Fallen Angels Taking Human Form.

A Study of Genesis 6: 1-7
IN a diary describing a visit by the writer to the ruins of ancient Egyptian temples, the following passage occurred:
"Who that has stood amidst the shadows of the towering pillars of the great Hypostyle Hall of the vast temple of Luxor, will easily forget the beauty of the scene as one looked across the large forecourt of Amenhotep III., and caught the glow of the sun, now setting behind the Theban Hills, irradiating with a golden brilliance the mighty columns of the colonnades?
“Yet the grandeur of the open court is of less interest than is the story depicted upon the walls of that apartment near the Sanctuary which is called the Birth Room.  The reliefs tell how the god Amen-Ra took to himself the form of Thothmes IV. and visited his queen Mutemua.  She, supposing the visitor to be her royal husband, received him to her chamber.  Before leaving her, the god revealed himself, and told her the child of their union should be named Amenhotep.
“In the mortuary temple of Hatshepsut at Dir-el-Bahri is given a story, somewhat similar in its detail, and identical in the essential feature of Amen-Ra becoming the father of Queen Hatshepsut, by visiting, under the guise of her husband, the queen Aahmes.
“And in the temple of Isis at Phylae is a further somewhat similar series of reliefs.
“Whether the very king and the very queen named in these inscriptions were of semi-superhuman origin, we do not say.  It may be that this was alleged of them merely to give them greater hold upon the superstitious peoples over whom they ruled and whose worship they guided.
“But was there anything or nothing of fact ever behind this alleged matter of gods taking human form, visiting such of the daughters of men as they would, and becoming the fathers of their children?   Is it a mere invention, or does it point to the most terrible of all evils that have afflicted this world?”
Scripture Testimony.
Before summarily dismissing the idea as impossible, as merely a cunning invention of priestcraft for the purpose of deceiving mankind in its own interests, the thoughtful will consider some facts.
(1)  Moses was “instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians" (Acts 7:22) and could not have been ignorant of these stories.  Indeed, he may have seen these very reliefs which the visitor still looks upon.
(2)  The Israelites also, by reason of their long sojourn in Egypt, must have been familiar with these alleged events.
(3)  Yet when Moses rejected the gods of Egypt to serve the only true God, Jehovah; and when he led Israel out of Egypt, and denounced all idolatry in unmeasured terms; he not only did not instruct his followers that these stories were “fond things vainly invented," mere abominable deceits of men, but, on the contrary, he, in narrating for Israel's benefit, the history of former times, declares that both before the Flood, and after that judgment also, certain of “the sons of Elohim saw the daughters of adam (man) that they were fair; and they took them wives of all that they chose" (Gen. 6).
That these “sons of God" were angelic beings is clear from the following particulars:
(a)  The contrast in the terms “the sons of Elohim" and “the daughters of adam” ("the adam" the descendants of the one so named, Adam).
(b)  That the offspring of such unions were, as might be expected, markedly “mighty,” and did such deeds as made them “men of renown.”  These features in the children are not accounted for on the supposition that the fathers were only men, even if godly men.
(c) That the consequence on earth was the so great abounding of wickedness, and specially the corrupting of the imaginations of men's hearts, that God could no more tolerate the scene, and judgment swept over the world of the ungodly.  This special inward corrupting of man, suggests some special inward spiritual agency and influence.
(d)  That the term “sons of Elohim" in the literature of the time meant angelic beings. Job was a contemporary writing with Genesis, and was given for the instruction of the same people, Israel.  To have used such a remarkable term for men in the one book, and of angels in the other book, would have been confusing.  But in Job 1: 6 and 2: 2, Satan is seen in the company of the “sons of God" and the locality is heavenly, for Satan informs Jehovah that he has come to that place of meeting "from going to and fro in the earth."
And yet more conclusive is chapter 38: 7, for there, God indicates that the "sons of God” were in existence before the earth was made, for at the creation of it, they shouted for joy.
In Psalm 82: 1, 6, the "elohim” are again spoken of, and as “sons of the Most High." Here they are threatened, that if they go on in the evil of which God complains in verse 2, they shall “die like Adam" (man).  Now if children of Adam were the persons addressed, it were superfluous to so warn them, for their death would be a matter of course; hence these "sons of the Most High” must be the “sons of Elohim," not of Adam.  It may be remarked that when our Lord quoted this verse (John 10: 34), He made no mention of what order of beings God was in this Psalm addressing.  His use of the passage to prove the inviolability of the Word of God is as pertinent whoever were the beings God was speaking to, whether angels or men.
