Prof. C. Fred Alford wrote an article for his GodBlog titled What Are the Nephilim in the Bible? He self-IDs, in part, as, “Professor Emeritus at the University of Maryland, College Park, where I taught ancient political theory (Plato and Aristotle) for 38 years…I have no professional training or background in theology.”
The article is really what he calls a, “Reader Guide” which has the goal of, “understanding how Fred approaches Genesis, biblical myth, literary interpretation, and the history of scripture.”
Referring to what which I term the Gen 6 affair (vss. 1-2, 4), we’re told, “Nephilim…have been described as giants” which begs these key questions: What’s the usage of the vague, generic, subjective, multi-usage and modern English word “giants” in English Bibles? What’s Prof. Alford’s usage? Do those two usages agree?
It’s then noted, “One approach treats Genesis primarily as a direct historical account. Under this view, its events describe things that happened much as the text reports them…Another approach sees Genesis as a collection of ancient traditions and stories brought together to explore fundamental questions.”
We’re told, “Modern readers often expect stories to answer practical questions…How tall were they?…Were the Nephilim giants?” about which we’re told, “This is probably the most familiar interpretation” so I can only imagine that Prof. Alford’s usage of, “giants” is something vaguely generic about subjectively unusual height of some unknown level above the parochial average (and yes, that is how useless the common parlance usage of that modern English word is).
Thus, his usage doesn’t agree with the English Bibles’ usage since the usage of the vague, generic, subjective, multi-usage and modern English word giants in English Bibles is that it merely renders (doesn’t even translate) Nephilim in 2 verses or Repha/im in 98% of all others and so never even hints at anything to do with any sort of height whatsoever.
He notes:
The Nephilim appear again in Numbers, where Israelite spies give a frightening report about the inhabitants of Canaan. They describe themselves as tiny by comparison with the people they saw. That imagery helped create the long association between the Nephilim and giants.
But even here, readers should be cautious.
The spies are describing people they fear. Their report is designed to emphasize how impossible conquest appears.
Language about enormous enemies can communicate terror without functioning as an exact physical measurement.
Genesis itself focuses more clearly on power and reputation than on height.
Calling the Nephilim “giants” therefore reflects an old and influential interpretation, but it does not answer every question about them.
Sure, it was, “Israelite spies” but that actually only refers to 10 unreliable guys whom God rebuked. Those 10 guys were, “describing people they fear” which led to them presenting, “Their report” which was the second in Num 13 and is referred to as having been an, “evil report” that consists of five mere assertions unbacked by even one single other verse in the whole Bible.
As for, “Were they children of heavenly beings?”:
Elsewhere in ancient biblical literature, similar language can refer to heavenly beings.
Under this reading, Genesis describes divine or supernatural figures crossing a boundary between heaven and humanity.
Their relationships with human women then become connected with extraordinary offspring.
This interpretation became especially important in later Jewish tradition.
But once again, Genesis itself provides very little explanation.
Later writings expanded the story with names, motives, battles, forbidden knowledge, and elaborate accounts of giant offspring.
Those later traditions are important for understanding how ancient people interpreted Genesis.
They are not identical with Genesis itself.
That is fair enough. I’ll note that Job 38:7, as one example, shows us that, “sons of God” can refer to non-human beings (which the LXX has as “Angeloi”: plural of “Angelos”) since they, at the very least, witnessed the creation of the Earth.
Jude and 2 Peter 2 combined refer to a sin of Angels, place that sin to pre-flood days and correlate it to sexual sin which occurred after the Angels, “left their first estate,” after which they were incarcerated, and there’s only a one-time fall/sin of Angels in the Bible. So, if they’re not referring to the Gen 6 affair, we’ve no idea to what sin they’re referring.
The original, traditional, and majority view among the earliest Jewish and Christian commentators, starting in BC days, was the Angel view as I proved in my book On the Genesis 6 Affair’s Sons of God: Angels or Not?: A Survey of Early Jewish and Christian Commentaries Including Notes on Giants and the Nephilim.
Prof. C. Fred Alford then notes:
The Nephilim are especially popular online because mystery invites imagination.
When a text leaves gaps, people naturally want to fill them.
That has produced theories involving hidden races, ancient superhuman civilizations, secret bloodlines, extraterrestrials, and discoveries allegedly concealed from the public.
Such ideas may make entertaining stories.
They are not the same as interpreting Genesis.
This comes into play due to the fact that, for example, the dirty little secret is that since we’ve no reliable physical description of Nephilim then their height is a non-issue and that alone debunks 99% of un-biblical Nephilology—the modern branch of which is just un-biblical neo-theo sci-fi tall-tales.
I’ve written whole books debunking them such as Nephilim and Giants: Believe It or Not!: Ancient and Neo-Theo-Sci-Fi Tall Tales and also Nephilim and Giants as per Pop-Researchers: A Comprehensive Consideration of the claims of I.D.E. Thomas, Chuck Missler, Dante Fortson, Derek Gilbert, Brian Godawa, Patrick Heron, Thomas Horn, Ken Johnson, L.A. Marzulli, Josh Peck, CK Quarterman, Steve Quayle, Rob Skiba, Gary Wayne, Jim Wilhelmsen, et al.
Also, see my article How Nephilim Absconded from the Tanakh and Invaded Folkloric Territory.
His answer to, “What can we reasonably conclude?” includes:
The safest conclusions are modest.
The Bible gives us very little direct information about the Nephilim.
They appear in Genesis and again in Numbers.
They are associated with extraordinary power and with ancient traditions that clearly impressed or frightened later readers.
Beyond that, interpretations multiply.
Note that it’s too vague to write, “They appear in Genesis and again in Numbers” since they appear in Genesis reliably and again in Numbers but unreliably. That is to say, they appear in texts that have them as historically alive, on the ground, in Gen but not in Num since the latter is just a tall-tale.
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