the passage does not refer to moral irregularities, but to permanent un ions. The intermarriage is directly related to the universality of sin in the generation of the flood, and was responsible for that judgment. The penalty is pronounced against man, not angels. If the sons of God were angels, they were not only involved, but were the cause of the judgment. Why should only men be punished when the angels were the instigators of the sin? When Satan sinned (Gen esis 3:14, 15), his punishment is indi cated first of all. It was man who had sinned against God. There is no definite proof that the nephilim (and remember they are spoken of later in Scripture long after the flood) of verse 4 are the result of the action of verse 2. Verse 4 does not state that the nephilim were the result of the union of the sons of God with the daughters of men. They could have existed before such unions as well as after them. Why could not unusual stature (giants) have accompanied the unusual span of life prevalent in those days? Those who hold that the sons of God are angels feel that Jude 6 and 2 Peter 2:4 teach the cohabiting of fallen angels with the daughters of men. Satan is supposed to have ar ranged this scheme in order to pro duce a race of monstrosities, and thus bring about the destruction of the human race. This is entirely pre sumption. Neither the Jude passage nor the 2 Peter text teaches anything about the marriage of angels; they speak only df the fall of the angelic creatures. It is in the interests of a particular view that such is injected at this point. In Jude 7 the “ these” does not refer to angels, but to the ungodly men referred to in verse 4. It is realized that the word of our Lord in Matthew 22:30 concerning angels militates against taking the phrase as speaking of angels. The circumvention that He is speaking of angels in heaven rather than on earth, is not to be taken seriously. Angels are holy or fallen; the fallen angels did not have a second fall on earth after their fall in heaven. An gels are sexless; they do not increase nor decrease. Certain angels do •not have procreative powers denied other angels. And where is the evidence that any such unions would issue in human beings? All this is foreign to the spirit of the Scriptures and savors of that which would inject ancient mythology into the Word of God. No, the sons of God are not angels, but the line of the godly, the line of Seth, and the account is carried on smoothly from Genesis 4:25,26. END.
WORDS
from the
WORD by Charles L. Feinberg, Th.D., Ph.D., Director, Talbot Theological Seminary
of God Why, then, should there be any objection to understanding the use in Genesis 6 as of angels also? Those who hold this position state their ob jection to the contrary view in sev eral ways. They feel the view that the sons of God are men limits God’s people to the male sex. This is a poor argument, and takes no account of the language of Scripture, which prefers the use of the masculine. Does the phrase “ sons of Israel” (trans lated “ children of Israel” ) mean that only males descended from Jacob? Do Romans 8:14 and Galatians 4:5-7 refer to men only? The answer is ob vious: when we speak of sons of God today, we also include daughters of God. A second objection is that, if - the sons of God were believers, then they perished at the flood according to 2 Peter 2:5. They could just as easily have died naturally, for the flood was preached by Noah for some 120 years. It is objected further that there is no indication that God had yet for bidden marriage betweeii believers ' and unbelievers. An unequal yoke would scarcely be visited with so great a calamity as the flood. We have no statement that Cain and Abel were told that blood sacrifice was required by God. They were evi dently informed, for Abel brought his by faith (Heb. 11:4), and faith is founded always upon testimony. Murder was wrong, and men knew it, long before it was forbidden in the Mosaic law. Men of that day knew that God was not to be dis owned in their lives in the careless manner in which they were living: eating, drinking, marrying, and giv ing in marriage. A last objection is that there is no reason why the union of believers with unbelievers should result in giants (v. 4). This objec tion fights a straw man, as we shall soon see. The most natural and Scriptural explanation of the Genesis 6 passage is that we have a mingling of the godly with the ungodly, or the Seth line with the Cain line, if you will. The concept in the words sons of God is found later in connection with Israel more than once (Deut. 14:1; Hosea 1:10; and 11:1). Note that
S o n s T his short phrase, found both in the Old Testament and the New, has been the subject of much differ ence of opinion by orthodox as well as liberal commentators. The He brew words for the phrase are bene ha’elohim, bene’elohim, and bene’- elim. The references are to be found in Genesis 6:2,4; Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7; Psalm 29:1; and 89:6. The Greek translation of the Old Testament (the Septuagint or LXX) translates huioi tou theou (sons of God) in Genesis 6:4; Psalm 29:1; and 89:6; hoi aggeloi tou theou (angels of God) in Genesis 6:2; Job 1:6; and 2:1; aggeloi mou (my angels) in Job 38:7. It will be readily seen that the LXX arbitrarily offers an interpretation in Genesis 6 instead of an accurate translation. Liberal commentators regard Gene sis 6:1-4 as a survival of early He brew mythology. The account is supposed to explain the rise of heroes and demigods in antiquity. This view is part of the approach to the Scrip tures which finds in the religion of Israel nothing more than the myths, legends and folktales found in other religions of the ancient world. Rev erent, orthodox opinion rejects this position in toto. Among orthodox expositors there are two principal views: those who hold that the sons of God are angels, and those who believe that the sons of God are the godly of that genera tion—the Sethites. The first position has been advanced by certain manu scripts of the LXX, Philo, Josephus, Book of Enoch, Justin Martyr, and Tertullian. With variations it was the accepted Jewish rabbinical opin ion. The second view has been held by Chrysostom, Augustine, Cyril of A l exandria, Jerome and most modern Protestant commentators. Those who maintain the second position readily admit that the phrase “ sons of God” does mean angels elsewhere in the Old Testament. In Job 1:6 and 2:1 it is clear that the angels, as crea tures of God, are answerable to the Lord, and must at stated times give an accounting to Him of their ac tivities. Satan, as a creature, had to appear also.
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