Angels Materializing.
(4)  Seeing that angels can so materialize to themselves bodies as to eat the food of men (Gen. 18: 8), to draw Lot by their hands (Gen. 19: 10, 16), etc., there need be no difficulty in believing them able to perform other bodily functions, if they so wish.
If Matthew 22: 30 be urged to the contrary, it may be pointed out that our Lord states what is the condition of things “in heaven."  He does not allege that angels cannot violate that order, and act otherwise on earth.   Whilst in Jude, verses 6, 7, we are plainly told that there have been “angels who kept not their own principality but left their proper habitation”; and it is explained that Sodom and Gomorrah, in going after strange flesh, sinned "like these" angels.
The thoughtful, we say, will consider these facts and scriptures, and will not fail to note that this abhorrent and terrible subject is of practical moment, inasmuch as the Son of God has forewarned us that the days before His appearing again on earth will present a true likeness to the days of Noah and to the state of Sodom in the days of Lot.
Let the modern westerner marvel and cavil if he please, but these stories plainly tell us that the men of old knew the possibility of these dark things.  And Genesis 6 tells us who were the real gods of paganism, who thus, for the purpose of debasing mankind, “left their proper habitation,” namely, rebellious angels. “Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our instruction."
Objections Considered.
When writing as above, I was not unaware that another view of Genesis 6: 2, has been advanced.
Defending that other interpretation, one reader of the diary was good enough to quote from a well-known work as follows:
“But the race of Seth also became infected with the vices of the Cainites.  This seems to be the only reasonable sense of the intercourse between the ‘sons of God’ (sons of Elohim) and the ‘daughters of men’ (daughters of Adam).  We may put aside all fancies borrowed from heathen mythology respecting the union of superhuman beings with mortal women and assume that both parties were of the human race.  The family of Seth, who preserved their faith in God, and the family of Cain, who lived only for this world, had hitherto kept distinct; but now a mingling of the two races took place, which resulted in the thorough corruption of the former, who falling away, plunged into the deepest abyss of wickedness.  We are also told that this union produced a stock conspicuous for physical strength and courage . . .”   Smith’s “Students’ Old Testament history.”
As we suppose that this will be accepted as a good statement of that interpretation, we will examine it a little closely.
I.  It is scarcely fair to those who hold the view under discussion that it should be summarily dismissed as “a fancy borrowed from heathen mythology."  For that view is deduced from numerous Scriptures, and considerations arising therefrom, of which many are before suggested, and were mythology silent upon the subject, it would still, as we think, be deducible and maintainable from the Word of God.
Nor is it true, wise or scientific to dismiss all ancient mythology as necessarily false to fact, and as being therefore unworthy of consideration.
Having seen in the Word of God itself reason for entertaining the view before advocated, those who advance it, point, by way of corroboration, to the unquestionable and remarkable fact that the ancient mythologies, which, be it specially noted, carry us back to the same period of history which the book of Genesis covers, reveal this as the almost universal belief of the whole ancient world at and after that period, and as being indeed a foundation of their religions.
How did this extraordinary conception come into existence and command such universal and permanent assent?  We think that those who reject the explanation which is offered by Genesis 6 (upon our reading of its meaning) can give no explanation of this pregnant fact.
The Real “Gods" of Paganism.
Our own view of paganism is that it was instituted by Satan, and his angelic co-rebels, for sinister purposes in opposition to the will of God.
This is the explanation given in the Scriptures, which definitely and repeatedly instruct us that it is to demons that idolatrous worship is really and finally directed (Deuteronomy 32: 17; Psalm 106: 37; 1 Corinthians 10: 20.
This being so, certainly much concerning Satan and his workings may be learned from paganism, if only it is studied in the light of God's revelation in Scripture.
Now mythology enshrines the remembrance by man of the earliest actings and teachings of these fallen angels.  And this is the only explanation which meets the facts of the case as they always have existed and do still exist.
The general correspondence of pagan worship in various lands and times, and particularly the secret and esoteric teaching which makes all paganisms and mythologies one body of demonology, finds here its sole and sufficient explanation.
