Holy Hormones Bible Study: Teaching — not Entertainment

WHAT DOES THE GENOCIDE IN DEUTERONOMY 2:32–34 TEACH ABOUT GOD’S JUSTICE?

How can you worship such a cruel God?

8 min readSep 27, 2022

Brace yourself! This is more of a teaching blog than an entertaining one. It may not be an easy read because there is more here than a normal, well adjusted person would normally want to know but it will be worth it. It is the detail which makes me a boring person that brings the Bible alive for me. But if you happen to like what you read, there’s more to be found here.

[NOTE: Important words analysed below are identified with Hebrew/Greek transliterations into English and Strong’s Numbers so that whoever wants to can check them out — it is strongly recommended that you do. I use the Blue Letter Bible (https://www.blueletterbible.org/ )]

Deuteronomy 2:32–34 || Then Sihon and all his people came out against us to fight at Jahaz. the Lord our God delivered him over to us; so we defeated him, his sons, and all his people. We took all his cities at that time, and we utterly destroyed the men, women, and little ones of every city; we left none remaining.

It is written in Deuteronomy 29:7 that Sihon was an ally of Og and both of these were Nephilim, as is written in Amos 2:9–10, Deuteronomy 3:11.

What are the Nephilim?

More detailed discussions of the Nephilim are found in the Apocrypha(ref 1) but this presentation will rely mostly on Holy Scripture.

To answer the question it is necessary to delve into Genesis 6:1–4 || Now it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose.

The wording infers that the ‘sons of God’, whoever they are, gave the ‘daughters of men’, whoever they are, no choice. Their progeny, according to Hebrew tradition, were named as Nephilim, a Hebrew word meaning ‘those who have fallen’ or ‘the fallen ones’, translated into Greek as gigantez, gigantes, or ‘giants’(ref 2). This Greek translation has been transliterated as ‘giants’ in the KJV Bible but the more correct transliteration of the Hebrew, ‘Nephilim’, has been applied to many of the modern Bible versions.

Who are the Sons of God?

There have been a number of views on this. The two most popular at this time are

1. The Sethite hypothesis.

“Sons of God” refers to descendants of Seth, godly men who sinned by marrying pagan descendants of Cain. The Nephilim were simply “heroes”, not giants, and may or may not have been the offspring of the mixed marriages.

The first person to popularize this idea was Augustine of Hippo(ref 3) in the 4th century C.E. Augustine’s commentary on the Genesis 6 account has become the predominant view, adopted by familiar names such as Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century to John Calvin in the 17th century.

Even though it has become the most predominant view, it is evident that Augustine was interpretation of Scripture was strongly influenced(ref 4) by Origen Adamantius (c.185–c.254)(ref 5) who embraced interpreted scripture allegorically and showed himself to be a stoic(ref 6), a Neo-Pythagorean(ref 7), and a Platonist(ref 8). For Origen, God was not Yehovah but the First Principle, and Christ, the Logos, was subordinate to him.

2. The Fallen Angel hypothesis.

“Sons of God” are fallen angels who lived on earth and mated with human women. Nephilim are giants of extra-human strength who were the progeny.

Prior to Augustine inventing the Sethite claim, the common view held was that the “sons of God” who had unlawful relations with the daughters of men were in fact fallen divine angelic beings(ref 9).

This paragraph can be skipped. It is references for those who are interested.
Pre-Christ, traditional Rabbinical literature; Book of Enoch (2nd Century B .C.)(ref 10), Testimony of the 12 Patriarchs(ref 11), and Josephus Flavius (37 — c. 100)(ref 12), shared the Fallen Angel hypothesis — as did the early Church Fathers, Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BCE — c. 50 CE)(ref 13), Justin Martyr (c. 100–165 AD)(ref 14), Irenaeus (early 2nd century — c. AD 202)‑(ref 15), Athenagoras (ca. 133–190)(ref 16), Tertullian (160 — c. 225 AD)(ref 17) and Lactantius (c. 240 — c. 320)(ref 18), among others.

To finish the Matter: Let the Scriptures Speak

Rather than indulge in rumour mongering character assassination. It seems prudent to go to the language of the Scriptures and let it decide. It was written in Hebrew for Hebrews.

“Sons of God”, ben ha’elohiym, was used by Hebrew scribes to depict angels coming before the Lord (Job 1:6 , Job 2:1 ) in Heaven, as shown in Figures 1 and 2. It can be seen that Satan is included so the term applies to both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ angels.

