ChevyRodeo said:
Cornelius said:
I also use to believe it , until I saw that God never calls angels "Sons of God" Hebrews tells us that God does not call angels His sons.
God never said to any of his angels, "You are my Son. Today I have become your Father." And God never said to any of his angels, "I will be his Father, and he will be my Son." Hebrews 1:5
However, God calls those who follow after Him, His Sons. We have two groups of people on this planet. The followers of God (Sons of God) and we have those who are in the world, who's father is the devil.(Because they follow after him) They are only sons and daughters of men (notice not MAN, but MEN ). We (Christians) are sons of MAN and sons of God.
American Standard Version Gen 6:4
The Nephilim were in the earth in those days, and also after that, when the sons of God came unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them: the same were the mighty men that were of old, the men of renown.
God ALWAYS wants separation between Sons of God and the people of this world "sons of men" In Genesis we have the seed of Cain who were "sons of men" and we have the seed of his brother Seth , who followed God.(Sons of God) The mistake was mixing these two "sons", because you cannot mix holy with unholy. God wants sanctification......holiness. The ox and donkey cannot pull the same cart.
The giants are scientific fact. Those who want to know why, can research the effect that , that atmosphere had on living things before the flood. High pressure atmosphere filled with a very rich oxygen air.After the curse came, it took a long time for human DNA to degrade to where we are now.The sons of God, who followed after God, obviously suffered less under the curse (as they do today as well) and when they lusted after the "daughters of men" their better DNA produced better offspring.
very good read!!! thank you
Unfortunately for you both the Hebrew bible has references where the 'sons of God' can only refer to celestial beings of some sort. (e.g.
Jb xxxviii.7; cf.
researcher above) Cornelius has also taken the book of Hebrews passage and the Kings passage totally out of context. The verse in the psalm is an adoption formula for the king of Israel upon his accession, and the Kings passage is a mirror of this same royal ideology where the king becomes Yahweh's unique son and representative. None of that has anything whatsoever to do with the phrase 'sons of God', which is known by all reputable experts to be an idiom for 'gods' or at least, if you prefer, semidivine or heavenly beings.
Other than the idiom itself there is also the fact that the very union of the 'sons of God' with the 'daughters of men' resulted in giant offspring. This is not the natural result of perfectly good and natural human unions. If the 'sons of God' is a reference to men the wording of the text, which is itself peculiar, makes no sense and suggests nothing about this union being out of the ordinary. It would essentially be saying
'men had sex with women and giants were born', which is a very odd thing for the text to be saying and very superfluous. 'Big people' are born, yes, but that humans, giant or otherwise, are born by men and women coming together goes without saying. Cornelius's pseudo and easily dismissible 'scientific' nonsense (he calls this curiously and humorously 'fact') needs no refutation. The passage only makes plausible sense if the 'sons of God' refer to supra-human entities. This is how it was interpreted, incidentally, in later Jewish tradition as well.
There is absolutely
nothing in the context of Genesis pointing to, nor any indirect support from the use of this idiom within the entire Hebrew bible for, the 'sons of God' in Gn vi.4 being descendants of Seth. I challenge any advocate of this groundless interpretation to prove me wrong. You have quite the task on your hands:
First, you have to explain why we shouldn't take the 'sons of God' as the widespread Semitic idiom denoting gods or heavenly beings of some sort that we know it to be.
Second, you have to explain why in all the relevant passages from the Hebrew bible where the phrase 'sons of God' is used the most natural interpretation from the context is that they are heavenly beings.
Third, you have to explain the giants with something other than utterly baseless and
ad hoc claims that are nowhere supported by the text or context. (see Cornelius for examples of what I mean)
Fourth, you have to explain the tradition behind interpreting the 'sons of God' as angels in later Jewish tradition.
Fifth, you have to supply positive evidence for your own interpretation that addresses items 1-4.
Good luck.
Finis,
Eric