The persistency of these ideas, and of rituals embodying these ideas, through thousands of years, in spite of the decay and passing of nations, is also thus readily explained. 
Permeating the Western World.
The solemn fact that the essential doctrines of these old pagan philosophies are even now subtly and widely permeating the western world, in spite of its education and scientific progress, and are captivating multitudes who would boast of intellectual superiority to the “poor heathen,” finds a prompt and adequate explanation in the thought that the mighty "god of this age" is powerfully working to reinfect the latest descendants of Japheth with the very same conceptions as blinded their forefathers and still blind the sons of Shem; conceptions which hide from men the true God and so make them the more ready prey to God's enemy and would-be usurper.
Nor is this a difficult work, seeing that peoples who have had the Word of God are largely refusing to walk in the light which that Word sheds forth, and are thus easily deluded by Theosophy, Spiritism, Christian Science. and the like philosophies, the essential teachings of which are identical with the pantheistic views of Hinduism and Buddhism, as well as the Grecian and Egyptian systems of thought which once flourished with but have been outlived by their more eastern relations.
Wisdom calls upon the discerning to be prepared to hear some solemn warnings from paganism, and to so detect some of Satan's wiles and depths, and to be kept therefrom.
And where, as in the point under review, the Scriptures of truth and the general belief of the ancient world strictly accord (as they do upon our view of those Scriptures), it is not wise, and may be dangerous, to peremptorily refuse to even listen to the united testimony.
Paganism pressed hard upon both Jews and Christian disciples, and was a constant spiritual menace to both; and much of the deeper, finer meaning of the utterances of prophets and apostles can only be appreciated when this fact is understood and kept in mind.
The Weakness of the Objection.
II.  The fundamental weakness of the case upheld by the writer quoted was never more clearly revealed than when he wrote as above, "we may . . . assume that both parties were of the human race.”
That is precisely the basis upon which the exposition rests; it is assumption.  It is a fact that in each other place where the exact term "sons of Elohim" is employed, it designates angelic beings; and therefore, it must be assumed that in Genesis 6, it means men, for that cannot be proved.  Let us notice how many and great are the assumptions involved in that one.
(1) It is assumed that the descendants of Seth as a whole, kept true to Jehovah. This is nowhere stated, nor even implied.  Of even the patriarchs, it cannot be proved, except in the cases of Enoch and Noah.
Indeed, the very fact that in a genealogy, the former is singled out for mention as being one who “walked with God" almost suggests that he differed in that particular from the others named, for had they all walked with God, why should his doing so be remarked upon and the rest be left without this praise?
(2)  But if Seth's descendants did for a time fear God, it is at any rate an assumption that they continued to do so through the many long centuries down to about the year of the world 1536; and,
(3)  It is a further assumption, for it is not so stated, that the collapse of their godliness took place just 120 years before the Flood.
Nor is any explanation forthcoming as to why they had not sooner noticed the daughters of men as being attractive, or why, if they had noticed them, they were not sooner overcome by their charms.
Were the daughters of Seth’s family without beauty that the fairness of the Cainite women suddenly and so disastrously conquered them? or had the two families, though rapidly multiplying, and living in the same region, never touched each other?
(4)  In order to explain the might and prowess of the offspring, it is assumed that Sethites and Cainites were separate races.
In point of fact, no national or racial distinctions were known at that time, for the differences are plainly stated to have commenced after the flood with the confounding of the one language hitherto spoken by all.
Hence our former remarks under 3 (b) (c) are not invalidated.
(5)  It is an assumption, having no warrant in other places where the term is used, that when God says “sons of Elohim", he means “sons of Seth."
An argument that requires that its every premise be assumed, cannot be maintained.
The Scofield Bible.
I was further referred to the footnote to Genesis 6 in that, in general, excellent work, Dr. C. I. Scofield's edition of the English Bible.
That helpful teacher denies that the term "sons of Elohim" always elsewhere denotes angelic beings.  But in support, he refers to but one passage (Isa. 43: 6); and lo! on referring to this solitary citation, it is to find that the term under consideration is not there used! Jehovah does not in that place describe Israel as “sons of Elohim,” but merely as “my sons.”
