Who Are the Nephilim?
The mysterious beings of Genesis 6
Alexandre Cabanel, CC0,, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
The Nephilim, the product of the sons of god mingling with the daughters of Adam, the great biblical giants, “the fallen ones,” the Rephaim, “the dead ones”—these descriptions are all applied to one group of characters found within the Hebrew Bible. Who are the Nephilim? From where do the “heroes of old, the men of renown” come?
Genesis 6:1–4 tells the readers that the Nephilim, which means “fallen ones” when translated into English, were the product of copulation between the divine beings (lit. sons of god) and human women (lit. daughters of Adam). The Nephilim are known as great warriors and biblical giants (see Ezekiel 32:27 and Numbers 13:33).
It was once claimed that the mating of the sons of god and the daughters of Adam that resulted in the Nephilim caused the flood, and this caused the Nephilim to have a negative reputation. This was believed because the next verse (Genesis 6:5) is the introduction to the flood narrative and because their name means “fallen ones.” It is unlikely that this interpretation is correct because Genesis 6:4 presents nothing but praise for the Nephilim and no criticism is present. In addition, the name “fallen ones” is likely a reference to their divine paternity transforming—falling—into the human condition, albeit an almost superhuman condition.
Genesis 6, Ezekiel 32, and Numbers 13 are the only passages that mention the Nephilim by that term. So where do the names Rephaim and “the dead ones” originate? The first thing to recognize is that these are not two separate titles, but rather a name, Rephaim, and a meaning, “dead ones.” The Bible refers to two groups as the Rephaim. The first are dead people who have achieved an almost divine status, similar to the concept of Saints. The second is a term that is applied to races of biblical giants. It is this second usage that is often conflated with the Nephilim.
The Rephaim appear in Deuteronomy 2:11; 3:11; 2 Samuel 21:19 and Joshua 11:22 and almost always take the form of one member of the Rephaim (Anaqim, Og, Goliath) being in opposition with Israel or its representative. In this sense, the Rephaim live up to their name, as their purpose in each narrative is to die. The juxtaposition of the mighty biblical giants defeated by the underdog, God’s chosen, is foreshadowed in the very name attributed to these characters.
Ellen White, Ph.D. (Hebrew Bible, University of St. Michael’s College), formerly the senior editor at the Biblical Archaeology Society, has taught at five universities across the U.S. and Canada and spent research leaves in Germany and Romania. She has also been actively involved in digs at various sites in Israel.
This Bible History Daily article was originally published on November 19, 2014.
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I failed to post WHY the Nephilim mated with the daughters of Adam, specifically. It was Satan’s attempt to corrupt the seedline of the coming Christ. This was his second attempt. His first attempt was in the Garden. The Serpent/tree of knowledge of good and evil were/are Satan. The sin in the Garden was NOT for eating a piece of fruit picked from a fruit tree. Adam and Eve covered/hid the part of their bodies that they sinned with. Cain was NOT Adam’s son.
Please elaborate on why Cain is not Adams son conclusion/ info. Thanks
God is not a Concept
For those who wish to find the truth, you will need to consider that the Nephilim are a race of beings are from the constellation of Orion or taken as the Orion’s (Anak or Anunnaki). The Aramaic version is correct and is a better translation. The stories in the bible are not about God, but of beings from another world who came to earth to terraform and plunder it for its resources. They were a highly technological society, so they appeared to us humans as gods because of their abilities. The Anunnaki(Elohim in the bible) came here around 450-370k years ago. The reference to this is in the Sumerian Kings List and also by Prince Ea(Enki) who has spoken directly to Elana Dannan to give this information. Yahweh (Enlil) also known as Yu is Ea’s half-brother from another mother, a reptilian mother in fact. Yu played the role of God and Ea played the role of the adversary (serpent). Ea is a geneticist and loved human beings because his own DNA was used in creating us so he can be considered our true genetic father. While Yu on the other hand only wanted to create us for doing work that the IGIGI (lower class of Anunnaki) got tired of working. The whole garden of Eden thing took place aboard their spaceship. When Yu found out what Ea did by making them (Adamu Human kind) too smart and was teaching them, Yu was furious, so he sent them down to earth to work instead of learning how to enlighten themselves. Yu didn’t approve of the mingling of Humans and Anunnaki. The whole reason we humans and Anunnaki could breed together was because of our genetics being of partial Anunnaki origin. After a period of time, Yu was getting so upset with all the racket of human beings, really it was about Anunnaki teaching the humans technology and understanding that put it over the top to where Yu convened a counsel of the other Anunnaki to put an end to humanity by bringing all kinds of things to cut down the population. The last and final blow was to send a great catastrophic flood, but Ea refused to agree to destroy what he was involved in creating. Ea kept trying to keep the bloodline true to his vision of humanity. Noah was a king at the time of the counsel’s decision to destroy mankind despite Ea’s rejection. Noah being of Ea’s bloodline warned Noah to build an ark to escape the flood. This is documented in the Eridu Genesis and the Epic of Atrahasis story which differs from the biblical version in that God sent the flood and God spared Noah which is incorrect. Both Eridu Genesis and Atrahasis story is of older origin than the biblical one. Many things have been intentionally hidden from mankind to tell partial truths to benefit the one, not so true god(Enlil, Yahweh, Yu). Jesus was trying to make a distinction between his father in heaven and the god of the Old Testament (Yu), but he had to do it in an indirect way, see Luke 11:11-13 as referencing what God (Enlil, aka Yu) did in Numbers 21:5-7. I would suggest reading Paul Wallis and Mauro Biglino books on true biblical interpretations of this. Also read the
books by Elana Dannan and Dr. Michael Salla so that you see how the past and current understanding fits together like a puzzle. All of them you can find on Youtube.