Beyond The Basics

Transcript:

Welcome to the Beyond the Basics Bible Study Podcast. My name is Dan Snyder and I am your host. Thank you so much for joining me for this episode of Beyond the Basics where we are exploring the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, one chapter at a time.

So last episode we read through a super interesting nice long list of names of old dead guys and ended with Noah appearing on the scene along with his three sons. Now the scene shifts here at the beginning of Genesis chapter 6 and we find out that these sons of God start to take the daughters of men to be their wives. As a result of the wickedness that is on the earth, God pronounces judgment on mankind. And this is the first time we see God feel an emotion. It says that he feels regret because of the violence on the earth. So he says he’s going to blot out mankind from the earth, but Noah, this chapter tells us, has found favor with God. So God tells Noah his plans to destroy the earth with a flood and gives him instructions to build an ark to save his family and the animals.

So going back to the beginning of the chapter, we have two groups of people. We have the sons of God and we have the daughters of men. The sons of God or the sons of Elohim. In other words, they are the sons of the gods is another way to translate this. And then the daughters of men, that word is Adam or Adam. So these are daughters of Adam. So the sons of the gods and the daughters of Adam.

So first we’re gonna discuss the sons of God. There’s a couple different views here. Some say that these sons of God are the sons of Seth. And this is drawn from the divergence of the genealogies of Seth and Cain in Genesis chapters 4 through 5, where Cain’s line is described as being wicked and exiled from God, and Seth’s line is described as calling on the name of God. So many will say that they’re the sons of Seth.

Another reason that people say this is that God’s people are referred to as God’s sons. Deuteronomy chapter 14 verse 1 says: “You are the sons of the Lord your God. You shall not cut yourselves or make any baldness on your foreheads for the dead.”

Jeremiah 3:19 says, “I said, How would I sit you among my sons and give you a pleasant land, a heritage most beautiful of all nations? And I thought you would call me, My Father, and would not turn from following me.”

So those are a couple examples of passages where God’s people, Israel is called God’s sons. The problem with this view is that Israel or God’s people are never directly called the sons of God. That phrase is not used.

So the other view is that they are fallen angels. And those who believe this view, they believe this because this phrase, sons of God or sons of the gods, always refers to spiritual beings in the Bible. A few examples here in Job, Job chapter 1 verse 6: Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord and Satan also came among them.

And then in Job chapter 2 verse 1: Again there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord and Satan also came among them to present himself before the Lord.

And then in Job 38:4-7: “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements? Surely you know. Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk? Or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?”

And then another reason many people believe that these are angels or fallen angels is because Jude directly calls them angels. In verse 6 and 7 of Jude it says: And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day— just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desires serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.

So in my opinion, this is the correct view. I believe that these are fallen angels. I believe that the Bible should interpret the Bible and we should use the Bible to interpret itself. And when the Bible uses certain words and certain phrases, only in certain situations, that’s a good indication of what that phrase or word means. And then of course we have Jude that directly refers to this and calls them angels. So I do believe that this is the correct interpretation, but I wanted to put both views out there for you so you can take a look at those more in depth on your own.

And then of course, the daughters of men. Again, two views here. Some say they’re the daughters of Cain for the same reason that many believe that the sons of God are the sons of Seth. This is the same reason many believe that the daughters of men are the daughters of Cain because of the divergent genealogies in chapters four through five.

And then others say that they’re human daughters in general. And again, this is my view. This is my opinion that they are human daughters. The word there is daughters of Adam, or daughters of Adam, not daughters of Cain. So I think this is the correct view. They are human daughters.

Another reason that I don’t believe that this is referring to the sons of Seth and the daughters of Cain is because the issue of intermarriage between the two groups does not seem worth destroying an entire planet over.

And it is true that God commanded his people not to intermarry. That was given to Israel as a law. And so that law wasn’t in place yet. But the reason Israel was given that law is because God didn’t want them risking spiritual contamination from the surrounding Canaanite tribes. And that was a law that was unique to Israel. And there’s no indication in the Bible that that is applicable to any other situation other than Israel in the promised land. And even if this law is in effect already in Genesis 6, even though God has not given the law, but even if it is in effect, the question is: Is this bad enough to destroy the world? Is the issue of the sons of Seth marrying the daughters of Cain such a bad thing that God would destroy an entire planet over that? In my opinion, I don’t think so. I don’t think that is worth flooding the entire planet.

