By Gilbert Lillo
Sometimes verses
can be found in Holy writ which may admit 2 and even 3
interpretations, but only one is true. Knowing which one is the good
one requires a spirit of revelation that we ought to ask to God
before opening our Bibles. I have had for years this peculiar problem
concerning one passage and that is Gn. VI:
1, 2 which says:
“And it came to pass, when men began to
multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair;
and they took them wives of all which they chose”.
The first time
I came through this passage I conclude straight forward that these
sons of God were angels because verse 4 points out that those women’s
offspring were giants, mighty men; men of renown from ancient times.
(In Hebrew they call them: Nephilim). As a matter of fact, the half
gods of Greek and Roman mythology came to my mind at once, and I
remembered all the fables about heroes like Hercules who were the
seed of such strange love affairs between the gods and some women.
Actually there is sometimes a little bit of truth in mythology; for
instance, Vulcan was for the Romans the god of forge, and his name
comes from Lamech’ son: Tubal-Cain who was the forger of all
instruments of bronze and iron (Gn. IV: 22)
... Therefore my first reaction was to consider that the sons of God
in Gn. VI: 2 were angels as it may be interpreted in the light of Job
I: 6 et II: 1. This interpretation was not something very original
because it was a classical rabbinical interpretation in past times.
Moreover it has become classical again in some Protestant
fundamentalist circles. Nevertheless 20 years later I came to the
knowledge of the other interpretation that can be also defended
linguistically. Actually this the most common interpretation which
holds that the sons of God in Gn. VI: 2 are men from the seed of
Seth. Those men took women from the seed of Cain. Of course herein is
the problem that nothing in the context points to Cainite women. Thus
according to this interpretation, believers became unequally yoked
together with unbelievers (2Co. VI: 14). I have even learnt recently
a finer interpretation of this sort, proposed by rabbis of the second
century, which says that the sons of God would be a royal seed from
Lamech who gathered harems. This last interpretation best explains
the phrase “of all which they chose”. Let
us also point out that in that time kings were judges as well, and
they were called gods and children of the Most High in Ps. 82: 6...
Anyhow both interpretations agree that the sons of God were men,
whether it be classical in traditional Protestantism, or rabbinical
during the second century, whether it be the seed of Seth, or the
seed of Lamech!
The fact is
that I forsook my first interpretation, and henceforth I held that
the sons of God in Gn. VI: 2 were mere human beings. Of course this
interpretation is more acceptable, more reasonable than the other
because our Lord told us that angels do not marry, they do not have
sexual intercourse in heaven as Muslims and Mormons do believe… We
are all aware that marriage between angels and women is something
unnatural. Wherefore I held firmly
for 20 years the belief that the sons of God were men, not angels. It
is actually a comfortable stance which does not imply neither mystery
nor going after strange flesh on the behalf of angels. Nevertheless I
changed my mind 2 weeks ago, and came back to my first assumption! I
was told once that only idiots never change their minds, and as a
defence for my case I may point out that even a great Bible
commentator: our brother A.W. Pink changed his mind twice on a more
important issue; an eschatological issue. As a matter of fact, he
started his ministry as a good Premillennialist teacher, then he
became an Amillennialist, and few months before going to heaven in
1952, he was on the way back to Premillennialism. We can take it for
granted that the rebirth of the nation of Israel in 1948 was the
turning point for such a surprising change of mind in so brilliant a
Bible teacher…
As for me, the
turning point was not neither an amazing event, nor the appearance of
any angel, but a passage in Holy Writ that worked as a detonator for
another passage which in continuance blew up my former assurance
about men being sons of God in Gn. VI:2! “Knowing this first, that
no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation” (2
P. I: 20), we have to follow the Holy Spirit comparing spiritual
things with spiritual (1 Co. II:13), i.e.
Scripture with Scripture. The main passage confirming my first stance
is Jud. 6 and 7. There we read:
“And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, He has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day; just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which LIKEWISE indulged in sexual immorality and pursued UNNATURAL desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire”. (English Standard Version).
