The Book of Mormon Evidence’s site tagline is, “The United States is the promised land foretold in the Book of Mormon.”
Its about section notes:
FIRM Foundation – Mission Statement
The FIRM Foundation (Foundation for Indigenous Research and Mormonism) is an organization dedicated to showing forth evidence for the Book of Mormon in order to provide LDS Church members with well-researched information enabling them to powerfully and respectfully defend its historicity and thus its truthfulness – with the ultimate goal of bringing people unto Christ.
Its Manager, Rian Nelson, wrote an article titled Fallen Angels, Nephilim, Watchers, Giants?
It begins with this image, the citation to which is, “A very large stone ax* was recently found in the state of New York by a man from the Seneca Nation. It weighs 20 pounds and must have been used by ‘a large and mighty man.’ (Photo courtesy of Wayne N. May).”
That it’s an ax and was thus used by a large and mighty man are assumptions—example: it could have been attached to a structure which was engineered to maximize force via a pulley system.
Regardless, it’s of import that reference was made to, “a large and mighty man” since the first paragraph notes, “The Nephilim…are large and strong; the word Nephilim is loosely translated as giants in some translations of the Hebrew Bible but left untranslated in others. Jewish explanations interpret them as fallen angels.” That seems like a copy and paste job from AI (virtually every neo-pop-article about Nephilim begins with virtually those exact words.
The immediate questions that come to mind are: what’s the usage of the vague, generic, subjective, multi-usage and modern English word “giants” in English Bibles? What’s Nelson’s usage? Do those two usages agree?
It’s not a case of, “are large” since they are nothing, they haven’t been anything since the flood so that assertion should have read, “were large.”
Yet, that’s an assertion so we will have to see if we’re told just how it is that they were even, “large”—which is just as vague, generic, subjective, and multi-usage as giants.
As for, “loosely translated as giants” that’s a fair enough qualification: it’s technically a rendering.
Asserting, “Jewish explanations interpret them as fallen angels” is generic, uncited, and unquoted and, “Jewish explanations” can range millennia.
It’s a virtually historically unknown view that Nephilim were fallen Angels. Rather, they were offspring of fallen Angels.
Wikipedia is appealed to for the statement, “The main reference to them is in Genesis, but the passage is ambiguous and the identity of the Nephilim is disputed.”
Yet, the original, traditional, and majority view among the earliest Jewish and Christians 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.
We’re told, “According to Bible Hub” etymology, the root, “nephel” refers to, “Miscarriage, stillborn…Word Origin: [from [Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance number] H5307 (נָפַל – fall)] 1. something fallen, i.e. an abortion untimely birth…naphal; something fallen, i.e. An abortion — untimely birth.”
It’s then asserted:
According to the Book of Numbers 13:33, they later inhabited Canaan at the time of the Israelite conquest of Canaan. A similar or identical biblical Hebrew term, read as “Nephilim” by some scholars, or as the word “fallen” by others, appears in the Book of Ezekiel 32:27.[3][4]”—I’m as unsure to what, “[3][4]” as I am about the asterisk above.
For some unknown reason, Rian Nelson stated, “According to the Book of Numbers 13:33” without telling us that he’s actually referring us to one single unreliable sentence from one single unreliable, “evil report” by some unreliable guys whom God rebuked. They contradicted Moses, Caleb, Joshua, God, and the rest of the whole entire Bible. And that’s only mentioning a few problems with that sentence, see my post Chapter sample: On the Post Flood Nephilim Proposal.
If, “they later inhabited Canaan at the time of the Israelite conquest” then God failed, missed a loophole, the flood was much of a waste, etc., etc., etc.
As for Ezekiel 32:27, that reads, “And they do not lie with the mighty, the fallen from among the uncircumcised, who went down to Sheol with their weapons of war, whose swords were laid under their heads, and whose iniquities are upon their bones; for the terror of the mighty men was in the land of the living.”
The issue is that Ezekiel employs the term נָפַל/nāp̄al in the generic sense of having fallen.
That is followed by a screenshot of, “Annotated Book of Mormon page 459.”
In my book Nephilim and Giants: Believe It or Not!: Ancient and Neo-Theo-Sci-Fi Tall Tales I filled a whole chapter with examples of such newspaper reports. Newspapers reports are generally no more than that reporter X noted that so and so claimed so and so, end of story. Thus, most are highly suspect—especially when a non-expert says they found a bone but can’t actually identify if it’s human, whale, dinosaur, pachyderm, etc.