So, we’ll discuss a few reasons why I believe that this story, at least the first part of this chapter, details the fall of the angels. The story parallels the fall of man very closely, and I believe very deliberately. Many believe that Satan and his angels fell before Adam and Eve were created, or at least before they were tempted. And obviously the reason for this is because Satan or the serpent was in the garden and tempted Eve into eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. it stands to reason that angels would have followed him, but that isn’t necessarily the case and that isn’t what the Bible says.

So all we know is that Satan was in the garden and that Satan tempted Eve. We are not given any other timeline other than that.

So in my opinion, this is the story of the fall of the angels. And I’ll tell you why I believe that. The phrase, the sons of is a Hebrew way of saying belonging to a group. So you will see this in many areas of the Bible, the sons of Korah. Another one is the sons of the prophets. You’ll see that phrase. So all that means is these people that we’re speaking of belong to this certain group. They belong to the prophets. They belong to Korah. They are of Korah.

And in this case, it’s saying that these particular individuals belong to God or belong to a group of gods. And that will be indicated by that word Elohim, the sons of Elohim, the sons of the gods belonging to the group of gods. And this would be further evidence of divine counsel. I mentioned that way back in episode one. This is another instance of that. If it’s something that you would like to learn more about, it’s not something that I have a whole lot of knowledge about, but some will use this as evidence of that divine council of little “g” gods that rule the nations under the authority of Yahweh God.

So another reason why I believe that this is the story of the fall of the angels is it uses Eden language. It uses the same language that Genesis 3 used to describe the fall of man. So if you purchase the study guide on the website, you will see that I’ve highlighted these similarities in different colors. So if you would like to go on the website and purchase the study guide or better yet, subscribe monthly, you can get access to the study guide and you can see the similarities a lot clearer here than just listening to it. But I’ll highlight them for you here.

So Eve, first of all, she saw the tree was good. And in Genesis chapter 6 here, the sons of God saw, in verse 2, that the daughters were attractive. Eve saw that the tree was good, and the sons of God saw that the daughters were attractive. So that’s the second similarity. First, the sons of God saw, just like Eve saw. And then the sons of God saw the daughters were attractive, just like Eve saw that the tree was good.

And thirdly, the sons of God took them, they took the daughters as their wives. And Eve in Genesis chapter three took of the fruit. So Eve in Genesis 3 saw, she saw the tree was good, and she took of the fruit. The sons of God saw, they saw the daughters were attractive and they took them as their wives.

So that very clearly draws a connection to Genesis chapter three, to the fall of man. I believe this is very clearly showing that this is another fall story. This time, this is the fall of the angels.

So that of course begs the question, why did the angels fall? Why did these spiritual beings start to go after human women? It’s unnatural. It seems like it should be impossible. But we have to remember that in the storyline of Genesis so far, we know that a seed is coming. And in Genesis chapter three, after the fall of man, God said that a seed is coming to crush the head of the servant. And in Genesis chapter 5, now we have Noah that is born and Noah is presented as that seed.

And so there suddenly seems to be an urgency on the part of these spiritual beings who find that their rule is suddenly threatened. And so they start polluting the human gene pool because if there is a seed that’s coming, if there is an offspring of Adam that is coming to crush the head of the serpent, that offspring can’t come from polluted genes. That offspring can’t come from a human-angel hybrid. It needs to be a human that crushes the head of the snake. And if it turns out that the human gene pool is polluted with non-human genes, now that destroys any possibility of a human seed coming to crush the head of the serpent.

So that’s why this is such a big deal. That is why God said, I have to put a stop to this. This cannot continue. And so he found Noah.

And so in verse 3, the Lord said, “My spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years.”

And again, here we have two different views. One view is that this is the maximum lifespan of humans after the flood. And the reason many will use to support this is that Moses lived for 120 years.

The other view is that this is the amount of time until the flood would come. And in my opinion, I used to believe that this was the lifespan of people after the flood for many of the same reasons, because you see that Moses lived 120 years. But the more I’ve read this, I do believe now that this is referring to the amount of time until God would send the flood, that it would be 120 years before God would flood the earth.

