Mark Tabata’s Weekday Devotionals:
Tuesday April 21 2026
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Genesis 6:1-4-Now it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, 2 that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose. 3 And the LORD said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” 4 There were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.
One of the intriguing questions in studying the Bible deals with the identity of these “sons of God” from Genesis 6.
It is commonly advocated that the “sons of God” here are the righteous descendants of Seth, while the “daughters of men” is a reference to the wicked descendants of Cain. So, it is argued that the passage is decrying the marriages of godly believers with unbelievers.
However, this interpretation has serious problems with it that make it untenable.
First, why would all of the descendants of Seth be righteous and the daughters of Cain all be wicked?
Second, if the passage is discussing godly and ungodly weddings between the descendants of Seth and Cain, then why would we be told that the “sons of God” here are godly if they are involved in such a terrible transgression?
Third, why would the union of the offspring of Seth and Cain be “giants?” Other passages in the Old Testament describe these giants as being as large as cedar trees (Amos 2:9), so that regular sized individuals are said to be like “grasshoppers” in comparison (Numbers 13:33). The descendants of Seth and Cain parenting such giants makes no sense.
Fourth, interpreting the “sons of God” here as being the descendants of Seth is not true to the language of the passage. The phrase “sons of God” needs to be understood based on its’ usage at the time that Moses wrote these words. The only other Book in the Bible contemporary with this passage is the Book of Job, and there the phrase had reference to angels (Job 1:6; 2:1-2; 38:4-7). Indeed, the Greek Old Testament translates this phrase as “angels of God.” We could also add a great deal of ancient testimony that bolsters this reading of the passage.
“This strange passage describes the bizarre circumstances that led to the cataclysmic disaster of the famous Flood of Noah. The Hebrew term translated “sons of God” is , B’nai HaElohim, a term consistently used in the Old Testament for angels.224 When the Hebrew Torah, which of course includes the book of Genesis, was translated into Greek in the third century before Christ (giving us what is known as the Septuagint translation), this expression was translated angels.225 With the benefit of the best experts at that time behind it, this translation carries great weight and it was the one most widely quoted by the writers of the New Testament. The Book of Enoch also clearly treats these strange events as involving angels.226 Although this book was not considered a part of the “inspired” canon, the Book of Enoch was venerated by both rabbinical and early Christian authorities from about 200 B.C. through about A.D. 200 and is useful to authenticate the lexicological usage and confirm the accepted beliefs of the period. The Biblical passage refers to supernatural beings intruding upon the planet Earth.…The “angel” view of this classic Genesis text is well documented in both ancient Jewish rabbinical literature and Early Church writings. In addition to the Septuagint translation, the venerated (although non-canonical) Book of Enoch, the Syriac Version of the Old Testament, as well as the Testimony of the 12 Patriarchs234 and the Little Genesis, 235 confirm the lexicological usage and the extant beliefs of ancient Jewish scholars. Clearly the learned Philo Judaeus understood the passage as relating to angels. 236 Josephus Flavius also represents this view: “They made God their enemy; for many angels of God accompanied with women, and begat sons that proved unjust, and despisers of all that was good, on account of the confidence they had in their own strength, for the tradition is that these men did what resembled the acts of those whom the Grecians call giants.” 237 In accordance with the ancient interpretation, the Early Church fathers understood the expression “sons of God” as designating angels. These included Justin Martyr, 238 Irenaeus, 239 Athenagoras, 240 Pseudo-Clementine, 241 Clement of Alexandria, 242 Tertullian, 243 Commodianus, 244 and Lactantius, 245 to list a few. This interpretation was also espoused by Luther and many more modern exegetes including Koppen, Twesten, Dreschler, Hofmann, Baumgarten, Delitzsch, W Kelly, A. C. Gaebelein, and others.” (Chuck Missler & Mark Eastman, Alien Encounters, 205-208 (Kindle Edition): Coeur d’Alene, ID: Koinonia House)
In contrast, the Sethite view of the passage came along much later then the time that Moses penned Genesis 6:1-4. For nineteen hundreds years, the “angel” interpretation of this text was understood and accepted by God’s people. Indeed, it likely a reaction to the Bible teaching regarding the Deity of Christ that led some of the Jewish people to come up with the Sethite interpretation in the first place!
