What is the significance of the fact there were giants in those days (Genesis 6:4)?

nephilim. The signification of this word is uncertain: some trace it to a root 'to fall,' but then it is not clear whether it signifies 'fallen ones,' or 'those who fall upon.' They were men of great stature, which made the Israelites consider themselves as grasshoppers in comparison. They are not said (as has been supposed) to be the offspring of the sons of God and the daughters of men: those born of them are described as "mighty men (gibborim) which were of old, men of renown." The nephilim are merely said to be "in the earth in those days," and they were also seen by the spies about a thousand years afterwards: this is all that is revealed respecting them. The various ancient versions confirm the translation of 'giants.' Gen. 6:4; Num. 13:33.

Before the sons of God took the daughters of men as wives, there were giants in the earth. There is no indication as to why men became giants (v. 4), but generally in scripture giants are connected with unbelief. The spiritual lesson from this is that unbelievers aspire to be great and outstanding, but a giant is an abnormal monstrosity.

God had by His Spirit been striving with men against their willful sin, but His patience would come to an end, though He would evidently allow them another 120 years before He would destroy civilization. Chapter 5:32 speaks of Noah being 500 years old, so that it seems that God spoke as He did in verse 3 twenty years before Noah became 500. Before the sons of God took the daughters of men as wives, there were giants in the earth. There is no indication as to why men became giants (v.4), but generally in scripture giants are connected with unbelief. The spiritual lesson from this is that unbelievers aspire to be great and outstanding, but a giant is an abnormal monstrosity.

The consciousness, not acquired but innate, of a Power above himself who in some measure influences if not absolutely controls his condition and shapes his destiny, together with a somewhat vague idea of his accountability, which is only the complement of immortality, are doubtless in man the springs of idolatry. That is, the faculties with which the Creator endowed man that he might be a worshipper of God, make him through the fall an idolater. When was idolatry developed? Not before the flood. Some think that a comparison of Gen. 6:5 with Rom 1:23 gives ground to believe that idolatry, as we now accept the term, existed before the flood. But the silence of Scripture as to idolatry, and its express statement that violence and corruption at that time filled the whole earth does not afford solid ground for that opinion. It is not that nature was less fallen then, but it is evidence of the kind of slavery in which Satan held the antediluvian race. In a thraldom which needed not false gods to rivet their chains, they were led on by Satan to the objects which nature presented, things to be seen and handled, not to deify them but to make them subservient to themselves and for their gratification. Satan in the garden said "Ye shall be as gods," and man was truly led on by him to the possession of power over the material things around him. We find among the antediluvians the cultivation of those arts which are said to ameliorate the condition of man. They builded cities, were artificers in brass and iron, and learned to handle the harp and organ. Modern civilization is gauged by progress in these and their cognate subjects. We can scarcely suppose that the city built by Cain was a mere assemblage of rude huts. And it is certain that some scientific knowledge was necessary to produce brass [? copper] and iron from the ore, and mechanical skill to be artificers. See the fine arts too, for the harp and the organ seldom stand alone in a community. Proficiency in all is surely not to be looked for in the same individual; but in cities where one of the fine arts flourishes, there also will be found men who excel in others. Among the antediluvians was the genius that invented instruments of music, as well as the knowledge that dug in the earth for ore, and planned a city. And in the origination, the discovery or invention, of these and other things, the men before the flood had as much intelligence and material wisdom as any after the flood. There is not the slightest reason to infer that the antediluvian organ was rude and ill made as compared with the modern instrument of the same name. If any inference can be made from their circumstances, it might be shown without any strain that there is sufficient ground for saying that their instruments might be superior to those we know spite of modern improvement, and that those who lived before the flood excelled in all that which the world has ever boasted since. There were giants in those days. Is that a mere reference to physical strength and immense form? Is it not quite as much and perhaps specially to mental and intellectual greatness? Giant-intellect is no uncommon expression now. But the Bible calls attention to the rapid and immense progress of the antediluvian race in the arts of civilization. "There were giants in the earth in those days," and among the inventors were Jubal and Tubal-cain long before.

As to ver. 4, the construction is not without difficulty. It appears to distinguish between the Nephilim or giants in those days, as afterwards also, and the Gibborim, mighty ones or heroes, who were the fruit of the union of the sons of God with men's daughters. In fact, notwithstanding the dark confusion of the old heathen remains, traces of this distinction are not wanting; though nothing can be more marked than the superiority of scripture in the very little it says on this painful subject over the traditional lore respecting the Giants and the Titans, which the later poets jumbled inextricably. Num. 13:33 of itself easily accounts for the clause here parenthetically marked. It may run, without parenthesis, "And also after that the sons of God …: these [are] the mighty ones which were of old, men of the name," thus distinguishing the giants and these heroes. One shrinks from boldness in speaking of such a phrase; but the latter part distinguishes a class which was not found afterwards: "These [are] the heroes, who [were of old, men of renown." These, as being of quite a different source and character, had a fame peculiar to themselves for might. The reputation they acquired of old was not founded on mere stature, like that of the Nephilim.