I believe in context, this is what makes the most sense. In context, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense for God’s judgment here to be a lifespan, a human lifespan of 120 years. There’s still plenty of time in there for humans to mate with angels, with fallen angels. So that’s not really an effective judgment. The true effective judgment is to limit the time that the entire human race is on the earth by 120 years and sending a flood.

So in verse four it mentions the Nephilim. This is also translated giants. The Nephilim are commonly believed to be the offspring of the gods and human women. It says that they’re the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.

Now in my opinion, this is just pure speculation, but I believe that many of the myths that we read are rooted in these mighty men, in these Nephilim. In fact, the myths themselves refer to a lot of these human-god hybrids, these demigods that walked the earth. Guys like Hercules or Gilgamesh. I believe that it’s possible that the myths are actually based on real people. Was Hercules an actual real person? I have no idea. Not saying that. What I am saying is that these myths and these stories were made up. They were rooted in stories that were passed down from generation to generation over thousands and thousands of years from people that had seen these types of people walk the earth.

Now this word Nephilim is from the root word Nephal which means to fall and so the word Nephilim means the fallen ones. So again, another indication that this is the story of the fall of the angels.

So moving on to verse six, it says: The Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him to his heart.

As I mentioned already, this is the first time we see emotion attributed to God in the Bible. This is the first time this is recorded where God is revealing his emotions. And this reveals how God feels about releasing judgment on people. He is grieved that it has come to this and that now he has to send a flood to restart creation, to recreate. Grieves him deeply.

And then of course later on in verse seven it says that he is sorry, he has made everything. Does this mean that God wishes he hadn’t made humans? I don’t believe that that’s what this is saying. I believe that what this is saying is that God loves humanity and loves his creation so deeply that he doesn’t want to see them degenerate into a lawless, murderous, violent, immoral society. And that when they do, it grieves him. He feels sorry because they have rejected him and they’ve rejected his law.

I think it’s very important for us to meditate on this aspect of God, on how he feels about his creation when they go wrong.

So then we are reintroduced to Noah. And in verse 9, it tells us that Noah was three things. The first thing he was is Noah was righteous, or in other words, Noah was just. He loved justice. He did right by others.

It says that he was blameless. In other words, he was complete and undefiled. He did not allow sin or uncleanliness to file him. There wasn’t anything that anybody could say against Noah. He was beyond reproach.

And then third, it says that Noah walked with God. And if you were paying attention, this is the same phrase that described Enoch. Enoch walked with God, and so did Noah. So essentially what this is saying is that Noah was uncorrupted by Satan’s attempt to destroy the genetic line of the seed. He, nor his mother, nor his wife, nor his son’s wives had been corrupted by this defiled gene pool.

Now that’s in contrast to verse 11 where it tells us the state of the earth before the flood. It says that the earth is corrupt in God’s sight. In other words, they had forsaken God’s way. God had shown them the way and they had forsaken it. Their way is corrupt. And then also it says that the earth is filled with violence. And this tells us that murder along with sexual deviancy was the primary sin on the earth at the time.

And so God determined that he would make an end of all flesh, but he gave Noah instructions for an ark to save his family. And this is the first occurrence of a remnant. And we’re going to see this theme throughout the Bible, that there is a cycle of disobedience by Israel, judgment from God, but God always saves a remnant. There’s always a few people that God finds to be faithful to him. There’s always a remnant.

So the question that we should ask ourselves is, am I part of that remnant? Because there is judgment coming one day. There is going to be a day when God will judge the earth. And am I going to be part of that remnant that God saves from that judgment? Or will I be destroyed in the flood, so to speak? Am I going to remain faithful, even when everybody else is going one way, am I going to remain faithful to God’s Word and God’s way and go the other way? Or am I going to go along with what the rest of the world is doing and risk getting swept away in the flood of judgment?

In verse 19, it mentions that Noah was to bring two of every sort of animal into the ark. So the question is, how did the ark fit all those animals? This is, I’m sure a question that you’ve asked yourself. I’ve asked myself this question many times.

And I’m not going to pretend to know all the answers here, but a couple things here that would help us understand how this could work is, first of all, this word sort. In other translations, it would be translated as kind. It’s similar to what we would consider an animal family or genus. So for example, when we think of dogs, dogs, wolves, jackals, coyotes, et cetera, et cetera, they’re all descended from a common ancestor. God did not create all those different varieties all at once. He created each animal in its sort or a kind. And then changes in genetics over the years have resulted in, and also specific breeding, have resulted in all these different varieties of dogs and jackals and wolves, et cetera, et cetera.

