I Am The Blog

Genesis 6 — Sons of god, weird His floody word

The "perfect" Bible in Genesis 6 starts out with a bunch of nonsense that still hasn’t been completely deciphered by anyone. I’ll cite the NIV this time, so its language is an easier read for modern English speakers:

"When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. [...] The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when
the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them.
They were the heroes of old, men of renown." (Genesis 6:1-2, 4)

So what’s going on here? The Bible does not tell us who the "sons of God" are (some say angels, though the Bible doesn’t support this), who the "daughters of men" are (human women?), or who these "Nephilim" are (the KJV calls them "giants"; are they tell humans or a different race?), or what their offspring were (half-angel-half-humans and half-giant-half-humans; were they demigods???)

Most translations also hide the fact that there is strong evidence for Hebrew polytheism in the Bible: the word "Elohim" is being used here for God. This is a word that is contrasted with the word "Yahweh" in Job. Many Christians are aware of the quote "Let us make man in our image "
(Genesis 1:26, KJV). Well, Elohim is used there and here in the original Hebrew. It’s a plural and is distinct from Yahweh in other parts of the Bible (e.g. Job 1).

In any case, no one knows for sure what on Earth (or heaven) Genesis is talking about in these verses. An informal discussion of these beings (also in relation to God and Satan talking in Job) can be found here in the SAB blog, Dwindling in Unbelief. My comment goes into more detail about what I’ve been able to figure out about these beings from among this biblical nonsense.

Maybe this is why God decided to order a flood, he/they just had too hard a time keeping all these crazy different beings straight and decided to start over?!?

But the reason given is that man was just too evil, and there was too much violence on the planet. God’s solution to this problem, like many others in the Bible, involves…violence. Fight fire with fire, I guess. Or in this case, water. God wants to start off with a clean slate, and decides to kill offf humanity. Nothing solves a problem like a good mass murder. He chooses though to save one family: Noah’s. Noah apparently was "perfect" (KJV) or "blameless" (NIV) and the best human God could find at the time — so good, that God "walked" with him. So we are all directly descended from the late, great Noah, according to the Bible.

God commands Noah to put his and his children’s families in a big wooden boat, and to bring two of every animal as well as all food. Reasonable people realize it would be impossible to put two of every animal and all their food into one boat for a number of reasons (space, weight, etc .). There are some people though who are too endoctrinated and honestly believe it must be true somehow, despite explanations.

I guess if you believe the rest of the Bible, this isn’t too hard to accept. With God, all things are possible, including a physics-defying boat and viciously killing nearly all humans, animals, and other life on Earth in a flood.

PS Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright© 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. All rights reserved.