In the Bible, who were the "giant sons of God"?

Who or what were the giant sons of God (Nephilim) mentioned in the Bible and what happened to them? Depending on the author, they are refered to as sons of Seth, angels, aliens, monsters, and "weird hybrid offspring" that may have been wiped out in the flood. Were the ancient scribes jealous because they were just the big guys that got the good looking daughters? --Michael K.

Let's quote the text from Genesis 6. This is my own translation, combined from several sources, trying to retain the literal text. I'm telling you, at the Straight Dope you're dealing with professionals:

This is one of the strangest accounts in Genesis, and there is no certain explanation. The Hebrew text is obscure, possibly deliberately so, to downgrade any mythic tone. In the first chapters of Genesis, human beings strive to become divine, and God intervenes, so that mankind cannot be immortal. Here, the reverse happens, divine beings lower themselves to the level of humans, and again God intervenes.

It is very likely that the passages are only a fragment of what was once a longer narrative, or commonly told tale. Presumably, the Nephilim were described as "heroes of old" based on popular stories and tales. Depending on who you think wrote the text, either the longer story was lost by the time the Redactor got to editing the various texts centuries later, or Moses left out popular and well-known stories about ancient times and just referenced them in a way that appears cryptic to us.

Almost all pagan mythologies abound with legends about intercourse between gods and mortal women, and between goddesses and mortal men, producing demigods or heroes as children. There is also a common mythology that there once existed a race of men of gigantic stature of strength. The story here seems similar, but is still consistent with the overriding theme of monotheism: there is only one God who makes decisions. The offspring of such unions may have been heroic, but they are not divine, they are flesh and blood like all humans ("since he too is flesh"). The one God controls the breath of life.

So, for a start, who are the "sons of God"? The most popular interpretation is that they are divine beings, the angelic host, the celestial court, a poetic image taken from the analogy of human kings surrounded by their entourage. The term "the host of heaven" is also sometimes used in the Bible to mean the same thing.

Some translators use "sons of the great," since the term elohim in the Psalms often means "mighty." It would also be possible to read it as "sons of the gods," but that would be inconsistent with the monotheism of the text. On the other hand, "sons of God" may simply mean those who serve and love God. One interpretation is that the children of Seth are sometimes called "sons of God," and then the "daughters of men" might imply the daughters of Cain.

So, I repeat, the text is extremely unclear. By the way, note the implication that the sons of God are driven by lust (they are attracted to the mortal women by their beauty rather than their personalities or moral character). And, lest your mind wander in the gutters, the term is definitely "took wives," meaning were married--there is no implication of rape or coercion.

And, now, who were these Nephilim? The plain reading of the text indicates that they are the offspring of the misalliances between the divine beings and the daughters of men. The term "The Nephilim were in the earth in those days" would thus mean that the union of the sons of God and daughters of man gave birth to them. However, it is possible that the Nephilim existed separate from the intermarriages, and the term "were in the earth in those days" just sets the time-frame as antediluvian. (Hah! I've always wanted to use that word in context!)

The word Nephilim itself unclear; the obvious root N-F-L would imply they are "fallen ones," that is, fallen angels. The Septuagint (Greek translation of the Torah, from about 200 BC) translates Nephilim as "giants," likely based on the reference in Numbers 13:33 (see below) that Nephilim were "of great size." Thus, the term is commonly translated as giants or heroes.

I don't know if this helps you much. Who the Nephilim and the "sons of God" were is a matter of conjecture and interpretation, and there are lots of different interpretations. As to what happened to them, at least here we have consensus: they did not survive the Flood. The Flood story comes hot on the heels of these verses, and so the conjunction of the two stories implies the Nephilim and the marriage of the divine and mortal beings was part of the wickedness that was destroyed by the Flood.

As a footnote, the word Nephilim appears significantly only one other time in the Bible.

In Numbers 13:32-33, the Israelites send advance spies to scout out the land of Canaan. The spies report that "All the people we saw in it are men of great size; we saw the Nephilim there--the Anakites are part of the Nephilim--and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them." Now, the problem with this description is that, if the biblical narrative is consistent, then the Nephilim would not have survived the Flood, so how would they have been around for the spies to see? The answer is that the spies were trying to instill fear in the hearts of the people, to discourage them from invading the land, and so they used poetic exaggeration. The term Nephilim was used for dramatic effect, as the term "Huns" was used to indicate Germans during the World Wars, centuries after there were no longer true Huns.

Staff Reports are researched and written by members of the Straight Dope Science Advisory Board, Cecil's online auxiliary. Although the SDSAB does its best, these articles are edited by Ed Zotti, not Cecil, so accuracywise you'd better keep your fingers crossed.


