Dear Mr. Editor:-
Referring to the article on Jude by H. A. I. in which the question of the "Nephilim" comes up, allow me space for some remarks:
It is assumed that the Nephilim and the fallen angels are one and the same, but this cannot be, for we have exactly the same word in Num. 13:33, "The Nephilim, the sons of Anak, of the Nephilim." So that we must separate the giants from angels, unless Anak were an angel, which will hardly be contended for, especially as he appears on the scene long after the flood. Nor are these Nephilim "sons of God" either, they are expressly distinguished from them in Gen. 6:4:"There were giants (Nephilim) in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men"; 1:e., the seed of the sons of God and the daughters of men became mighty men, men of renown ; but they were not Nephilim-they came after.
It is safe to say that angels would never have been thought of in connection with "sons of God" had it not been for the passages in Job i:6; 2:1 and 38:7; and these are poetic, and not written until hundreds of years after the events recorded in Gen. 6:4.
I make bold to say that there is not a trace of angelic beings in Gen. 6; the whole theme is earth, mankind. "The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence … I will destroy man whom I I have created from the face of the earth:both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air … The end of all flesh is come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold I will destroy them with the earth " (vers. 5 to 13).
Angels are spirits, not flesh (Ps. 104:4; Lk. 24:39), and it is utterly impossible for the incongruous intercourse which men have imported into Gen. 6 :4 to take place :and were it possible, what would the offspring be, angels or men? flesh or spirit? And whose would the responsibility be:that of the angels or that of the daughters of men? "And God saw the wickedness of man that it was great in the earth." We gather from our Lord's words to the Sadducees in Lk. 20 :35, 36 that the angels neither marry nor are given in marriage, but the "sons of God " in Gen. 6, are said to have taken " them wives of all which they chose." According to the passages cited from Job, angels are "sons of God," but as representing Him in their own sphere; it is to be seriously questioned if fallen angels would be so designated. It is a fact that men are called "sons of "God," and this was so from the beginning:"Which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God" (Lk. 3:38, and see Acts 17 :28).
Cain's seed are not recognized as God's representatives here on earth ; Cain had gone out from the presence of the Lord with the brand of a murderer upon him, and had built his city :and God had appointed another seed instead of the one he had murdered, and here seems to be the culminating point of the corruption which filled the earth at this time, and which was so obnoxious to God:Seth's line, the "sons of God," those responsibly standing for God, as opposed to Cain's line, deliberately choose from the murderer's seed whom they would, as though all was right. Then all testimony for God is gone, and judgment must follow.
"In like manner with them "(Jude 7) cannot be pressed as applying to the similarity between Sodom's sin and that of the angels', but rather to "the cities around them." The sin of Sodom and Gomorrah had become well known from other Scriptures; that of "the cities around them " needed this explanatory word to make it definite-" the cities around them, in like manner with them" (1:e., the surrounding cities were greedily committing fornication like Sodom and Gomorrah). Nor would it do to say that angels went " after other flesh," which would be to make them flesh, whereas we are distinctly told that angels are not flesh.
2 Peter 2, which gives these judgments in their historical order, places the incarceration of angels that sinned before the judgment upon the old world (vers. 4, 5, 6).
"Sons of God " are those who are of and for God in a scene wholly against Him, this is precisely what Seth's seed were; but to mix with the enemy as though there were no difference was to obliterate all testimony, and judgment must follow.
Yours for the Truth,
J. B. J.