Now we must
repeat what we have said already in order to drive the matter home:
it seems obvious to all of us that it is utterly unnatural that
angels would have sexual intercourse with women, for the simple fact
that they do not have sex; they do not procreate in their original
estate. Such a strange desire goes against their own nature which is
spiritual, and moreover would require a physical, a flesh and blood
body, to fulfil it. But actually this exactly what Jude said: they
did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their
proper dwelling! Bear in mind also that fallen angels are engaged in
a relentless and furious rebellion against God. The only satisfaction
that remains for them is to gainsay whatever God declared; the goal
their commander (Satan) sets before them is to destroy the divine
order in creation so as to establish his reign of darkness and
confusion. Now someone will ask: Is it possible for an angel to take
upon him a human nature? Does not Gn. I repeat 10 times that every
living thing must bring forth “after his kind?” Of course we
freely admit devilish possessions, that demons can enter into people,
but this is not the case we are dealing with; we are talking about
angels’ incarnations, not demons’ possessions.
The answer
about this strange fact is in the Bible, and it is crystal clear; yea
the angels can incarnate as human beings for a while. Take for
instance Gn. XVIII: 2 where we see Abraham
receiving 3 men. Yet these 3 men are not common men for one is
Jehovah himself; theologians call this kind of divine incarnation a
theophany… As for the 2 other men; these are angels, and there is
no word in angelology for this phenomenon… We must point out that
Abraham did not have a vision of 3 men but a real meeting with 3 men;
men of flesh and bones who drank water, washed their feet, sat under
the tree, and took a meal that Sarah cooked for them (v4 and 5).
Afterward the 2 angels went to Sodom where they spent the whole night
at Lot’s where “he made them a feast, and did bake unleavened
bread, and they did eat” again (Gn. XIX:
3)! At dawn they grabbed Lot, his wife and
their 2 daughters by the hands and compelled them to leave hurriedly
that wicked city. Thus there is no doubt that these angels had taken
upon them the nature of men because they ate, they drank, they
grabbed, they walked, they sat and nobody saw them as angels but as
common men. Yet we must press upon our reader that all angels are by
nature “ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them who
shall be heirs of salvation” (Hb. I: 14) and that our Lord Jesus
when he rose from the dead ate before the disciples in order to
ascertain them that he was not a spirit, i.e. an angel: Lk. XXIV: 37
to 43. Moreover this is not the only passage in the Bible where we
see incarnated angels. Jacob fought all night long with a man, and we
are told after that he was the Angel of Jehovah (Gn.
XXXII: 22 to 30). Joshua too
met a man « when Joshua was by
Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold there
stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand”, and
this man was actually the Angel of Jehovah (Josh. VI: 2)!
We could also quote Gideon, Manoah, but let us go to the NT, and
herein are found 3 women who “entering into the sepulchre,
they saw a young man sitting on the right
side, clothed in a long white garment; and they were affrighted”
(Mk. XVI: 5). But that young man turned out
to be an angel according to Luke’s and John’s gospels!
Holy Writ does
not give us much information about angels, but we know that they are
spirits who can appear in divers manners such as celestial beings
with wings, and even as men, but never as women. In
the sight of Gn. XVIII and XIX we can
assume that they can abide in a human body for 15 or 18 hours,
because when the 2 angels appeared to Abraham it was about midday
(XVIII: 1), and
when they disappeared it was the next day at dawn (XIX:
15). When they take upon them the body of
men, they can eat, drink, fight and do whatever a man can do,
therefore it is not a great thing if they can also copulate, and
thereby loose their own position of
authority, and their proper dwelling as Jude tells us!
Man on the
earth dwells in an earthy tabernacle; his soul and spirit abide in
flesh and bones body. Angels in heaven have spiritual tabernacles,
and their spirits dwell in bodies of light. Even the wicked
scientists of the CERN in France have recently discovered with their
collider that there is a kind of particle made of sheer light which
could be the origin of matter… But we have a much better testimony
which is infallible, so we read in 1 Co. XV: 40 : “There are
celestial bodies and terrestrial bodies; but the glory of the
celestial is one and the glory of the terrestrial is another”.
Therefore it is obvious that when an angel takes upon him for few
hours the body of a man and copulates with a woman, he becomes one
flesh with her, and thereby loses his dignity of celestial creature.
