Genesis 6:1-2

by Dansk 46 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  bebu

  My husband was thinking about this the other day. He thinks that the "sons of God" might actually refer to the line of Seth. Adam's genealogy is given in Gen 5, but only as the line of Seth. In Gen. 4 the line of Cain is given, and some of the men were . He pointed out that in Luke's genealogy of Jesus, Adam is called the son of God.

  On Cain's side you have Lamech, who had a hot temper. On Seth's side, there was Enoch, who 'walked' with God'. So, perhaps the descendants of Seth (the boys) were attracted to the daughters of Cain.

  Interestingly, after Gen 6:1-2, it reads,

  The LORD saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.

  So things went downhill fast!

  bebu
• 

  Narkissos

  Bebu:

  I wouldn't buy into the Sethite interpretation because:

  - the most obvious meaning of "sons of the gods" and "daughters of the men (adam !)" is "gods" and "women";

  - the oldest traditional Jewish (Enoch, Jubilees) and Christian (Jude, 2 Peter) interpretation logically refers to angels and not men: it was not understood as an inter-human issue;

  - human intermarriage would not explain why the offspring are giants -- on the contrary, it makes full sense in the case of intercourse between gods and women (in a mythological mindframe of course).
• 

  googlemagoogle

  I think the nation becoming monotheistic was also a downturn for women being treated as equals of men
  
  the "nation" never became fully monotheistic. they always had the canaanite gods, and every now and then the yahwoh priests tried to gain power and eradicate their competition, that's the way i read it... that's why they are always trying to convince people that yahwoh is the better god (and jealous by the way).
• 

  Leolaia

  bebu....Another exegetical problem for the Sethite explanation (aside from the excellent ones Narkissos posed) is that it would demand two differing referrents of "daughters of men" in two adjacent verses. It would require the "daughters" of v. 2 to be a subset of the "daughters" of v. 1, unless we insist that the "men" in v. 1 are only supposed to refer to the descendents of "Cain" -- and this is unjustified considering the preceding context.

  The "Sethite" explanation is an old one (tho not as old as the underlying legend and angelic interpretation of Jubilees and 1 Enoch), going back to Luther and Julius Africanus.
• 

  LittleToe

  Why is there an assumption that the offspring were giants?
  There's mention of the Nethilim in that verse, but it doesn't indicate that these were necessarily the offspring mentioned. The offspring were the men of renoun, or champions, potentially in opposition to the Nethilim tyrants.
  Nor can it be certain that Nethilim means giants (Num.13:32, 33 mentions size in addition to Nethilim).

  I'd like to take it from another perspective, too. Myths are usually built on some kind of fact, such as there being some really big people around at the time. The fathers and mothers of these children were known, even if they'd come down from the mountains as another branch of the family of mankind.

  Unless we're proposing a mythological reporting of an Extra-Terrestial encounter, I have to question the veracity of the interpretation

  Sometimes literary criticism has to be taken with a pinch of anthropology...
• 

  ezekiel3

  Not that this answers the excellent question posed, but:

  *** w61 1/15 pp. 57-58 Angels?God?s Spirit Messengers ***

  Angels are generally represented as males, because God and his Son are spoken of as males. They are, however, without sex, for Jesus told that those who come forth upon earth in the resurrection will not marry, because they will be like angels. It was the pleasures of sex that caused certain angels to leave their heavenly positions in Noah?s day.

  (Actually they are "represented as males" because Bible writers would never ascribe "female" to anything more powerful than a human male.)

  So what about Jehovah God?

  ***

  sh chap. 16 p. 366 The True God and Your Future ***

  But the Bible gives this reality name, gender, and personality?Jehovah, the living God. That unique God said to Cyrus the Great of Persia: "I am Jehovah, and there is no one else. With the exception of me there is no God. . . . I myself have made the earth and have created even man upon it."?Isaiah 45:5, 12, 18; Psalm 68:19, 20.

  (That gender is MALE)

  Is it possible to ascribe female traits to Jehovah or Jesus? I guess not...

  *** it-2 p. 53 Jesus Christ ***

  It is true that in Hebrew, which assigns gender to its nouns (as do many other languages), the word for "wisdom" is always in the feminine gender. This would continue to be the case even though wisdom is personified and so would not rule out wisdom?s being used figuratively to represent God?s firstborn Son. The Greek word for "love" in the expression "God is love" (1Jo 4:8) is also in the feminine gender but that does not make God feminine. Solomon, the principal writer of Proverbs (Pr 1:1), applied the title qo·he´leth (congregator) to himself (Ec 1:1) and this word is also in the feminine gender.

  Wow, WTS really is mysogynist.
• 

  gumby

  If an angel is truly sexless and it wants to try some human hanky panky, surely it wouldn't matter which sex it became?

  Ian.....go into the bathroom, get naked, bend over, then look at yourself in the mirror while bent over. Angels aren't stupid.

  Gumby
• 

  LittleToe

  Gumby:You're saying that they couldn't be lesbian angel-types?

  Or how about hermaphrodite?

  Ezekiel:
  There's a view that the Holy Spirit represents the feminine side of the godhead.
  That might partially explain why the WTS relegate "it" to a mere mindless force that just does stuff.

  Which reminds me of the joke, why is a woman like a hurricane?
  Coz when she enters your life she's wet n wild, and when she exits she takes everything...
• 

  Leolaia

  LittleToe...I'm not sure what you mean here:

  Nor can it be certain that Nethilim [sic] means giants (Num.13:32, 33 mentions size in addition to Nethilim).

  The word Nephilim itself does not express a meaning of "giant", but the Nephilim were described as giants ("all the people we saw there were of great size"..."we seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes"). Moreover, Deuteronomy 2:10 indicates that the Emim were as tall as the Anakim (a branch of the Nephilim according to Numbers), and the next verse equates the Rephaim with them. The Rephaim were otherwise described as giants (cf. Deuteronomy 3:11-13; 2 Samuel 21:15-22).
• 

  Dansk

  Gumby, LOL

  Ian.....go into the bathroom, get naked, bend over, then look at yourself in the mirror while bent over. Angels aren't stupid.

  Point taken. Sheesh, do I really look like that?! LOL!!!

  Have you ever seen a builder bend over? They usually have at least an inch of bum cleavage showing. That's enough to put anyone off

  Now, not to digress. I'm enjoying all the posts..........................even Gumby's LOL!!

  Ian