In result it is clear that the bounds of creation were wickedly traversed by certain angels, and thus a peculiarly evil corruption introduced among men, where evil in its ordinary character grew apace as we are afterwards shown. But that unnatural amalgam touched the rights of Jehovah, though outwardly He had left man to himself since his expulsion from Paradise; as it played its grave part in calling for divine intervention in the governmental act of the deluge of which Genesis speaks, but in those deeper, lasting, and unseen ways which the epistles of Peter and Jude reveal in unison with N.T. truth for eternity. The evasive reading of the passage which many pious ancients and moderns have adopted to escape its only fair interpretation, because it conveys what is to us beyond measure strange, if not incomprehensible how it could be, is nothing but a makeshift of unbelief. Received simply, it gives the sure, though purposely reserved, revelation on the darkest scene of old, the true source of what was expanded, after its wonted fashion in Jewish tradition and Pagan mythology. In scripture the evil was dealt with in holy judgment; among men it became the basis of fame for beneficent might on man's behalf in vain struggle against envious but superior gods: no untrue description of beings who were really demons. "Jehovah, what is man that Thou takest knowledge of him? or the son of man, that Thou makest account of him? Man is like a breath, his days are as a shadow that passes away. Bow Thy heavens, Jehovah, and come down."

As we open Genesis 6 we are carried on to the later centuries of the antediluvian age, when the population had considerably increased and human wickedness began to rise to a climax. Many have understood the term, "sons of God," to refer to men of Seth's line — the line of faith — who fell away and married daughters of Cain's line, but we agree with those who accept the term as meaning beings of an angelic order, as it clearly does in such scriptures as Job 1:6 and Job 2:1 and Job 38:7. How such connection can have been established, resulting in progeny superhuman in size and strength, we do not know, but we believe that Jude 6 and 7 confirm what we are saying. Sodom and Gomorrha went after "strange flesh," committing such enormous evil as is forbidden in Exodus 22:19, and these sons of God did the same thing in principle, by going after the daughters of men. Thereby they apostatized, leaving their first estate, and lest they should repeat the offence they are held in everlasting chains under darkness until eternal perdition falls upon them. They will be finally judged at the great day of the great white throne.

In Genesis however, we are only told about the terrible effect of this in the world of men. The monstrous men produced were monsters of iniquity, filling the earth with violence and corruption. Yet man in his fallen condition is such that these monsters instead of being considered men of infamy were treated as men of renown. They were the originals doubtless from whom sprang those tales of "gods" and "goddesses" and "Titans," etc., which have come down to us in the writings of antiquity. They are popularly dismissed as fables, but it looks as if they have a larger basis of fact than many care to admit.

I have little doubt that many of the traditions of mythology were founded upon what took place before the flood; but whatever "the mighty men of old" and the "giants" may have been, I believe that the most important thing of all is the exposure of that moral monstrosity; "every imagination of the thoughts of man's heart was evil daily."

They are called giants or nephilim, giants I suppose earthborn; all this history is their being men of renown. Ovid says, besides the violence against men they would have aimed at heavenly rule, but were judged. Yet the giants and Titans are said to have been in contention; the oppression of the heaven-assailing rebels, who would have introduced all this, may be here alluded to.

I have sometimes thought that in this verse (4) two classes of persons are referred to - the giants, and men of renown. They were men of renown (I apprehend the article in the Hebrew is emphatic), the builders of Babel aimed at it; it is possible that the mythologists mixed up this story with it. I apprehend certainly it is "the" giants were in the earth in those days, and also after that the sons of Elohim came into the daughters of Adam, and they bore to them, the same were mighty men which were of old, men of name - of the well-known name, an'shey hashshem, the men of name.

I can understand two distinct classes here, but they seem to have subsisted together, though the first may have, in the first instance, preceded the second. They may have been Cain's progeny; another offspring of the unholy mixture of the sons of God and daughters of men. Certainly the two are brought out as bringing about the Flood, they both characterised the epoch which brought about the Flood - "those days."

The principle is the mixture of those who are of God with evil; but I am not aware that B'ney ha-Elohim (sons of God), is ever used for men. Job 38:7, they are surely not men, but angelic; so Job 1: 6. B'ney El khay (sons of the Living God) in Hosea 1:10 (in the Hebrew 2:1), is surely different. Judges are called "Elohim," but not B'ney ha-Elohim (sons of God). But there is no question of that here; so that the usage is certainly for beings angelic, not human, in nature; see Jude. I cannot for a moment doubt the force of this B'ney ha-Elohim (sons of God), and b'noth ha-Adam (daughters of man); and Jude quite confirms it. It seems to me also that akharey ken is not "afterwards" but "after that"; i.e., the consequence of this alliance; they were Titans and such like. All these traditions had a source. It may be questioned if the nephilim (giants) and gib-bo-rim (mighty ones) are identical.