He left his proper dwelling in an infamous way going after strange
flesh. Those angels who committed such abomination (before the flood)
received a swift condemnation, and henceforth were kept in eternal
chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day,
i.e. they were cast into hell. Mark well reader that it is written:
“He has kept them” not “He will keep them”. (I have consulted
various good translations in 4 different languages and they always
use a past tense). Now we all know that Satan and his demons walk
freely on the earth (Job II: 7) seeking someone to devour. As said
John “we know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the
power of the evil one” (1Jn. V: 19, ESV). Thanks be to God that
Satan has limits he cannot pass, but the fact is that he usually has
his minions in all the keys positions in the earthy governments; he
is the ruler of this world. Wherefore it is obvious that God has not
kept him yet in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the
judgment of the great day. It shall happen during the Millennium, and
not before (Rev. XX: 1, 2, 3)! Till now he
is busy keeping his dominion upon earth and in the air wherefore he
is also called the prince of the power of the air. So we can assume
that Jude 6 deals with a peculiar sort of angels who are already kept
in hell until judgment day. These fallen angels must needs be the
sons of God of Gn. VI: 2. The evidence whereof is that today there is
no offspring of theirs; we see no Nephilim around, neither do we hear
about Hercules ‘heroic deeds on the front page of the newspapers!
We just hear about some Hercules aircraft carriers on mission in
certain countries… And we still use the adjective “herculean”,
but that is all that remains from that era of the half gods. As a
matter of fact, the whole human race pure and genetically transformed
by angels perished at the days of the great flood. Only 8 persons,
(Noah and his family) survived, and they were all 100% human
offspring. Hence we are all the seed of those 8 persons. But someone
will say: “Seeing that angels can take a real human form, why would
demons not commit this abomination again? Why do they not take women
today?” The answer is easy: they are afraid to do this again
because they know that God certainly would cast them into hell at
once, and they would be kept in eternal chains until Judgment day.
Now we can
compare the incarnation of angels to scuba diving. Man since the 20th
century can enjoy sea life like a fish. He can seek pearls, harpoon
fishes, or just go for a dive to see the beauties of coral reefs.
Nevertheless he must return to the surface as soon as his oxygen
tanks are empty. Man is not made for living under water, and although
he can spend one or 2 hours with the fishes of the sea, his dwelling
place is on the earth because he is an earthy creature. Angels
likewise can enjoy for a while the reality of earthy life in a human
body, but their nature is celestial wherefore they must return to
their dwelling place which is heaven, and at least the first heaven,
i.e. the atmosphere, for the fallen angels… But let us now linger
on verse 7 for it is the confirmation of all our explanation.
There the
Spirit says: “… just as Sodom and
Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which LIKEWISE indulged in
sexual immorality and pursued UNNATURAL desire…” Herein is the
proof that the sin committed by the angels who are right now kept
under gloomy darkness is perfectly similar to the sin of the
Sodomites; it is a sin against nature, it is going after strange
flesh! Homosexuality implies demonic possession as Ro. I points out
clearly, repeating three times that the men
who changed the glory of the incorruptible God were delivered unto
uncleanness (v. 24), unto vile affections (v. 26), and unto a
reprobate mind (v. 28). Actually all
unnatural sins are wrought directly by demons like divination
(Ac. XVI: 16) or homosexuality.
Nobody is born as a Sodomite, but God has given over to homosexuality
lots of people today because of their arrogance toward their Creator.
It is not a matter of free will but of divine chastisement through
demons. Bear in mind reader that Satan was the first creature to sin,
not man, and his fallen angels were the first ones too “to go after
strange flesh”! They started the sin against nature taking wives
amidst the daughters of men. Afterward they induced men and women
through possession to commit the sins of homosexuality and
bestiality.
Angels and men
have many things in common, therefore both are called the sons of
God. Both have a sin which brings an instant and eternal
condemnation. Angels who copulated with women were cast into hell
before time, meanwhile men who blaspheme against the Holy Spirit have
their eternal perdition sealed at once (Mk. III: 29). Hence it seems
obvious that all the angels who sinned against nature having
intercourse with women are right now “kept
in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the
great day”; they are in hell and they do not roam around in the
light of the day, with Satan their chief, looking for someone to
devour… The devil and all his legions are well aware of this swift
and scathing indictment concerning that sin. They know that whoever
among them commits this sin against nature will be sent into hell
before time, and therefore they keep away from that sin, because hell
is not pleasant neither for men nor for demons.