It is by no means denied that men are in a true sense, sons of God.  Adam, as created by God, is so called in Luke 3: 38, by implication from verse 23; and in the same creaturely sense, of relationship to the Creator, all Adam's race are termed God's “offspring" (Acts 17: 28).
Moreover, by regeneration of the inward man, all believers of every age become spiritual sons of God.  But these usages of the term “son” in no degree establish that a distinct and very seldom used term so peculiar as is “sons of Elohim” also means men, when in the rest of the places where it is found, it plainly denotes angelic beings.
That it means human beings is one more assumption, and a very large one, since it must be made in antagonism to the uniform biblical usage of the term.
Summing Up.
III.  We would restate the matter as follows:
(1)  Reading Genesis 6, it is observed that certain beings termed “sons of God" are said to have consorted with the “daughters of Adam.”  Who are these “sons of Elohim"?  The contrast between the two terms suggests other than human beings, for the natural description of these latter would be “sons of Adam."  Also, if Sethites and Cainites were meant, why were not those terms used, for so no ambiguity would have been left? 
(2)  The presumption that angelic beings are meant, is strongly confirmed when it is found that in the other places in Scripture where this exact term is employed, it plainly means angels.
(3)  That this is the meaning is further established by the statement of the Holy Spirit through Jude, that there were, at an earlier period, angels who kept not their own principality, their assigned region of the universe, but left “their proper habitation" (oiketerion: only elsewhere used in 2 Corinthians 5: 2, “to be clothed upon with our habitation which is from heaven").
Hence these angels left that form, that spiritual body, in which they were created, and took a “house,” a bodily dwelling, which did not belong to them by God's will; that is, as Jude describes it, comparing it with the unnatural intermixtures of the Sodomites, they “went after strange (heteros) flesh," that is, they mingled with heterogeneous beings, creatures of a different nature by constitution.
Such violations of His divisions and limitations amongst His creatures, God suffers not in any sphere of life (see Lev. 19: 19), and condign punishment was commanded (Ex. 22: 19).  Similarly, these particular angels were cast down to “pits of darkness“1 and there enchained, pending the final assize of the universe (Jude 6, 7 and 2 Pet. 2: 4). 
1("Pits of darkness." Greek Tartarus. 2 Peter 2: 4. only.  The Holy Spirit here employs a term well-known in the then current Greek mythology, with which the readers of the Epistle were surrounded in Asia Minor.  He thus definitely confirms two of the pagan notions associated with that term: (1)  That there is such a region, and that it is a prison.  (2)  That superhuman beings are therein confined.  This is itself a hint that an element of fact and truth mingles with the false in ancient mythology.)
(4) This sense of the passage is strongly confirmed by the fact of the monstrous offspring which resulted in those days before the flood and also after that great judgment—offspring gigantic in size, power and wickedness.
The Anakim who terrified the Israelitish spies, the nephilim and the rephaim, all will be suitably accounted for by this parentage, with its infusion of superhuman vitality and force.
The very term nephilim (fallen ones) reminds of Jude's utterance, “angels . . . be cast down."  The term is found only in Genesis 6: 4, “The nephilim were in the earth in those days (i e., before the flood) and also after that (judgment), etc."; and in Numbers 13: 33, where the Israelitish spies report of Canaan, “and there we saw the nephilim, the sons of Anak, which come of the nephilim.”
Here the name is given both to the giant descendants and also to their progenitors, but the two are distinguished, "We saw the nephilim . . . which come of the nephilim."
Why this peculiar usage?  It were strange and needless to say, “We saw the English . . . which come of the English.”  But allow for the supernatural character of those who first bore the name, and a suitable explanation is found for distinguishing between the race and their originators.
Influencing Earthly Affairs.
In Psalm 82: 7, the cognate verb to the noun nephilim (fallen ones) is used and is translated “fall," and appears to refer back to the same dire event of the remote past in the heavenly world.
There God is described as standing in the congregation of the “elohim," which cannot mean earthly judges, since there is no hint in Scripture of God standing in the midst of a gathering of such and revising their doings; whereas there are plain instances given of His so doing with heavenly beings (Job 1: 6-12; 2: 1-6; 1 Kings 22: 19-23).
