STAND FIRM: Biblical Foundation of the Unseen World - Genesis 6:4 and the Second Divine Rebellion
As mentioned previously, this series aims to help us revive the view of the unseen world the first audience of Scripture had. Those first-century Jews had a different view than we do today. Their view involved three angelic rebellions, while our view today centers primarily on one — the rebellion of Satan in the Garden of Eden. In their view, that would be the first one. They looked at the second rebellion being told briefly in Gen. 6:1-4 and more thoroughly in the Book of Enoch and other second-temple writings.
In the previous article, I shared how the view of this second rebellion made its way into the New Testament in II Peter, Jude and Revelation. This view stood as the primary view until an alternative view began to appear in the time of Augustine. Still, the alternative views didn’t become the majority view until the last couple hundred years as biblical interpretation has moved away from the supernatural in Scripture. The change comes from variant interpretations of Genesis 6:1-4 (NIV): “When human beings began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. Then the Lord said, ‘My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.’ The Nephilim were on the earth in those days — and also afterward — when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.”
As stated throughout most biblical history, there has been only one interpretation of Gen. 6:1-4. Still, it’s now one of the most debated passages in the Bible, with questions about who the “sons of God” and the “daughters of men” are, as well as the Nephilim. The three main views are often classified as the Angelic View (the traditional view), the Sethite View (the most prevalent today) and the Royalty View. Here’s more about those three views:
• The Angelic View — The Angelic View is one of the oldest interpretations and is supported by ancient Jewish literature, including the Book of Enoch. It is the most straightforward reading of the text. In this view, the “sons of God” were angels who rebelled against God and descended to earth before the time of Noah. On earth, they took human wives, the “daughters of man.” The Nephilim were born from the union between the rebel angels and human women. These Nephilim were giants, as confirmed later in the Scriptures during the time of Joshua. These giants were what mythology would call demigods.
Beyond the straightforward reading, this view has additional biblical support. The use of “sons of God” happens elsewhere in the Old Testament, specifically in the Book of Job, where it clearly refers to angelic beings. The New Testament also retells the account with this view as II Peter and Jude tell of rebel angels being held in the underworld, “Tartarus,” and Revelation 9 tells of the release of angels from beneath the earth.
Along with the biblical support, all ancient Jewish writings hold this view. The early church held this view, as seen in the writings of the early church fathers. Interestingly, the mythologies of nearly every ancient civilization have a similar story, but in those accounts, the rebel angels and their offspring are worshipped rather than the Creator they rebelled against.
The only criticism of this view is just how mythological it all sounds.
• The Sethite View — This view holds that the “sons of God” were the righteous descendants of Seth, Adam’s son, while the “daughters of men” were the descendants of Cain, who was cursed. This has become the prominent view and one I’d say most Christian leaders hold today. I held it after coming out of seminary. The Biblical support used for this view is that there are separate lists of these two family lines in Genesis 4 and 5.
Though this view solves the problem of the craziness of the Angelic View, the Biblical support is sketchy at best. Though there are two lists in Genesis, there’s never anything said against the two lines intermarrying. The greater problem is that the view doesn’t explain how an ungodly intermarriage could produce Nephilim. It also fails to deal with the fact that the phrase “sons of God” refers to angels throughout the Bible.
• The Royalty View — The Royalty or Dynastic View holds that the “sons of God” were tyrannical human rulers or kings who claimed divine status and took many wives, often by force. Again, this view solves the problem of the craziness of the angelic view, but there isn’t any biblical support for this view. For one, the language about taking wives doesn’t appear to indicate they were taken by force or that there were multiple wives. This view fails to deal with the phrase “sons of God” repeatedly referring to angels and how taking multiple wives would produce giants.
I had planned to try to present all three views as evenly and unbiased as possible, but it is hard when it comes to biblical support. I hadn’t heard of this debate until studying the Bible in college and seminary, but now it is often in the public discussion with shows like the History Channel’s Ancient Aliens. For most of my ministry, I held the Sethite View, but a couple of years ago, I just couldn’t deny the amount of biblical support behind the Angelic View.
— Jake is a state missionary and would love to share about the work in Northwest Arkansas and encourage your church to stand firm. (standfirmministries.com)
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Jake McCandless
Jake McCandless authors a weekly column titled, Stand Firm and Live Epic, through which he seeks to encourage the modern church to not just survive, but thrive in current times. He also addresses many end-times topics.
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