Many a
believer thinks that demons are the ruler in hell, and that they just
spend their time aching poor souls who fell in that abyss. Now this
is pure tale: hell is a temporary prison for men as well as for
angels. Did not Jesus say: “everlasting fire prepared for the devil
and his angels” (Mt. XXV: 41)? Satan knows well that the
everlasting fire will not be a place of dominion for him but of
humiliation and suffering, and maybe he knew beforehand that every
angel who would take a woman would be cast at once in hell. But he is
the father of all lies and he has love for nobody; he just rules over
his legions, and as long as he can wreak havoc in humanity he does
not care if some fall into the hands of the living God before time.
Human race genetically modified by his fallen angels could have been
a good deal for him in order to hinder the plan of salvation that God
promised from Genesis… However this is over now, because all the
demons know the swift consequence of so infamous a transgression, and
they avoid it because they do not want to go to hell before time!
Even Satan cannot convince them any longer; they know he is not
trustworthy! This is actually the reason for the strange encounter
between Jesus and a legion of demons in the country of the Gergesenes
(Mt. VIII: 28).
As I said
before; this passage
in the country of the Gergesenes was the
detonator which sparkled the truth hidden in Jude 6 and made explode
the covering whereof. The legion of evil
spirits knew Jesus as the Son of God and feared him because they were
well aware that he is Jehovah the Son, and that 3000 years ago he
cast their fellow angels who took wives among the daughters of men
into hell for this unnatural sin. They knew also that one day they
too will go to hell for a 1000 years before ending in the lake of
fire. But the time for the Millennium was not come yet at that
moment; Jesus was made in the likeness of earthy men, in form of a
servant, and did not come to them as the King of kings in a glorified
body on a white horse with all the holy angels. Therefore this legion
is puzzled; they are afraid and cannot
understand why Jesus came to this Gentile country, (remember Jews do
not have herds of swine), as he said that he was sent to the house of
Israel (Mt. X: 5). It is so strange a
situation that contrariwise to all the encounters with demons; this
time they go on ahead and as soon as Jesus was come out of the ship
they immediately met him (Mk. V: 2). Take note that usually people
brought them that were possessed with devils (Mk. I: 32, Mt. IV: 23);
they never came to him willingly as we see in this case. Moreover
they start to talk with him; now bear in mind that Jesus did not use
to do that because it is written: “He suffered not the devils to
speak, because they knew him” (Mk. I: 34). And they say unto him:
“What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? Art thou
come hither to torment us BEFORE TIME?” (Mt. VIII: 29). They even
ask him not to send them away out of the country (Mk. V: 10), i.e.
« they beg him not to command them to depart into the abyss »
(Lk. VIII: 31, ESV) which means hell. They plead their cause
earnestly and successfully because they know that they did not commit
the unnatural sin, and that there is still time left before the
kingdom of Christ come with the power of His might
unhindered by a terrestrial human nature. Surely
they knew Es.
XXIV: 21 to 23 which
says: “And
it shall come to pass in that day, that Jehovah shall punish the host
of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon
earth. And they shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered
in the pit, and shall be shut up in prison, and after many days shall
they be visited. Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun
ashamed, when Jehovah of hosts shall reign in mount Zion, and in
Jerusalem. And before his ancients gloriously”. So they knew that
none of those things had happened yet and therefore they plead their
cause showing that it was not fair to send them already into hell.
Their argument was solid and Jesus allowed them to stay in the
country of the Gergesenes (or Gadarenes) and even to possess the herd
of pigs that was nearby. Mark well reader that it is the only time
that Jesus talks with demons and grant them their desire! Now I do
not know all the reasons why our Lord went to that country, but one
thing I know: it enables us to understand Jude 6. Scripture indeed is
interpreted by Scripture, but we need more than a good concordance to
divide rightly the Word of God! That is why Jesus said: “I thank
Thee, 0 Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that Thou hast hid these
things from the wise and the prudent, and hast revealed them unto
babes” (Lk. X: 21).