Now, we next get an answer to Rian Nelson’s use of giants since there is a section titled just that, “Giants” and states, “Unusually large, tall persons” thus, his usage doesn’t agree with the English Bible’s usage since in English Bibles 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.
We’re then told, “Unusually large, tall persons…are mentioned both before the Flood (Gen. 6:4…” which is not the case since that chapter doesn’t say a single word about any size at all: he’s just misreading large/tall into the term giants.
He also cited a Mormon book titled Moses at 8:18 which also doesn’t say anything about large/tall, “And in those days there were giants on the earth, and they sought Noah to take away his life; but the Lord was with Noah, and the power of the Lord was upon him.”
Reading the multi-usage modern English word giants and merely assuming large/tall is a word-concept fallacy and it’s folly to chase a modern English word around an ancient Hebrew Bible.
Now, the statement is actually, “Unusually large, tall persons…are mentioned both before the Flood (Gen. 6:4) and after (Num. 13:33; Deut. 2:10–11, 20; 3:11–13; 9:2; Josh. 15:8; 18:16).
Let us review:
“Unusually large, tall persons…Gen. 6:4” not so.
“Unusually large, tall persons…Num. 13:33” an unreliable tall-tale.
“Unusually large, tall persons…Deut. 2:10–11, 20,” the text reads, “(The Emim formerly lived there, a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim. 11 Like the Anakim they are also counted as Rephaim, but the Moabites call them Emim…It is also counted as a land of Rephaim. Rephaim formerly lived there—but the Ammonites call them Zamzummim—[adding v. 21a] a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim.” Thus, this is where the subjective nature of, “tall,” “giants,” “huge, etc. comes into play since, sure, that refers to, “tall” but that’s subjective to the average Israelite male who was 5.0-5.3 ft. in those days.
“Unusually large, tall persons…3:11–13; 9:2” which reads, “(For only Og the king of Bashan was left of the remnant of the Rephaim. Behold, his bed was a bed of iron. Is it not in Rabbah of the Ammonites? Nine cubits was its length, and four cubits its breadth, according to the common cubit.) When we took possession of this land at that time, I gave to the Reubenites and the Gadites the territory beginning at Aroer, which is on the edge of the Valley of the Arnon, and half the hill country of Gilead with its cities. The rest of Gilead, and all Bashan, the kingdom of Og, that is, all the region of Argob, I gave to the half-tribe of Manasseh. (All that portion of Bashan is called the land of Rephaim…a people great and tall, the sons of the Anakim, whom you know, and of whom you have heard it said, ‘Who can stand before the sons of Anak?’” Thus, Og for whom we’ve no physical description and well, nothing else: as for his, “bed” the implications is that we can derive his height from it but that’s an non sequitur based on various assumptions—see my book The King, Og of Bashan, is Dead: The Man, the Myth, the Legend—of a Nephilim Giant?
“Unusually large, tall persons…Josh. 15:8; 18:16” which reads, “Then the boundary goes up by the Valley of the Son of Hinnom at the southern shoulder of the Jebusite (that is, Jerusalem). And the boundary goes up to the top of the mountain that lies over against the Valley of Hinnom, on the west, at the northern end of the Valley of Rephaim…Then the boundary goes down to the border of the mountain that overlooks the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, which is at the north end of the Valley of Rephaim. And it then goes down the Valley of Hinnom, south of the shoulder of the Jebusites, and downward to En-rogel.” Apparently, the point was that Rephaim, on average, were subjectively taller than 5.0-5.3ft.
See, “Unusually large, tall persons” merely means just that: some vague level of height above the parochial average.
The Mormon Church of Jesus Christ site is cited for the statement:
Raphah of Gath was said to be the father of several giants of whom Goliath was one (1 Sam. 17:4–7; 2 Sam. 21:16–22; 1 Chr. 20:6). A 12-fingered, 12-toed giant is also mentioned as one of the sons. The giants in Palestine were also known as Anakims, Emims, and Zamzummims.
Biblically contextually, “Raphah of Gath was said to be the father of several giants” means, “Raphah of Gath was said to be the father of several Raphaim.” For some reason, Rian Nelson didn’t tell us that the Masoretic text has Goliath at just shy of 10 ft. Yet, the earlier LXX and the earlier Dead Sea Scrolls and the earlier Flavius Josephus all have him at just shy of 7 ft. so, that’s the preponderance of the earliest data.
