Start with the text.
World English Bible Updated · public domain. The passages below are source text, not AI quotations.
Genesis 6:1-8 Read passage
1When men began to multiply on the surface of the ground, and daughters were born to them,
2God’s sons saw that men’s daughters were beautiful, and they took any that they wanted for themselves as wives.
3The LORD said, “My Spirit will not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; so his days will be one hundred twenty years.”
4The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also after that, when God’s sons came in to men’s daughters and had children with them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.
5The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of man’s heart was continually only evil.
6The LORD was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him in his heart.
7The LORD said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the surface of the ground—man, along with animals, creeping things, and birds of the sky—for I am sorry that I have made them.”
8But Noah found favor in the LORD’s eyes.
Numbers 13:30-33 Read passage
30Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, “Let’s go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it!”
31But the men who went up with him said, “We aren’t able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we.”
32They brought up an evil report of the land which they had spied out to the children of Israel, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that eats up its inhabitants; and all the people who we saw in it are men of great stature.
33There we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim. We were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.”
Jude 6 Read passage
6Angels who didn’t keep their first domain, but deserted their own dwelling place, he has kept in everlasting bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day.
Read this in context.
Genesis 6 introduces the escalation of human corruption and violence on the earth, contrasting human grasping for renown (“men of name”) with Noah finding favor with the Lord.
What we can observe.
Genesis 6:2 names the “sons of God” taking wives. Verse 4 mentions the Nephilim being on the earth in those days and afterward. Numbers 13:33 uses the same word in the frightened spies’ report about tall warriors in Canaan.
A reading to consider.
Regardless of how the “sons of God” are identified, the passage’s narrative purpose is clear: it exposes the spread of pride and violence that precedes the flood narrative.
Where Christians differ.
One ancient view (reflected in Second Temple Jewish literature and linked by many scholars to Jude 6 and 2 Peter 2:4) sees the “sons of God” as rebellious spiritual beings. A second view (common since Augustine) identifies them as the godly line of Seth intermarrying with the line of Cain. A third view sees them as ancient royal tyrants claiming divine status.
Read it for yourself.
Why might Genesis spend four verses on the Nephilim and then focus the chapter on violence, grief, and Noah’s faithfulness?
A question of your own?
Take what you have read into a guided study. Begin with the passages, explore their context, and keep room for your own reflection.