“Likewise, the Hebrew words translated “sons of God” in the passage, bene ha’elohim, refer to divine beings, not mortal men. That isn’t been the consensus among Christians since about the fifth century, thanks to the great theologian, Augustine of Hippo. Around the beginning of the fifth century AD, Augustine popularized a view first put forward about a hundred years earlier by Julius Africanus,[ 11] the notion that bene ha’elohim in Genesis 6: 1–4 should be translated as: [T] he descendants of Seth… on account of the righteous men and patriarchs who have sprung from him, even down to the Saviour Himself; but that the descendants of Cain are named the seed of men, as having nothing divine in them, on account of the wickedness of their race and the inequality of their nature…[ 12] By shifting Christian thought away from taking the text of Genesis 6: 1–4 at face value, Julius Africanus and Augustine put Christians on a new path; one that, to this day, leads us away from preaching and teaching that the pagan gods of the ancient world were real. It has de-supernaturalized the Bible, which is a very strange thing to do, when the core of Christian belief is that the Creator of the universe became a human, died, and then rose again. Hardly natural at all. Ironically, this de-supernaturalization commenced with Jewish scholars roughly a hundred years before Julius Africanus. …the Fall of the Watchers was the dominant Jewish interpretation of Gen 6: 1-4 from the second century BCE until the middle of the second century CE. It should be noted that, despite the prevalence of this interpretation for hundreds of years, in the second century CE there was a “widespread reaction in Judaism against the interpretation of bene Elohim as angels.”… R. Simeon b. Yohai cursed anyone who thought the bene Elohim were actually “sons of God”: in his view, the expression meant “sons of judges.”[ 13] Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai was a student of the famed Rabbi Akiva, considered one of the most learned Jewish scholars and sages in history. Akiva was executed by the Romans in 135 AD, following the Bar Kokhba Revolt, which might have something to do with Rabbi Simeon’s new direction. Akiva’s declaration that Simon bar Kokhba was the Messiah caused a split between Jews and Christians. Prior to this, Nazarenes were considered a sect of Judaism and lived as part of the Jewish community. But since the gospels clearly described Christ’s return, “in clouds with great power and glory,”[ 14] and Bar Kochba’s feet were touching the ground, Jewish Christians generally refused to follow him and withdrew their support of Akiva. This reportedly led to Akiva targeting Jewish Christians for persecution: For in the Jewish war which lately raged, Barchochebas, the leader of the revolt of the Jews, gave orders that Christians alone should be led to cruel punishments, unless they would deny Jesus Christ and utter blasphemy.[ 15] Rome crushed the rebellion after about three and a half years (a prophetically significant period that did not escape the notice of early church theologian Justin Martyr), killing more than half a million Jews and destroying all hope of an independent Jewish state for the next nineteen hundred years. That led to an irrevocable split between Jews and Christians that’s been exploited by the Fallen to this day. Teachings that had previously been accepted among rabbis were reversed. Most significantly, they denied the existence of a second power in heaven, usually named in the Old Testament as the Angel of Yahweh. Christians understand these appearances as Christophanies—appearances by the preincarnate Jesus in the Old Testament. After the failure of Bar Kokhba’s rebellion and the perceived treason of Jewish Christians, their claim that Jesus of Nazareth was the second power in heaven could not be tolerated. But the rabbis went further: The existence of other divine beings called sons of God was also deemphasized in rabbinic teaching. Rabbis feared that doctrine offered a persuasive argument for the existence of a second power in heaven, who Christians identified as Jesus of Nazareth.” (Derek Gilbert & Sharon Gilbert, The Gates of Hell: Unlocking the Ganymede Code and the Demonic Portals of Mount Hermon and the United States Capitol, 5-7 (Kindle Edition): Crane, MO: Defender Publishing)
The war between God and the “gods” (i.e, fallen angels) continues in the world, even today (Ephesians 6:10-18).
Lord, thank You for victory through Your Name. Amen.