See, Desire, Take

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Today’s reading is one of the most obscure and difficult in the entire Bible. Below the reading I’ve done my best to offer a little bit of commentary.

 

Genesis 6:1-8

1 When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose. 3 Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years.”

4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.

5 The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil contin- ually. 6 And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. 7 So the Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.” 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

 
 

Genesis 6:1-8 is a very strange and confusing passage. Some quick thoughts:

  • The entire prologue of the Bible (Genesis 1-11) is about how the creatures God made rebelled against his rule, from the Garden of Eden to the Tower of Babel.

  • This is the pattern of that rebellion: they “see” what they want, desire it as “good”, and they “take” it.

 

See → Desire → Take

 

  • In the Garden, the woman sees the fruit, desires it as good, and takes it.

  • In the Garden, the man and the woman wanted to become godlike.

  • Here, there is a reverse rebellion: the angelic/spiritual beings God created want to cross the boundary and become united with humanity.

  • The sons of God “see” the human women, desire them as “good” (the word translated “attractive” in v.2 is the Hebrew word for “good”), and they “take” them.

  • It’s the same pattern of rebellion.

  • A note on the “sons of God”: every time the phrase “sons of God” appears in the Old Testament, it signifies the angelic/ spiritual beings that God made.

  • It seems reasonable to conclude that the serpent in Genesis 3 is a rebellious spiritual being.

  • Genesis 6 is telling us (in terse language) of one form the rebellion of these spiritual beings took.

  • Just as God will not allow humanity to marry technological progress with human wickedness (the story of Babel in Genesis 11, which we’ll read next week), so here God will not allow the fallen spiritual beings to combine with humanity.

 

Don’t trust your own desires—trust God’s word to give you guidance today