Indeed, the “12-fingered, 12-toed” Repha is the only person in the Bible described as such. And we already saw that, “The giants in Palestine were also known as Anakims, Emims, and Zamzummims” means, “The” Rephaim, “in Palestine,” Cannan or Israel, “were also known as,” their clan, “Anakims” and their a.k.a.s, “Emims, and Zamzummims.”
He notes that some, “Christians say the Nephilim are the Fallen Angels or Spirits” but historically, that’s a virtually unknown view.
He adds, “I am confident that spirits, or those who have not come to this earth to receive a body, cannot have sexual relationships with those who have a physical body,” Yet, there’s no indication that any spirits came to Earth to receive a body: that’s Mormon add-ons.
He added, “Nephel in Hebrew means stillborn or abortion. Nephilim may have not been a race of people, but an ideology and a set of practices that some people after the Flood returned to which included abortion and other sexual depravities” and yet, the context of the Gen 6 affair’s narrative is that they were physical offspring of physical copulation after marriage which came after attraction.
He then notes that he will provide, “quotes below from members of our Church are most likely to be correct” beginning with the section title, “JOSEPH SMITH DIDN’T BELIEVE IN WATCHERS” which begins with a quote about, “the rise of the” whatever is meant by, “giant race” for which Gen 6 is quoted regarding, “giants (Nephilim).”
It’s noted that, “two main schools of exegesis have formed” one being, “disobedient angels (sometimes called Watchers)…producing a race of giants” and, “the pious race descended from Seth, who sinned by marrying descendants of Cain, who would have been pagans.” Thus, the pious weren’t pious since they were such terrible sinners that their sin served as the premise for the flood. And, that Sethites were pious and Cainites Pagans is a myth based on prejudice.
It’s noted, “The first explanation is definitely the cool one. I would have thought that Joseph Smith would have been all over fallen angels, with his emphasis on the corporeality of divine beings. But it turns out that Joseph didn’t believe in Watchers” which is a clue about his level of accuracy since he rejected the original, traditional, and majority view among the earliest Jewish and Christians commentators, starting in BC days.
It’s at this point that Rian Nelson informs us he’s been quoting Hugh Nibley (Professor Emeritus of Ancient Scripture at Brigham Young University) who also noted, “Seth…carry on his [Adam’s] work…that line of successors in the priesthood, etc.
Next, this map is provided about how Sethies lived in the US of A and Cainites across the pond—well, it’s noted, “…the earth had no division between the old and new world. There was no Atlantic Ocean”: the statement before the map is, “Cainites Lived Near Jerusalem. Sethites Lived Near Eden which was near the Garden of Eden.”
Hugh Nibley asserted, “Cainites dedicated to following Satan, who…devoted themselves to all the pleasures of the flesh and all manner of immorality” even though there’s literally zero indication of that. And, “Sethites…were faithful to the divine law” well, except when they weren’t.
It’s noted, “In apocryphal Enoch stories we are told…special heavenly messengers…were sent down to earth…but…yielded to temptation…They are variously designated as the Watchers, Fallen Angels, Sons of God, Nephilim, or Rephaim, and are sometimes confused with their offspring, the Giants.” I’m unsure who variously designated them as such but that’s a category error since Watchers is just an a.k.a. for Angels which is sometimes an a.k.a. for Sons of God with Nephilim being their offspring, Rephaim being utterly unrelated and Giants referring to Nephilim (2% of the time) or Rephaim (98%) of the time merely linguistically.
We’re told, “While the sons of God have been identified with both angels and the Watchers, the Greek Enoch does not identify the Watchers with Satan’s hosts who fell from heaven from the beginning—they are another crowd.” Yet, there’s no such thing as, “Satan’s hosts who fell from heaven from the beginning” since Angels fell during the Gen 6 timeline, “When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them.”
