Hi all,
Today we will look at the ‘mighty men’ and consider DNA…
Genesis 6:2 says the sons of God took as wives the daughters of men
Immediately in v3 God says: “My spirit will not always umpire in the ways of men, because he is just flesh; Yet his days will be 120 years.”
Up until this point, God Himself acted as ‘umpire’ directly, with capital crimes. We see this by His involvement with Cain and with Lamech who also killed a man (4: 23-24). After Noah got out of the Ark the Lord delegated 3 things to man as his responsibility from that point on: Crime & punishment, diet – allowing them to eat meat for the first time*, and reproduction.
*Genesis 9: 1-7. Genesis 1: 29-30 states man and animals were vegetarians originally, and to that we will return – wolf laying down with the lamb, the lion eating straw like an ox, etc. – Isaiah 11: 6-7; 65: 25.
Some understand the 120 years as a cap on man’s lifespan
Others understand it to be a countdown until the flood. That means the whole time between Seth’s godly line who identified as the children of God and the taking of wives among the daughters of men, was no more than 120 years.
Men of renown? Mighty men of old?
Genesis 6:4 says: “There were giants in the earth in those days, and after that when the sons of God had children with the daughters of men. These were mighty men of old, men of renown.” The word ‘is used only 3 times in the Bible. Here, and twice in Numbers 13: 33. Each time it refers to people, giant, violent, tyrants, ungodly warriors.
It is not a compliment to call them ‘men of renown, mighty men of old’. The same phrasing is used of Nimrod in 10: 9 who calls him a ‘mighty hunter before the Lord’, which is an unfortunate translation in the King James Version. “…a mighty hunter of men in full view of the Lord’ or ‘in spite done in the Lord’s view’ is closer to the meaning.
Deuteronomy 3: 11 tells us king Og of Bashan was ‘of the remnant of the giants’. The word used for ‘giant’ here and everywhere else you see the word ‘giant’ other than Genesis 6:4 and Numbers 13:22, is ‘rephaim’, not ‘nephilim’.
So we can’t trace Goliath nor Og to the giants of Noah’s day. And II Samuel 21:20 tells us Goliath’s son who was also a giant, had 6 fingers and toes for a total of 24 – an example of genetic error.
So we see the genetic code was within mankind, even in Noah’s DNA, for giantism, just like dwarfism – both are seen today. The 8 in his family were the only ones to survive the flood, but their genetics contained enough life to see all the variety of all people and all races who have lived since. So the recessive gene of giantism and also the genetic or chromosomal errors we see then and now, were within Noah’s family genes.
Nimrod gathered people for the express purpose of making war, though he knew better. He did so out of spite hunting men who were made in God’s image. These ‘mighty men of renown’ were evil and the statement about their ungodly violent nature and the spreading of violence and war.
They were men who acted out of spite and hatred against God and others, violent men, bullies, tyrants, giants in evil character.
Consider the genetics a little more
When God created plants, animals, and man, He commanded the ‘multiply and fill the earth’. In doing so He also gave them the genetic ability to fulfill that command, meaning genetic variation, what we call ‘micro-evolution’.
Macro-evolution is the erroneous belief one species can evolve into another species – algae becomes a frog that becomes a mammal that becomes an ape that becomes man.
But micro-evolution, is scriptural.
Darwin found 5 types of beaks on the same species of finch and theorized evolution. Each beak type was specialized: One broad for cracking seeds, one long and narrow to catch insects on the fly, and so on. That micro-evolution was merely God’s built-in genetics which allowed each species to fill the earth according to His command, by adapting to the environment.
God didn’t create Golden Retrievers or Chihuahuas. He created mom and dad wolf and said ‘fill the earth’. He didn’t create your house cat, He created mom and dad big cat and said ‘multiply’. He created 1 type of elephant and from that original mom and dad elephant we’ve had Mammoths to today’s African and Indian elephants as time and environment have occurred.
In the same way
Within that first man and woman were all the genetic abilities for every person alive today, all 8+ billion of us, and all who have ever lived. Estimates are about 117 billion people have lived and died over the centuries.
A side note to think about. Adam lived 930 years, and if Eve lived about the same, her child bearing years could have been maybe 700 or more – if she had 300 or 400 children, realize that many of those would not have been closely related to one another like brothers and sisters are today. The question, ‘Did Cain marry his sister’ is more complicated and more simply explained at the same time.
In the days when man lived 900 years, what if there were 50 or 100 years in age difference between spouses with all those other children in between? It is possible with all the genetic life in Adam and Even, there would be siblings only distantly related to one another.
Technically, we are all brothers and sisters genetically speaking
We all came from the original mom and dad. But our genetics are diluted through tens of billions of people since then. What if you were among the first babies born on the earth?
Your genetic variations would have come from Adam and Eve but more ‘concentrated’, capable of perhaps including every type of human on earth today, from Asian to African to caucasian to dwarf and giant and all in between, hundreds from the same mom and dad but genetically more distant than today’s brothers/sisters. Interesting.
All the races, all the body types, all the skin colors, all the facial features, were within the genetics of Adam and Eve. From giants to dwarfs, pygmies to Goliath of Gath, all the genetics were within Adam and Eve. And with Noah and his 3 sons and their wives – we all exist today. Amazing.
Next week: What about giants like Goliath and today?
Until then, blessings,
John Fenn