Figure 1: Job 1:6

Figure 2: Job 2:1

Genesis 6:2 uses the term ben ha’elohiym. Expositional consistency infers that angels similar to those in Job are the subject.

Figure 3: Genesis 6:2

Genesis 6:2 also uses the term, bath ha’adam, Daughters of Adam (man), to describe the (unfortunate[?]) women. This is a generic term in Rabbinical writing for all women.

Deuteronomy 32:8 uses the term, ben ha’adam, Sons of Adam (man), as the generic term for all men.

Figure 4: Deuteronomy 32:8

Numbers 13:33 uses the term ben ha’anak, to refer to the sons of Anak.

Figure 5: Numbers 13:33

To satisfy the constraints of expositional consistency, it is not unreasonable to deduce that sons of Seth in Genesis 6:2 would be ben ha’seth.

What is so special about ben ha’elohiym?

An important distinction of Sons of God, ben ha’elohiym, is that the Rabbinical definition of them is that they are a direct creation of HaShem(ref 19). Satan, as we saw in Figures 1 and 2, is such a direct creation — as was Adam he was formed from the dust. Adam’s blood-line (us), however, are sons of Adam. Sons of the Devil, John 8:44, are a sub-set mentioned by Yeshua, Himself.

Conclusions on Sons of God and Daughters of Adam

Based on the information above, the Nephilim are the angelic/human hybrid product of the grotesque breeding of the Sons of God (bene ha-’elohim) and Daughters of men (bath ha-’adam) having great height and strength and, as we will see, . . . dead souls.

These were Satan’s attempt to contaminate the blood-line of Adam, therefore prohibit God’s plan of Redemption proclaimed in Genesis 3:14–15. They were the wicked gene-pool which had to be wiped out in the Great Flood. Genesis 6:4, however, indicates that the problem will return, The Nephilim were on the earth in those days — and also afterward — when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them.

After the Flood

God let it be known that Abraham was part of His Redemption Plan and later let it be known that his family would be in Egypt for 430 years. During that time fallen bene ha-’elohim contaminated the blood stock of the Canaan tribes in preparation for the return of Israel.

Rephaim, Emim, Horim, Zamsummim are encountered in Genesis 14 and 15. As are Arba, Anak and his seven sons (Anakim ), encountered in Numbers 13:3. Also Og, King of Bashan in Deuteronomy 3:11 and Joshua 12 and the most famous Nephilim, Goliath, with his four brothers in 2 Samuel 21:16–22 and 1 Chronicles 20:4–8.

After the flood the general term for the generic Nephilim is Rephaim. Some of these are those that HaShem told Joshua to obliterate in Deuteronomy 2:32–34. God had to completely eliminate the gene-pool again. Ironically, those that Joshua did not wipe out (Golan Heights, Hebron, and the Gaza Strip, Joshua 15:14, et al) are those areas giving Israel most trouble today. The true battle is not between Israel, Hamas and the PLO for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

Some other names for the Rephaim are along the lines of ‘living dead’, ‘soulless dead’, ‘walking dead’. That is, Zombies.

What I can’t understand is why only the humans were marked for destruction in Deuteronomy 2:32–34. It is written in Joshua 6:21 that even the animals had to be killed in Jericho (the current Palestinian Capital). From Mark 5:11–13 I deduce that this was because the demonic spirits must inhabit living beings, but is open to discussion. It is also deduced from Matthew 12:43–45 that demonic spirits are territorial and do not like dryness.

When all is said and done

This blood-thirsty episode answers a question that often stumps Christians. “Why is Jesus so cute and Jehovah a brute?”, bibliotecapleyades.net/biblianazar/. Next to the Creation Poem, it is the question most used by those who reject the Redemption offered by the Blood of Yeshua. There is no contradiction in Deuteronomy 2:32–34 regarding HaShem’s love and mercy. The ones He was obliterating were not human. They were demonic souls intent on destroying His redemptive plan and enslave all of Creation — you and me. If only the topic were better taught in our Churches.

Have no doubt they will be back.

The forgoing evidence has not been presented to convince any reader but to allow a personal decision to be made. There is much more to know about this subject. Perhaps you’ll pay another visit, sometime.

All Glory to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

(We all have a plank in our eye. It’s bigger than we think.)

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Holy Hormones Bible Study: Teaching — not Entertainment

WHAT DOES THE GENOCIDE IN DEUTERONOMY 2:32–34 TEACH ABOUT GOD’S JUSTICE?

How can you worship such a cruel God?

Written by Brad Banardict