These “elohim" are reproached for perverting justice on the earth; and their subtle influence upon godless earthly judges is the only adequate explanation of the virtually universal corruptness of the law courts and officials, a state of affairs so manifestly disastrous to the people, and yet almost everywhere, acquiesced in by its victims, and seemingly beyond remedy, save only where God's holy Word has created a strong public opinion demanding equity in public affairs.
The "elohim” are then warned that unless they mend their ways, by rightly using their powers on behalf of the needy and afflicted, they “shall die like a man (or Adam) and fall like one of the princes."
If men were here in view, plainly the threat that they should die like a man were needless, since that end would be theirs for certain, and whether they were just or unjust in public duties.  Nor, supposing they were men; can any definite meaning be assigned to the warning that they should “fall like one of the princes." 
But when we take the preceding verse, “I said, Ye are elohim (being akin to myself, the mighty El), and all of you sons of the Most High" to apply to heavenly rulers (“the world rulers of this darkness," Eph. 6: 12), then all is plain and harmonious.
The present rebel rulers, not yet dispossessed from office, are warned that, by going on in the course of prostituting their powers to evil ends, they will deserve and share the same fate as man, they will die—that is, will pass from their original sphere and state into a lower and miserable condition of banishment from God and from their glorious region of the universe, the heavens.
Thus, like those former princes of their order, they too shall fall.  And the prophetic picture of this downfall is given in Revelation 12: 7-12, and their imprisonment, like those earlier fallen princes, is pointed to in Revelation 20: 1-3, and their final dreadful doom subsequent to the millennial Kingdom, in verse 10 and in Matthew 25: 41.
Thus, our view of Genesis 6 is confirmed by its agreement with other passages, all these Scriptures illuminating, amplifying and corroborating one another.
Mythology Agrees.
(5) It is further confirmatory that the mythologies of all ancient peoples, preserving as they do the traditions of their earliest beliefs, definitely and constantly embody this conception; and do this so persistently, and so without attempt to persuade to the acceptance thereof, as to create the presumption that some reality, which none in those times questioned,  lay at the root of the belief.
This explanation of mythology agrees with the statement of the Scriptures that the offspring of the illicit unions became the “men of renown" (literally "the men of the name"); their mighty and abominable doings, with those of their angelic begetters, forming, upon this view, the historical background upon which much of the stories of the gods of mythology was based.
(6) The reading of the term “sons of Elohim" as meaning men, does violence to all the facts included in the foregoing observations, refutes none of the arguments drawn from these facts, and requires numerous pure assumptions to give it any seeming basis.
Upon, analysis of the thinking of those who object to the view here advocated, it will probably be found that the only radical objection may be stated in the question, “How can these things be?”
This objection is anticipated in paragraph 4 of section 4, of our opening remarks. The control by angels of the material universe, animate and inanimate, is largely exemplified, though not formally discussed, throughout God's Word.  But even could we not find an answer to the question “How?" that would not warrant our not accepting the foregoing statements of Scripture in their simple and solemn meaning.
A Concluding Argument.
(7)  Lastly, we will advance one other consideration which seems conclusive even by itself. It is alleged that the term “daughters of Adam” means the women of the Cainite  family.
This implies that the previous term, “when men began to multiply,” means Cainite men only, since it is their daughters who are in question.
But this is a plainly impossible, because plainly inaccurate use of the term, since the Sethites were equally “men."
And it is equally impossible that the former term should mean Cainite women as distinct from and in contrast to Sethite women.  It is vital to the view we reject, that the term should apply to the Cainite women only.  Without this being allowed, the argument is gone.
But it is positive and plain that the Sethite women were equally “daughters of Adam," and that therefore the term could not with any correctness apply exclusively to the women of either family, but necessarily covered them all.
So that the term “sons of Elohim" does most certainly stand in sharp contrast to both of the terms “daughters of men" and "men," and implies that those so described were not men.
If any ask whether this question is worth laboring, we can but reply that all Scripture being given to us by the love and wisdom of God, it must be of value to accurately understand it; and we must again reflect that the days of Noah present a picture of the times to precede our Lord's return.
To be forewarned from a right understanding of those former days is to be forearmed, to meet the terrible dangers of the last days, toward which season, as so many devout students believe, we are fast approaching, if we have not already felt and seen their first chill shadows.
He who foresees cries, “I say unto all, Watch!"   “Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation.”
“The Christian Worker’s Magazine” Sept. 1916.