Bill Munns stands next to his model of a Gigantopithecus male, a quadrupedal, fist-walking creature that also could have stood erect, as bears do.
To gain a more complete image of what the giant ape looked like, we sought the help of Bill Munns, who creates highly realistic, life-size models of existing endangered primates - gorillas, orangutans, and the Chinese golden monkey - for zoos and educational institutions. Based on the jaws and teeth, and using the proportions of the skulls of existing great apes, we estimated that the average male Gigantopithecus had a skull that measured eighteen inches from the bottom of the jaw to the highest point of the sagittal crest (a male gorilla, for comparison, has a skull ten inches high). The next step was to project a hypothetical skeleton from the hypothetical skull. For this purpose Munns used as references two of the largest terrestrial primates known: one modern, the gorilla, and one from the fossil record, the extinct giant baboon Theropithecus oswaldi. In determining the size of Gigantopithecus, we felt it necessary to scale the body back a bit, so as not to be influenced too much by the giant ape's extraordinarily deep and thickened mandible. Nevertheless, given that the average male silverback gorilla is about six feet tall (standing erect) and weighs in at 400 pounds, Munns calculated that the average Gigantopithecus male was more than ten feet tall and weighed as much as 1,200 pounds - comparable to a large male polar bear. LINK The ten-foot size estimate is based on approximate head-to-skeleton ratios in primates. In humans that ratio is approximately 1:7; in Lucy, an early human, it was 1:8. Ciochon and Munns tried 1:7 and thought the result looked too small. They settled on 1:6.5. Though shocked by resulting huge size, the researchers believe their estimate is conservative. Relative arm and leg size is based on the ratio of forelimbs to hindlimbs, also known as the intermembral index. In humans the ratio is approximatelty 70%; in orangs 134%. Munns split the difference between the gorilla and Theropithecus, yielding 108%. LINK

Gigantopithecus jaw vs. human jaw.

Just another take on the subject.

That puts the legend back in time to 30,000 years ago, or more.

Actually, I'd say it puts it back to X? years ago. I am skeptical about both Usher's 4000 year chronology and the chronology of modern science. I believe the scriptures to be inerrant IN THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPTS. However, when you consider how much language can change over the course of thousands of years, and also realize that Hebrew didn't use numbers, but letters of their alphabet, then the possibility has to be kept open that the text we have now in Genesis listing the ages of the patriarchs might not mean the same thing it did when written. That's not saying the Bible is in error, it is just leaving open the possibility that our interpretation of it is. As for science, they operate on a premise of uniformity of natural causes in a closed system. As a Bible-believing Christian, I operate on a premise of uniformity of natural causes within an OPEN system, subject to intervention by Divine creation and providence. In particular, the Bible tells us that there have been three global/universal discontinuities in the uniformity of natural causes due to divine intervention: the creation itself, the fall, and the flood. I would argue that we cannot know with any certainty that everything in the world before the flood was just as it is now after the flood. The earth's orbit and rotation could have been different, the occurance of C14 and other radioisotopes could be different, lots of things could be different. The chronology for natural history and anthropology that scientists have constructed take no accout of this, and thus their chronology must be suspect.

I have no problem with the idea of antediluvian patriarchs and neanderthals being contemporaneous. I just can't assign a particular date to them with any degree of confidence.

By the way, I also don't have any problem with the idea of a neolithic culture of antediluvian patriarchs coexisting with populations of paleolithic neanderthals and paleolithic homo sapiens sapiens. Such a neolithic culture could have been a very small part of the total antediluvian population, and finding any evidence that might have survived the flood could be like searching for a needle in a haystack. Nor do I have any problem with the idea that humankind may have been created civilized but then that large portions rapidly regressed to a more primitative state. Such cultural regressions are fairly common and well documented by anthropologists. It is only those who vainly believe in the inevitable progress of humanity as the hope of their salvation who are uncomfortable talking about that fact.

Appendix 25 of The Companion Bible by Dr. E. W. Bullinger:

25. THE NEPHILIM, OR "GIANTS" OF GEN. 6, &c.

The progeny of the fallen angels with the daughters of Adam (see notes on Gen. 6, and Ap. 23) are called in Gen. 6, Ne-phil-im, which means fallen ones (from naphal, to fall). What these beings were can be gathered only from Scripture. They were evidently great in size, as well as great in wickedness. They were superhuman, abnormal beings; and their destruction was necessary for the preservation of the human race, and for the faithfulness of Jehovah's Word (Gen. 3:15). This was why the Flood was brought "upon the world of the ungodly" (2Pet. 2:5) as prophesied by Enoch (Jude 14).

But we read of the Nephilim again in Num. 13:33 : "there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, which come of the Nephilim". How, it may be asked, could this be, if they were all destroyed in the Flood? The answer is contained in Gen. 6:4, where we read : "There were Nephilim in the earth in those days (i.e. in the days of Noah); and also AFTER THAT, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became [the] mighty men (Heb. gibbor, the heroes) which were of old, men of renown" (lit. men of the name, i.e. who got a name and were renowned for their ungodliness).