So this does indicate the existence of microevolution, meaning small changes happen over time resulting in differences. They’re minor differences. They’re not wolves changing into rhinoceroses. They’re wolves changing into dobermans. They’re coyotes turning into German shepherds. You know, it’s minor changes, minor genetic changes that happen over the years.

Verse 22, it says that Noah did all that God commanded. There is no indication that Noah questioned. There is no indication that Noah even conversed with God when God gave him these instructions. He simply spent the next 120 years of following God’s command without any fruit. He built this ark. Maybe over the course of 20 years, maybe it took him a lot less time, I don’t know. But either way, he did it without question when no one followed him and no one believed him. Can we go 120 minutes of following God’s command without questioning God much less 120 years?

So, how does this point to Jesus?

Well, first of all, similarly to the last chapter, chapter five, Noah is a deliverer. He is a messiah figure. He points to Jesus with Jesus being the greater Noah. Noah is one who unquestioningly followed God and believed God’s voice and followed his command and did what God told him to do to deliver the human race to deliver a remnant from God’s judgment.

And Jesus did the same thing. He came, he followed God without question. He did everything that God commanded him to do. He said that, “I only do what I see my father doing.”

And he did so in order to save a remnant from God’s judgment.

And also the word Noah is from the Hebrew word for rest. Jesus is the Sabbath rest. He brings rest to the despairing, the weary, to the oppressed, all those who need rest can come to Jesus and He will give them rest. He is the true Sabbath rest. Noah points to someone who is coming who would give us rest.

So here’s some questions for reflection.

First question is, what are God’s commands to us that are countercultural? Many things that we read in the Bible that the Bible commands us are very different than what the culture, in whatever culture we live in, whether it’s in America or anywhere around the world, the Bible tells us very different things than what we see others doing. What are those commands? What has God commanded us to do that is counter-cultural? And then how do we follow those commands when no one else will follow? How does God feel about the corruption and violence in our society?

Next question, in what way was Noah blameless in his generation? And how are we called to be blameless in our generation?

And last, how do you feel about the idea of God judging humanity? Do you believe that God still judges humanity today?

Well, thank you for listening. I just want to remind you, if you enjoy the podcast, please subscribe on your favorite podcast app, click like, it’s a great way to support the podcast if you enjoy what you’re hearing.

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This is a great way to do not only your own study, but you can also do a group study with these. You’re going to have additional information and study notes that I don’t cover in the episode. There’s going to be spaces for you to answer the questions that I ask at the end of each episode. And there’s also further study questions that I do not cover in the episode that will help you in your understanding and your comprehension and recognizing patterns and themes throughout the Bible and what we’re reading. So if you would enjoy something like that, please subscribe and support the podcast in that way.

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Sources:

Bible Hub. (n.d.). 2142. zakar. Strong’s Hebrew: 2142. כרַ זָ) Zakar) — remember. Retrieved April 17, 2023, from
https://biblehub.com/hebrew/2142.htm

Guzik, D. (2018). Study Guide For Genesis 8. Blue Letter Bible. Retrieved April 15, 2023, from
https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/guzik_david/study-guide/genesis/genesis-8.cfm

Gedwiser, M. (2016, November 4). He Sent Out The Raven. The Lehrhaus. Retrieved April 17, 2023, from
https://thelehrhaus.com/scholarship/he-sent-out-the-raven/

Armstrong, S. A. (2011, June 20). Genesis 2011 – Lesson 8. Verse By Verse Ministry International. Retrieved April 17, 2023, from https://versebyverseministry.org/lessons/genesis_2011_lesson_8

Mackie, T. (n.d.). Noah To Abraham: Exploring Genesis 6-12. Bible Project. Retrieved April 24, 2023, from https://s3-us-west2.amazonaws.com/tbp-web/media/Noah%20to%20Abraham/Noah-Abraham_Session%20Notes.pdf

Music:

Psychedelically – Marianela Pitteri

Pop Rock Motivational – Melatronic

Indie Folk – Action Alexi

Never Give Up – John Drummer