Jude 6-Did the Sons of of God in Genesis 6.2 and 4 Receive the Ability to Procreate
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Thursday May 12, 2022
Jude Series: Jude 6-Did the Sons of God in Genesis 6:2 and 4 Receive the Ability to Procreate?
Lesson # 22
Jude 5 Now, I am prompted to desire to cause each and every one of you to be reminded (even though each of you are possessing a thorough knowledge about each of these examples) that Jesus, sometime after having delivered the people out from the land that is Egypt, destroyed those who would not believe. 6 Correspondingly, He is keeping by means of eternal chains under the control of total supernatural darkness for the purpose of executing the judgment during the great day of those who entered into the state of not keeping their own sphere of activity but in fact abandoned their own place of habitation. (Lecturer’s translation)
Now, Jude 6 is properly interpreted by comparing its contents with the contents of Genesis 6:1-8, 2 Peter 2:4-5 as well as 1 Peter 1:18-20, which is indicated by the fact that each of these three passages discuss the actions of fallen angels in relation to the judgment of the world-wide flood during the days of Noah.
The period from the fall of Adam to the flood of Noah is called by theologians, “the antediluvian” period.
Secondly, there is a connection between Jude 6 and Genesis 6:1-8 as well as connection between Jude 6 and 2 Peter 2:4-5, which is indicated by the fact that the condemnation of the angels described in Jude 6 is fitting in light the actions of “the sons of God” and the Nephilim in Genesis 6:1-8.
Thirdly, like 2 Peter 2:4, Jude 6 describes these angels as presently chained under the control of total supernatural darkness and kept incarcerated until the day that their sentence of experiencing eternal condemnation is executed at the Great White Throne Judgment (Rev. 20:10-15).
Therefore, Genesis 6:1-8, 1 Peter 3:18-20, 2 Peter 2:4-5 and Jude 6 are all speaking about a rebellion of some of Satan’s fallen angels during the antediluvian period.
Altogether, these four passages give us the identity of these angels and when in history they rebelled against the Lord and their present place of incarceration as well as the execution of their sentence of eternal condemnation at the Great White Throne Judgment.
Now, as we noted there is a connection between Jude 6 and Genesis 6:1-8 because the condemnation of the angels described in the former is fitting in light the actions of “the sons of God” and the Nephilim in the latter.
Therefore, like Genesis 6:1-8, Jude 6 describes the rebellious actions of these fallen angels.
In fact, Jude 6 interprets the contents of Genesis 6:2, which asserts that “the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose.” (NET)
Jude 6 describes that these actions of “the sons of God” as that of “entering into the state of not keeping their own sphere of activity but rather in fact they abandoned their own place of habitation” (Lecturer’s translation)
Genesis 6 and in particular Genesis 6:1-8 records that the sons of God carefully chose and took wives for themselves during the antediluvian period. As we will note, “the sons of God” were angels and in particular fallen angels who were led by Satan.
Now, the question arises as to how the bənê-hāʾĕlōhîm (בְנֵי־הָֽאֱלֹהִים֙), “the sons of God,” in Genesis 6:2 and 4 were able to have the ability to have sex and procreate with women?
There are only two options and the first would be that they were able to take on human form.
Remember, in Scripture, whenever angels have visibly appeared to men, they have appeared in the physical bodies of men.
The angels who met with Abraham, for instance, actually ate with him (Gen. 18:8) and later, they appeared to the inhabitants of Sodom in such perfectly manlike shape that the Sodomites contemplated taking them for homosexual purposes.
Hebrews 13:2 states that some “have entertained angels unawares” and angels are always described as men with the pronoun “he.”
For some reason, God gave them the capacity to materialize themselves in masculine human form when occasion warrants, even though their bodies are not under the control of gravitational and electromagnetic forces, which limit our own bodies in this present life.
The second option is that they possessed the bodies of men.
There are many instances of demon possession in the gospels during the First Advent of Jesus Christ (cf. Matt. 9:32-33; 10:8; Mark 1:26; 6:13; Luke 8:30) as well as during the early ministries of apostles (Acts 10”13-17).
This often results in the person possessed by the fallen angel to possess supernatural strength and ability to perform certain human functions.
