A Textual Comparison Between the Torah and the Book of Enoch Genesis 6 is one of the most debated passages in Biblical literature. Rather than speculate, we will examine: 1 What the Torah explicitl...
Transcript
In Genesis 6-2, the Torah states that, the Sons of God saw the daughters of men and took wives for themselves. The word for angels, Malachim, does not appear in this passage. The phrase Beneha Elohim literally means Sons of God. In other parts of the Tanakh, such as Job, this phrase can refer to heavenly beings. However, Genesis 6 itself does not define the term. Genesis 6 4 mentions the Nephilim. The Torah does not define them as giants. The term is left unexplained in the text. The Book of Enoch, a second temple Jewish text, expands this narrative. It describes the sons of God as angels, called watchers, who descended and took human women as wives. It also describes their offspring as giants. This interpretation comes from Enoch and other apocryphal literature. The Torah itself does not explicitly state that the sons of God were angels, nor that the Nephilim were giants. That distinction matters. I personally find the interpretation in the Book of Enoch compelling. However, I do not attribute that interpretation directly to the Torah. Interpretation must remain separate from what the text explicitly says.