Genesis 6 Might Describe Angels and Humans Producing Giants

Episode twenty of a 21-day October series on what Scripture actually says about the spiritual realm. Week 3 (Victory in Christ). One episode before the Halloween capstone. This is the strangest passage in the whole arc — and one of the most debated in all of Scripture.

Genesis 6:1-4 (KJV):

"And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose... There were giants in the earth in those days; 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 mighty men which were of old, men of renown."

Then, immediately: "And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth... And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth" (Gen 6:5-7). The flood follows.

Who were "the sons of God"? The Reformed tradition genuinely splits into three views.

View 1 — The Sethite view (Calvin, Augustine).
"Sons of God" = the godly covenant line of Seth (who "began... to call upon the name of the LORD," Gen 4:26). "Daughters of men" = the ungodly line of Cain. The intermarriage corrupted the faithful line until almost no one was left righteous but Noah. This view avoids the metaphysical problem of angels procreating (Matthew 22:30 says angels "neither marry, nor are given in marriage") and fits the genealogical flow of Genesis 4–5. It was the dominant view through much of church history and Calvin held it.

View 2 — The fallen-angel view (many early fathers; many modern scholars).
"Sons of God" (bene ha'elohim) refers to angelic beings — which is exactly what the phrase means in Job 1:6, 2:1, and 38:7. Some Septuagint manuscripts render Genesis 6:2 "the angels of God." And the New Testament appears to comment on this:

— 2 Peter 2:4-5: "God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell... and spared not the old world... bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly."
— Jude 6-7: "the angels which kept not their first estate... he hath reserved in everlasting chains," placed right alongside Sodom's going "after strange flesh."

Many read these as apostolic pointers back to Genesis 6. The intertestamental book of 1 Enoch (the "Watchers") elaborated this view at length — though 1 Enoch is NOT Scripture and should be treated as Second Temple background only. Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian held this view, and it has grown among modern evangelical and Reformed scholars precisely because of the 2 Peter and Jude connections.

View 3 — The divine-king/dynastic view (Meredith Kline and others).
"Sons of God" = royal despots who claimed divine status and titles, seizing women into harems ("took them wives of all which they chose"). The "mighty men of renown" (gibborim, men of the name) fits tyrant-king language. On this reading, Genesis 6 describes the rise of God-defying, self-deifying political power.

Which view is right?

Honestly: the Reformed world has not settled this, and this video does not pretend to. There are serious scholars in all three camps. The fallen-angel view has notable NT support (2 Peter 2; Jude 6); the Sethite view has Calvin, Augustine, and the Matthew 22:30 difficulty in its favor; the dynastic view fits certain features of the Hebrew. A humble, honest treatment holds the identity question with an open hand.

But here is what all three views share — and this is the point.

Whatever "the sons of God" were, Genesis 6:1-4 describes a catastrophic VIOLATION OF A BOUNDARY — covenantal, angelic, or royal-cultic — that provoked the flood. In every reading:

1. A boundary God established was transgressed.
2. The transgression produced deep corruption.
3. God did not shrug. He judged the whole earth with a flood.

Genesis 6 is not a weird footnote to skip on the way to Noah's ark. It is a warning: the unseen realm is real, the boundaries God sets are real, and God judges those who break them.

A note against sensationalism.

This passage attracts a great deal of fringe content — giant-skeleton hoaxes, "Nephilim bloodline" conspiracies, ancient-aliens theories, and treatments of 1 Enoch as though it were canonical. None of that belongs here. The weight of Genesis 6 is not in speculation about giant anatomy; it is in the sobering fact that God flooded the earth over spiritual corruption. The gravity is theological, not tabloid.

The Reformed anchor.

Whatever the Nephilim were, the God who flooded the earth over them is not neutral about the dark. He was not indifferent to spiritual corruption in Genesis 6, and He is not indifferent now. The same holiness that sent the flood will judge all evil — and the same mercy that saved Noah and his family through the water is the mercy that saves sinners through Christ (1 Peter 3:18-22 explicitly links the flood to salvation in Christ).

This is episode 20 of the 21-day October series. One left. Tomorrow — Halloween night — the capstone: Colossians 2:15, where Christ disarmed every dark power at the cross and made a public spectacle of them. The war this whole series has described already has a winner.

📖 Passages: Genesis 4:25-26, 5:1-32, 6:1-8, 6:11-13, Numbers 13:31-33, Deuteronomy 2:10-11, 3:11, Job 1:6, 2:1, 38:4-7, Psalm 29:1, 89:6-7, Matthew 22:30, 24:37-39, Luke 17:26-27, Romans 5:12-14, 1 Peter 3:18-22, 2 Peter 2:4-9, 3:5-7, Jude 6-7, Revelation 20:1-3

(Note: Genesis 6:1-4 is a genuinely debated passage. This video presents the three main Reformed views fairly and does not claim to settle the identity question. 1 Enoch is cited as Second Temple background, not as Scripture.)