Did the Nephilim (hybrid giants) only exist before the flood?

Question

Genesis 6:4 says:

"The Nephilim proved to be in the earth in those days, AND ALSO AFTER THAT..." (my caps added)

Then when the spies reported back to the Israelites on what the land of Canaan was like they said (Numbers 13:32,33):

"The land, which we passed through to spy it out, is a land that eats up its inhabitants; and all the people whom we saw in the midst of it are men of extraordinary size. And there we saw the Nephilim..."


I'm not trying to make a big issue out of this, I just find it interesting.

Shane I'm not taking it out of context; the scripture clearly states that there are two peroids in which the angels came to earth and produced the Nephilim. My question is, when?

"The Nephilim proved to be in the earth in those days, AND ALSO AFTER THAT, when the sons of the true God continued to have relations with the daughters of men and they bore sons to them, they were the mighty ones who were of old, the men of fame."

Some translations put it like this:

“In those days, as well as afterward, there were giants [Hebrew - hannephilim] on the earth, who were born to the sons of the gods whenever they had intercourse with the daughters of men; these were the heroes [Hebrew - haggibborim] who were men of note in days of old.”

My question still remains:

"in those days, and also after that..."

After when?

Just to clarify:

"the Nephilimin proved to be on the earth in those days (in the days of Noah I presume?), and also after that (after the days of Noah?)"

That's what the scripture looks like it's saying, am I wrong? Please explain.

I understand that Nephilims were destroyed at the time of the flood, but this scripture looks like it's saying that there were two time periods when the Nephilim were produced via angels? E.g. After the flood also?

Answer 1

Interesting.

Well, we know ONLY Noah and his family survived the flood, so there's no way those people in Canaan could be descendants of the Nephilim.

They were exaggerating.
Were ALL the people giants? No.

They used the word "Nephilim" to scare the people, and it worked so well that the Israelites wanted to go back to slavery!!!

There were big men in the land, but nowhere else in the Bible are they called Nephilim.

EDIT: I read your additions and thought I'd try to figure "something" out.

Is it possible that the part "The Neph′i·lim proved to be in the earth in those days" refers to their initial appearance upon the earth (as a result of what is said in verse 2)?

Then the phrase "and also after that" could mean more of them appeared on the earth because "the sons of the true God CONTINUED to have relations with the daughters of men and they bore sons to them", and because of their growing in number, they were described as "the mighty ones who were of old, the men of fame"

Just guessing!!! :-))

Answer 2

Why do you use only portions of a verse?

"...when the sons of the true God continued to have relations with the daughters of men and they bore sons to them, they were the mighty ones who were of old, the men of fame."

The above is the rest of the quote from Genesis, next time stop taking things out of context.

As far as your other scripture...The ten spies who brought back to the Israelites in the wilderness a false report on the land of Canaan declared: “All the people whom we saw in the midst of it are men of extraordinary size. And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who are from the Nephilim; so that we became in our own eyes like grasshoppers, and the same way we became in their eyes.” No doubt there were some large men in Canaan, as other scriptures show, but never except in this “bad report,” which was carefully couched in language designed to strike terror and cause panic among the Israelites, are they called Nephilim.—Nu 13:31-33; 14:36, 37.

Basically, we know they died in the flood because they were not among the 8 persons who survived.

Answer 3

The faithless spies reported to the Israelites that in Canaan they “saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who are from the Nephilim; so that we became in our own eyes like grasshoppers, and the same way we became in their eyes.” (Nu 13:33) These men of extraordinary size, called the sons of Anak (probably meaning “Long-Necked [that is, of tall stature]”), were not actually Nephilim, as reported, but were only unusually tall men, for the Nephilim, the offspring of angels and women (Ge 6:4), perished in the Flood.


A Report Intended to Terrorize.
The ten spies who brought back to the Israelites in the wilderness a false report on the land of Canaan declared: “All the people whom we saw in the midst of it are men of extraordinary size. And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who are from the Nephilim; so that we became in our own eyes like grasshoppers, and the same way we became in their eyes.” No doubt there were some large men in Canaan, as other scriptures show, but never except in this “bad report,” which was carefully couched in language designed to strike terror and cause panic among the Israelites, are they called Nephilim.—Nu 13:31-33; 14:36, 37.

Answer 4

Giants existed after the flood as well. The height of the Philistine named Goliath, from Gath, was six cubits and a span, or 9 1/2 feet (see 1 Samuel 17:4). Robert Wadlow (February 22, 1918 – July 15, 1940) was 8 feet, 11 inches (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Wadlow).

Answer 5

They were the sons of Anak, Interesting if you look up the sons of Anak you can began to wonder if the Nephilim are a race of giants that existed before and after the flood or is the word just a generic term describing large strong people?

Answer 6

Hmmmmmmmmm.......in one of our publications, I believe it's the Live forever book, it shows the Nephilim de-materializing and returning to the spirit realm while their human wives and children perished in the flood. see page 94

Now, I don't know if this is an indication that they survived or not because of them not being of flesh. The caption on that page also reads " The materialize angels did not drown; they put aside their fleshy bodies and returned to the heavens." Of course they were no longer allowed to become part of God's Holy organization again, but were thrown into Tartarus to be reserved for judgement.

Answer 7

To my understanding of it, the Nephilim drowned during the flood. The angels were not allowed to come back to the earth after that. Any rather large people after the flood were not a cross of angels and woman of mankind.

Answer 8

The Nephilim were the descendants of the fallen angels which mated with human woman. These were the mythological periods in mans dark history. Their seed made it through the flood through one of Noah's daughters-in-law. Later during the time of King David the last of them were slain. David killed Goliath (nephilim) and his two brothers were also killed. That ended their seeds forever. That's why the David and Goliath story was important in the Bible.

Answer 9

The nephilim are mythical. They never existed.

The nephilim, Biblicaly, are the offspring of the sons of God and the daughters of men. Genesis 6:1-4

"Now it came about, when men began to multiply on the face of the land, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose. Then the LORD said, "My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; nevertheless his days shall be one hundred and twenty years." The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.[1]"

Answer 10

This verse is evidence that the flood of Genesis was local, not global.

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Goliath has been identified as a Greek. The Philistines were migrants from Greece. The Philistines of Genesis are not so clear, but they appear to have been Phoenicians.

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The Nephilim were not hybrids of men and angels. The "sons of God" refers to the worshippers of God because they thought they were direct descendents. The "sons of men" was likely a term of prejudice referring to the Elamites who lived in the mountains.