Now we’re told:
“It is the Joseph Smith Enoch which gives the most convincing solution: the beings who fell were not angels but men who had become sons of God. From the beginning, it tells us, mortal men could qualify as “sons of God,” beginning with Adam. Moses 6:68
How? By believing and entering the covenant. Moses 7:1 Thus when “Noah and his sons hearkened unto the Lord, and gave heed … they were called the sons of God.” Moses 8:13
In short, the sons of God are those who accept and live by the law of God. When “the sons of men” (as Enoch calls them) broke their covenant, they still insisted on that exalted title: “Behold, we are the sons of God; have we not taken unto ourselves the daughters of men?” Moses 8:21 (Hugh Nibley, “A Strange Thing in the Land: The Return of the Book of Enoch, Part 8,” Ensign, Dec 1976, 73)
It’s as already noted then, “Joseph Smith Enoch” which seems to be a typo, “gives the most convincing solution” which is that those who were, “believing and entering the covenant…who accept and live by the law of God…” weren’t really believing, nor really entering the covenant nor really did accept nor live by the law of God since they, “broke their covenant.”
It’s then noted that Joseph Fielding Smith (tenth Mormonism president) referred to the original, traditional, and majority view among the earliest view as a, “foolish notion” resulting from, “lack of proper information” even though 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.
Smith referred to Mormonism’s founder Joseph Smith’s view as, “the inspired interpretation given to the Prophet” (cited as, “(Answers to Gospel Questions, 5 vols. [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1957-1966], 1: 136.)).”
Moreover, “in sermons in the Journal of Discourses…by Charles W. Penrose, “heirs to the Priesthood….obeyed the holy covenants…received the word of the Lord…were consecrated to the Almighty” but really weren’t and didn’t.
Rian Nelson notes that in, “the FirmFoundationExpo post on Facebook…Mason Wheeler…responded ‘The roots of the Hebrew word ‘nephilim’, and of the Greek ‘gigantes’, both of which get translated in the Bible as ‘giants,’ have nothing to do with large size, or angels. On the contrary, ‘gigantes’ refers to people ‘of the Earth.’ And ‘nephilim’ is related to words meaning ‘mighty’ and, strangely enough, ‘abortion.’”
Well, naphal and gigantes are technically rendered as giants and indeed, “have nothing to do with large size, or angels.” I can see how it’s noted that, “‘gigantes’ refers to people ‘of the Earth’” since it literally means earth-born (as in born of Gaia: the Greek Earth false goddess). Yet, it’s not “‘nephilim’ is related to words meaning ‘mighty’” since that’s gibborim (he may have been thinking of elohim) and as for abortion well, that certainly wouldn’t be literal since they were born and grew up into mighty men.
Now, besides more than highly questionable qualifications, teachings, and actions, I pondered why OG Smith would oppose the original, traditional, and majority view and we may have gotten a hint a the tale end of the article. Perhaps it was a pragmatic move in that, “Extrabiblical sources tell us that Joseph Smith was right when he said the antediluvian “sons of God” were fallen Priesthood leaders, not fallen angels” I suppose, if, “Extrabiblical sources” refers to assertions from the 1800 AD.
More to the point, if they were humans, “This understanding also explains how they could survive the Flood and have ‘giants’ in the land of Canaan for Joshua’s scouting team to find.”
Do you see what just happened here? By chasing a generic modern English word around a specific ancient Hebrew Bible, we ended up with Smith seeming to solve a problem which is actually a non-issue.
Since, “‘giants’ in the land of Canaan for Joshua’s scouting team to find” is too vague an assertion so I’ll elucidate in both directions that it can take us:
If it’s, “‘Rephaim’ in the land of Canaan for Joshua’s scouting team to find” then certainly, there were Rephaim there but they have literally nothing to do with pre-flood days and thus, nothing to do with the flood, so no reason to invent tall-tales about their survival. Nephilim were strictly pre-flood hybrids, Rephaim were strictly post-flood humans, and there’s zero correlation between them.
If it’s, “‘Nephilim’ in the land of Canaan for Joshua’s scouting team to find” then he’s actually referring to that one single unreliable sentence from an unreliable, “evil report” by unreliable guys whom God rebuked so it’s a double non-issue.
He further notes, “Nephilim was not a race of people, but an ideology and a set of practices that some people after the Flood returned to” but if that’s the case then why are Nephilim only referred to one single time post-flood (and, in a most unreliable manner)?
Mason Wheeler claimed to get such ideas from Jonah Barnes’ book The Lost Gems of Genesis so now you know to avoid that book—unless you want to write a debunking critique.
Thus, overall, we got an article based on faulty linguistics and some faulty sources which results in that which I term pop-Nephilology which consists of un-biblical tall-tales.
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