There are effectively two views[13] regarding the identity of the nephilim, which follow on from alternative views about the identity of the sons of God:
Offspring of Seth: The Qumran (Dead Sea Scroll) fragment 4Q417 (4QInstruction) contains the earliest known reference to the phrase "children of Seth", stating that God has condemned them for their rebellion. Other early references to the offspring of Seth rebelling from God and mingling with the daughters of Cain, are found in rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, Augustine of Hippo, Julius Africanus, and the Letters attributed to St. Clement. It is also the view expressed in the modern canonical Amharic Ethiopian Orthodox Bible.
Offspring of angels: A number of early sources refer to the "sons of heaven" as "Angels". The earliest such references[14] seem to be in the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Greek, and Aramaic Enochic literature, and in certain Ge'ez manuscripts of 1 Enoch (mss AQ) and Jubilees[15] used by western scholars in modern editions of the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha.[16] Also some Christian apologists shared this opinion, like Tertullian and especially Lactantius. The earliest statement in a secondary commentary explicitly interpreting this to mean that angelic beings mated with humans, can be traced to the rabbinical Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, and it has since become especially commonplace in modern-day Christian commentaries.
Fallen angels[edit]
Main article: Fallen angel
The New American Bible commentary draws a parallel to the Epistle of Jude and the statements set forth in Genesis, suggesting that the Epistle refers implicitly to the paternity of nephilim as heavenly beings who came to earth and had sexual intercourse with women.[17] The footnotes of the Jerusalem Bible suggest that the Biblical author intended the nephilim to be an "anecdote of a superhuman race".[18]
Some Christian commentators have argued against this view,[19] citing Jesus' statement that angels do not marry.[20] Others believe that Jesus was only referring to angels in heaven.[21] However, Genesis does not speak of marriage between the women and "the sons of God".
Evidence cited in favor of the "fallen angels" interpretation includes the fact that the phrase "the sons of God" (Hebrew, בְּנֵי הָֽאֱלֹהִים; literally "sons of the gods") is used twice outside of Genesis chapter 6, in the Book of Job (1:6 and 2:1) where the phrase explicitly references angels. The Septuagint's translation of Genesis 6:2 renders this phrase as "the angels of God."[improper synthesis?][22]
Second Temple Judaism[edit]
Main articles: Book of Enoch, Book of Jubilees, and Watcher (angel)
See also: Second Temple Judaism
The story of the nephilim is further elaborated in the Book of Enoch. The Greek, Aramaic, and main Ge'ez manuscripts of 1 Enoch and Jubilees obtained in the 19th century and held in the British Museum and Vatican Library, connect the origin of the nephilim with the fallen angels, and in particular with the egrḗgoroi (watchers). Samyaza, an angel of high rank, is described as leading a rebel sect of angels in a descent to earth to have sexual intercourse with human females:
And it came to pass when the children of men had multiplied that in those days were born unto them beautiful and comely daughters. And the angels, the children of the heaven, saw and lusted after them, and said to one another: 'Come, let us choose us wives from among the children of men and beget us children.' And Semjaza, who was their leader, said unto them: 'I fear ye will not indeed agree to do this deed, and I alone shall have to pay the penalty of a great sin.' And they all answered him and said: 'Let us all swear an oath, and all bind ourselves by mutual imprecations not to abandon this plan but to do this thing.' Then sware they all together and bound themselves by mutual imprecations upon it. And they were in all two hundred; who descended in the days of Jared on the summit of Mount Hermon, and they called it Mount Hermon, because they had sworn and bound themselves by mutual imprecations upon it...
[23]
In this tradition, the children of the Nephilim are called the Elioud, who are considered a separate race from the Nephilim, but they share the fate as the Nephilim.
According to these texts, the fallen angels who begat the nephilim were cast into Tartarus (Greek Enoch 20:2),[24] a place of 'total darkness'. However, Jubilees also states that God granted ten percent of the disembodied spirits of the nephilim to remain after the flood, as demons, to try to lead the human race astray until the final Judgment.
In addition to Enoch, the Book of Jubilees (7:2125) also states that ridding the Earth of these nephilim was one of God's purposes for flooding the Earth in Noah's time. These works describe the nephilim as being evil giants.
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan identifies the nephilim as Shemihaza and the angels in the name list from 1 Enoch.[25] b Yoma 67, PRE22 and 1 QapGen ar ii 1 also identify the nephilim as the angels that fell.
There are also allusions to these descendants in the deuterocanonical books of Judith, Sirach 16:7, Baruch 3:2628, and Wisdom of Solomon 14:6, and in the non-deuterocanonical 3 Maccabees 2:4.
In the New Testament Epistle of Jude 1415 cites from 1 Enoch 1:9, which many scholars believe is based on Deuteronomy 33:2.[26][27][28] To most commentators this confirms that the author of Jude regarded the Enochic interpretations of Genesis 6 as correct, however others[29] have questioned this.
The descendants of Seth and Cain[edit]
Orthodox Judaism has taken a stance against the idea that Genesis 6 refers to angels or that angels could intermarry with men. Shimon bar Yochai pronounced a curse on anyone teaching this idea. Rashi and Nachmanides followed this. Pseudo-Philo, Biblical Antiquities 3:13 may also imply that the "sons of God" were human.[30] Consequently, most Jewish commentaries and translations describe the Nephilim as being from the offspring of "sons of nobles", rather than from "sons of God" or "sons of angels".[31] This is also the rendering suggested in the Targum Onqelos, Symmachus and the Samaritan Targum which read "sons of the rulers", where Targum Neophyti reads "sons of the judges".