So that "after that", i.e. after the Flood, there was a second irruption of these fallen angels, evidently smaller in number and more limited in area, for they were for the most part confined to Canaan, and were in fact known as "the nations of Canaan". It was for the destruction of these, that the sword of Israel was necessary, as the Flood had been before.

As to the date of this second irruption, it was evidently soon after it became known that the seed was to come through Abraham; for, when he came out from Haran (Gen. 12:6) and entered Canaan, the significant fact is stated : "The Canaanite was then (i.e. already) in the land." And in Gen. 14:5 they were already known as "Raphain" and Emim", and had established themselves at Asteroth Karnaim and Shaven Kiriathaim.

In ch. 15:18-21 they are enumerated and named among Canaanite Peoples : "Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, and the Amorites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites" (Gen. 15:19-21; cp. Ex. 3:8, 17; 23:23. Deut. 7; 20:17. Josh. 12:8).

These were to be cut off, and driven out, and utterly destroyed (Deut. 20:17. Josh. 3:10). But Israel failed in this (Josh. 13:13; 15:63; 16:10; 17:18. Judg. 1:19, 20, 28, 29, 30-36; 2:1-5; 3:1-7); and we known not how many got away to other countries to escape the general destruction. If this were recognized it would go far to solve many problems connected with Anthropology.

As to their other names, they were called Anakim, from on Anak which came of the Nephilim (Num. 13:23), and Rephaim, from Rapha, another notable one among them.

From Deut. 2:10, they were known by some as Emim, and Horim, and Zamzummim (v. 20, 21) and Avim, &c.

As Rephaim they were well known, and are often mentioned : but, unfortunately, instead of this, their proper name, being preserved, it is variously translated as "dead", "deceased", or "giants". These Rephaim are to have no resurrection. This fact is stated in Isa. 26:14 (where the proper name is rendered "deceased," and v. 19, where it is rendered "the dead").

It is rendered "dead" seven times (Job 26:5. Ps. 88:10. Prov. 2:18; 9:18; 21:16. Isa. 14:8; 26:19). It is rendered "deceased" in Isa. 26:14. It is retained as a proper name "Rephaim" ten times (two being in the margin). Gen. 14:5; 15:20. Josh. 12:15 (marg.). 2Sam. 5:18, 22; 23:13.& b31 nbsp; 1Chron. 11:15; 14:9; 20:4 (marg.). Isa. 17:5. In all other places it is rendered "giants", Gen. 6:4; Num. 23:33, where it is Nephilim; and Job 16:14, where it is gibbor (Ap. 14. iv).

By reading all these passages the Bible student may know all that can be known about these beings. It is certain that the second irruption took place before Gen. 14, for there the Rephaim were mixed up with the five nations or peoples, which included Sodom and Gomorrha, and were defeated by the four kings under Chedorlaomer. Their principal locality was evidently "Ashtaroth Karnaim"; while the Emim were in the plain of Kiriathaim (Gen. 14:5).

Anak was a noted descendant of the Nephilim; and Rapha was another, giving their names respectively to different clans. Anak's father was Arba, the original builder of Hebron (Gen. 35:27. Josh. 15:13; 21:11); and this Palestine branch of the Anakim was not called Arbahim after him, but Anakim after Anak. They were great, mighty, and tall (Deut. 2:10, 11, 21, 22, 23; 9:2), evidently inspiring the ten spies with great fear (Num. 13:33). Og king of Bashan is described in Deut. 3:11.

Their strength is seen in "the giant cities of Bashan" to-day; and we know not how far they may have been utilized by Egypt in the construction of buildings, which is still an unsolved problem.

Arba was rebuilt by the Khabiri or confederates seven years before Zoan was built by the Egyptian Pharoahs of the nineteenth dynasty. See note on Num. 13:22.

If these Nephilim, and their branch of Rephaim, were associated with Egypt, we have an explanation of the problem which has for ages perplexed all engineers, as to how those huge stones and monuments were brought together. Why not in Egypt as well as in "the giant cities of Bashan" which exist, as such, to this day?

Moreover, we have in these mighty men, the "men of renown," the explanation of the origin of the Greek mythology. That mythology was no mere invention of the human brain, but it grew out of the traditions, and memories, and legends of the doings of that mighty race of beings; and was gradually evolved out of the "heroes" of Gen. 6:4. The fact that they were supernatural in their origin formed an easy step to their being regarded as the demi-gods of the Greeks.

Thus the Babylonian "Creation Tablets", the Egyptian "Book of the dead", the Greek mythology, and heathen Cosmogonies, which by some are set on an equality with Scripture, or by others adduced in support of it, are all the corruption and perversion of primitive truths, distorted in proportion as their origin was forgotten, and their memories faded away.

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