Bible Questions and Answers

What are giants (nephilim) in Genesis 6:4?

Genesis 6:4 There were giants on the earth in those days...

Eve is described as the ‘mother of all living’ so these giants were descendants of Adam and Eve.

Using Strong’s Concordance: Giants 05303. נפיל nephiyl; or נפל nephil; from 05307. נפל naphal; a primitive root; to fall,; properly, a feller, i.e. a bully or tyrant: — giant.

Used in one other place when the spies reconnoitred the land of Canaan.Numbers 13:33 There we saw the giants <05303> (the descendants of Anak came from the giants <05303>); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.

Only Noah and his family survived the flood, so ‘came from the giants’ (‘came from’ is not in the Hebrew) must be understood as ‘of the kind’ rather than physical decendants.

There have been men of great stature throughout history. From the Wikipedia article "Gigantism": Gigantism (Greek: γίγας, gígas, "giant", plural γίγαντες, gígantes), also known as giantism, is a condition characterized by excessive growth and height significantly above average. In humans, this condition is caused by over-production of growth hormone in childhood, resulting in people up to 2.7 m (9.0 ft) in height. It is a rare disorder resulting from increased levels of growth hormone before the fusion of the growth plate which usually occurs at some point soon after puberty. This increase is most often due to abnormal tumor growths on the pituitary gland.

There are other ‘giants’ recorded in scripture (Goliath for example), although the word Nephilim is not used to describe them. The word used is 07497 רפא rapha’.

I hope this helps.

God bless,
Glenn