I am well
aware that for many a brother this interpretation will appear as
fanciful, but we must press upon our reader that for us (radical
Protestants), reason must be submitted to Scripture and not the
opposite, as modern and liberal Protestants are wont to do. A God who
can be explained by a finite mind is not the true God. How can the
finite comprehend the Infinite? It would be like an illiterate
Chinese giving a lecture on English literature at Oxford University…
We worship a holy Trinity who says: “My thoughts are not your
thoughts, neither are your ways My ways...For as the heavens are
higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my
thoughts than your thoughts” (Is. LV: 8, 9). Does it not sound
erroneous to many a believer that the sun, the moon and the stars
were created three days after the tiny earth? And what about light
shining upon earth since the first without sun? Bear in mind reader
that our earth is like a grain of sand on a beach if you compare the
dimension of cosmos with it. Why is it so? Without Holy Writ we could
not understand these things, but if we read Gn. I: 14 in the light of
Ps XIX: 1, then we receive light as it is written: “In Thy light
shall we see light”! There are even Unitarian heretics who aver
that heliocentric theory is fake. The verse
they use thereto
is Josh. X: 12. But they use also scientific evidence like the way
astronomers calculate the launching of
rockets into the outer space, for they do it on a geocentric basis.
Bear in mind that according to heliocentric theory the earth evolves
around the sun thirty times faster than a bullet! Germans when they
shot their shells with their Berta super field gun upon Paris during
WW 1, based their calculations on a geocentric assumption!
If the earth revolved then the shells would have fallen at 30
kilometers westward from Paris… Anyway I do not want to take my
stance in this scientific issue since it does not raise any confusion
in our understanding of the great truths which Holy Writ expounds
before our eyes. Not so with the issue of the sons of God in Gn. VI:
2, because if you hold the wrong interpretation you will not be able
to comprehend neither Jude 6, nor the passage of the encounter of the
legion of the Gadarenes with our Lord Jesus! Returning to that old
rabbinical
interpretation that assumes that the sons
of God were actually angels, is a must if you are ever to understand
these 2 passages, in case you follow a historical and grammatical
interpretation as we do…
Now
few more words and I have finished. I want to warn my brothers about
a fantasy unto which are driven some who hold our interpretation.
Many a brother follows his imagination and forgets that during the
flood in the days of Noah the whole offspring of angels and women
perished with the rest of all the living, and that those angels since
that day remain prisoners in the bottomless pit of hell. The rest of
fallen angels dare not now commit the same unnatural sin, as James
II: 19 states: “the devils also believe and tremble”. Nonetheless
some brothers think that certain fallen angels have continued to have
intercourse with women, and that there is still a hybrid human race
on the earth! My, this is like a fairy tale, or rather like a
Hollywood science fiction picture! There is no verse to sustain such
a fantasy. The only fallen angels who try to alter genetically the
human race are the wicked scientists who are earnestly endeavouring
to create a hybrid human race using animal cells, or trying to
connect our brains to computers by electronic implants. The
US military has revealed $65 millions of funding for a program to
develop a 'brain chip' allowing humans to simply plug into a
computer. They say the system could give soldiers super
senses and even help treat people with
blindness, paralysis and speech disorders. The goal is 'developing an
implantable system able to provide precision communication between
the brain and the digital world,' DARPA officials said... Albeit
they will never achieve their purpose since the time is running out
and Christ will soon rule the nations with a rod of iron. The only
thing they will be able to do is to improve the electronic implant
under the skin of their followers ‘right hands and foreheads,
because this is clearly prophesied in Rev. XIII: 16, 17 and XIV: 19!
Our Lord
Jehovah-Jesus has total control of the present situation, wherefore
bionic men, mutants and Hercules are nothing else than series on TV.
God put a limit to human’s wickedness as well as fallen angels’.
The worst thing devils can do is to possess whoever willingly opens
the door of his inner man. This is precisely what the eschatological
Antichrist will do since it is written: “whose coming is after the
working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders” (2 Ts.
II: 9). He will not be the first to do that since Hitler who himself
was his own type did it, and got from it a powerful charisma wrought
by Satan who dwelt in his spirit. May our Lord keep us in his grace
that we may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall
come to pass, and to stand before the Son of God!
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