? Were they being married to “sons of men”?
This naturalistic interpretation is so forced and awkward that it seems to do disservice to the doctrine of divine inspiration to suppose that this is really what the writer meant to say. He surely meant to convey to his readers the idea that, in these days of Noah, such an awful irruption of abnormality and wickedness burst forth on the earth that it could only be explained by a demoniacally supernatural cause.