I believe that the bənê-hāʾĕlōhîm (בְנֵי־הָֽאֱלֹהִים֙), “the sons of God,” actually possessed the bodies of men and did not assume human bodies in order to have sex with women and thus procreate with them.
This interpretation is supported by the fact that angels do not die and their number does not increase or decrease (Luke 20:36).
Thus, they do not have the ability to procreate since if they did, the numbers of angels would be increasing and God would have created them with the ability to procreate and perpetuate their race like He did with the human race.
Consequently, God must not have given them the ability to have sex and have offspring and thus there would be no need for them to have genitalia like men in the human race and this is supported by the Lord’s teaching in Matthew 22:30.
Matthew 22:25 Now there were seven brothers among us. The first one married and died, and since he had no children he left his wife to his brother. 22:26 The second did the same, and the third, down to the seventh. 22:27 Last of all, the woman died. 22:28 In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife of the seven will she be? For they all had married her.” 22:29 Jesus answered them, “You are deceived, because you don’t know the scriptures or the power of God. 22:30 For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like angels in heaven. 22:31 Now as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, 22:32 ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not the God of the dead but of the living!” 22:33 When the crowds heard this, they were amazed at his teaching. (NET)
In Matthew 22:30, the Lord taught that when we receive our resurrection bodies, there will be no more marriages and sexual unions; instead, we will be like the angels, not having sex.
Now, I have “not” always held to this view that the bodies of men were possessed by the sons of God of Genesis 6:2 but rather that these angels had the ability to have sex at one time.
When confronted with Matthew 22:30, I believed the objection posed by this verse was presupposing more about angelic abilities than we know.
Also, I also taught at one time that Matthew 22:30 does not assert or imply that the angels or even some of the angels had no ability at one time to procreate but rather that this was the case at the time of Jesus Christ’s First Advent and will still be true up to the twenty-first century and on into eternity.
I thus believed that at one time they had the ability to procreate but lost it after the events of Genesis 6.
However, as already noted, there were a fixed numbers of angels created by God and they do not increase in number or decrease and thus the implication is that they do not have sexual ability and are thus not able to procreate with their angelic bodies.
Another reason why I believe that the bənê-hāʾĕlōhîm (בְנֵי־הָֽאֱלֹהִים֙), “the sons of God” of Genesis 6 actually possessed the bodies of men and did not assume human bodies is that Genesis 6:4 describes the Nephilim, who were the offspring of the sons of God and the daughters of men as “the famous men” of their day.
Notice, they are not described as half men and half angels but simply “men.”
Therefore, these fallen angels who are described in Genesis 6:2 and 4 as the bənê-hāʾĕlōhîm (בְנֵי־הָֽאֱלֹהִים֙), “the sons of God” were possessing the bodies of men in order to have the experience of having sex with women.
Jude 6 describes this act as “entering into the state of not keeping their own sphere of activity but rather in fact abandoned their own place of habitation.” (Lecturer’s translation)
The Nephilim were thus the children of demon possessed men and unregenerate women.
No wonder the behavior of the Nephilim was evil since the influence of their demon possessed fathers and unregenerate women influenced their conduct and antediluvian society.
I also believe that the purpose of these fallen angels possessing the bodies of men in order to have sex with women was to prevent the incarnation of the Son of God.
However, not in the sense that their sexual relations with women would so corrupt the human race in that it would leave only half men and half angels on the earth.
But rather, through these angels, Satan was attempting to prevent the incarnation in the sense that he was trying to so corrupt and influence the behavior of members of the human race so at to cause God to judge the human race.
In other words, Satan wanted the behavior of the human race to reflect the evil character of himself and those angels who were following him in his rebellion against God that God would judge the human race and wipe it out.
Consequently, the Lord would not be able to fulfill His promise to Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden after their fall to provide them and their progeny a Savior to deliver them from sin and Satan, however, Noah and his family through a monkey wrench in his plan.
Noah’s godly behavior as a result of his faith not only produced in him godly behavior but also appropriated the omnipotence of God, which delivered him and his family from the judgment of the flood which destroyed the entire human race.
Hebrews 11:7 By faith Noah, when he was warned about things not yet seen, with reverent regard constructed an ark for the deliverance of his family. Through faith he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith. (NET)