Preaching through Genesis this summer at college group gave me the opportunity to tackle some of those more controversial passages. And by far, one of the most controversial is Genesis 6:1-12. Do you remember that chapter? That’s right. The flood—the great, catastrophic holocaust of the entire human race as a judgment on sin.
And it’s in 6:1-2 where the intrigue and controversy begins. The text says this: “Now it came about, when men began to multiply on the face of the land, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose.”
Now I don’t know if you realize this or not, but there is an avalanche of controversy over this chapter and over this verse in particular. Because what we need to know is: who are the “sons of God”? Who are “the daughters of men”? Who are the “Nephilim” in v. 4?
And everything from aliens to angels to half-breed demonic giants are said to be found in this chapter. And so we need to be good exegetical archaeologists and get to the bottom of what Moses is describing.
We need to know first: who are the “sons of God”? Some say that this refers to polygamous kings and judges and rulers who brutally took women by force and made them concubines and slaves in some kind of kingly harem. The problem with that view is that kings and rulers are found nowhere in this chapter, nor is this verse saying that they took these women by force.
Others say—and this is by far the strangest and the oldest view—others say that the “sons of God” were evil, angelic beings who invaded the earth and had unnatural sexual relations with women, producing a race of half-breed demonic giants called “Nephilim” who filled the earth. And at first this view seems kind of attractive because the phrase “sons of God” is used in the book of Job to describe angelic beings (cf. Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7).
And the Nephilim are found in Numbers 13:33 when spies from Israel say that the land of Canaan was impossible to conquer because the inhabitants in that land were giant and massive. And so, on the surface, this view seems to have some credibility. And yet, the problems with that view are simply overwhelming. First, there is no real indication that angelic beings are found anywhere in this text, because “sons of God” doesn’t have to refer to angels—it can also be a way to describe people.
Second, the context has nothing to do with angels and their punishment but has everything to do with humanity and their wickedness. Third, this view is borrowed and dependent upon old Jewish mythical stories and bizarre mystical writings that do not have a shred of credibility.
Fourth, according to Jesus in Matthew 22:30 angelic beings do not procreate. And even if demons did possess human beings, that doesn’t explain at all why their children would be a race of half-breed demonic giants. Fifth, v. 4 doesn’t actually say that the Nephilim were the offspring of the sons of God and daughters of men. That is a sloppy grammatical assumption that can’t actually be supported from the text.
In the end, I believe the evidence against that view is crippling.
This leaves us with one more possibility, which I believe is the correct one. The “sons of God” were real, literal men in human history who belonged to the godly line of Seth and who tanked the human race by marrying godless women who didn’t give a rip about God. In other words, believers married unbelievers.
That view is the only view that actually fits the context because Moses’ point in chapters 4 and 5 is to unfold for us the tragic depletion of those who walked with God. That’s what makes chapter 6 so horrifying is that those souls in the world whose allegiance to YHWH—who were already grossly outnumbered, became virtually non-existent through really stupid marriage decisions!
Now maybe that view is not very exciting. Maybe that’s not as dramatic as demons impregnating women with would-be giant half-breeds. But in the end, what actually happened here was even more tragic, because those who believed in YHWH married people who had no interested in God and 120 years later God killed everyone in a flood.
And we see this exact same scandalous pattern throughout history: the people of Israel intermarried with the surrounding pagan nations who hated God and eventually it got them exiled to Babylon as slaves. Solomon married hundreds of idol worshipping women and it cost him the kingdom.
And there are thousands of professing believers today who marry whoever they darn well please, thinking that it is some innocuous decision that has few consequences, only to find years later that their lives are an absolute train wreck. I have not been a pastor long, but I have seen dozens of professed believers marry those who do not know Christ and every single one has been a disaster. The lesson from this text for you is: it matters who you marry.
Jerod is the former College Pastor at Faith Bible Church. He is now the senior pastor at Christ Community Bible Church in Arlington, Texas. He and his wife Sarah have three daughters and he enjoys learning languages, particularly ancient languages.
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