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General corruption of humanity. Gen.6:1. When people began to multiply on earth and daughters were born to them, The context of the speech shows that here the whole is taken instead of the part - “Cainites” are designated by the general concept of “people”, an analogy to which we see in other places of Scripture (Jer. 32:20; Ps. 77:5, etc.). Gen.6:2. then the sons of God saw the daughters of men, This is one of the most difficult passages in the Bible to interpret; its main difficulty lies in determining who should be understood here as “sons of God.” Some, mainly Jewish rabbis, based on the philological meaning of the root El (God), saw here an indication of the sons of nobles and princes, generally of the highest and noble classes, who allegedly married girls of lower social strata. Hence, the term "sons of God" in Arabic. translated in the text - filii illustrium, in the Targum of Onkelos - filii principium, in Symmachus - υἱοὶ των δοναστεύοντων. But this explanation does not stand up to any criticism, being completely arbitrary and not explaining the further consequences of this fact. Most other Jewish and Christian interpreters of antiquity, together with rationalists of modern times, understand Angels by “sons of God.” Having been thoroughly developed in the apocryphal books of Enoch and Jubilees and in the writings of Philo, this opinion in the first centuries of the Christian era enjoyed such wide popularity that it was shared even by many of the fathers and teachers of the Church (Justin the Philosopher, Irenaeus, Athenagoras, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Ambrose, etc.). Although it is true that by the term “sons of God” the Holy Scripture sometimes, mainly in the poetic sections, means “angels” (Job 1:6, 2:1, 38:7, etc.), nevertheless, both the very context of this narrative and its positive historical character, as well as the philological and dogmatic requirements do not allow us to take the side of this opinion. We consider the third opinion to be the only correct one, happily avoiding the shortcomings of the two above opinions and satisfying all philological, textual and historical-dogmatic requirements, according to which the “sons of God” should be understood as the pious “Sethites.” On his side stands the majority of the Church Fathers renowned for their exegetical works (John Chrysostom, Ephraim the Syrian, Blessed Theodoret, Cyril of Jerusalem, Jerome, Augustine, etc.) and a number of modern learned exegetes (led by Keil). This opinion is fully justified philologically, since the name “sons of God” in the Holy Scriptures of both Testaments (Deut. 14:1; Ps. 72:15; Wis. 16:26; Luke 3:38; Rom. 8:19; Gal. 3:26, etc.) is often applied to pious people. This is also favored by the context of the previous narrative, in which, when counting the descendants of Seth, the name of God is placed at its head, which is why all the Sethites are presented as His children. The same thing is indicated even more decisively by the final verse of chapter 4, where (Gen. 4:26) it is said that in the days of Enos the Sethites began to solemnly call on the name of the Lord and themselves were called in honor of Him “sons of God.” Finally, the very nature of the marriages concluded between the sons of God and the daughters of men speaks for this: in the sense of the biblical expression used here, these were not temporary and unnatural relationships (which were the only relationships between Angels and wives could be), but ordinary marriages, legally correct, although disastrous in their moral consequences. that they were beautiful, and took them as wives, whichever one chose. If we remember that when characterizing the Cainite women, physical beauty and sensual charm were in the foreground (Ada, Zilla, Noema), then it will become clear that here the writer of everyday life is talking specifically about the Cainite women. With this understanding of the “sons of God” and “daughters of men,” we fully withstand the contrast between them given in the text: both are representatives of the same primitive humanity; but, being similar in nature, they are opposite in their spiritual and moral mood: the “sons of God” were exponents of all that is good, sublime and good; human daughters behaving seductively are the personification of earthly sensual interests. Over time, the contrast of morals disappears - the sons of God mix with the daughters of men, which blurs the line between good and evil and gives full scope to the dominance of the lower, sensual interests of the flesh to the detriment of the higher interests of the spirit. Gen.6:3. And the Lord [God] said: My Spirit will not forever be despised by men, Obviously, this is a continuation of the previous narrative: there the fact itself was indicated, here the corresponding assessment is given; and if the characters here are clearly called people, then they (and not Angels) were meant above. In particular, the words of the biblical text: “To My Spirit” contain an indication either of the inner, spiritual essence of human nature (with a blind reference to the history of the creation of man, Gen. 2:7), or, what is even more likely, of the Holy Spirit, as the creative principle of all in general (Gen. 1:2) and religious and ethical life par excellence. Disdain for Him is precisely that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which, according to the Savior, constitutes one of the most serious mortal sins (Mark 3:29), since it characterizes such a degree of sinful bitterness of a person with which no correction becomes psychologically impossible. This is the reason why people neglected the divine Spirit and deserved punishment. M. Philaret more accurately translates the first word of this phrase: “in his error,” obviously, the biblical author again pointed to the wicked intercourse of the Sethites with the Cainites. Since by entering into such marriages, people testified to the decline of their higher, spiritual interests and the dominance of lower, carnal interests, they themselves seemed to turn into that coarse flesh, which in the language of Holy Scripture serves as a synonym for everything base, material and sinful. let their days be a hundred and twenty years. These words cannot be understood in the sense of reducing human life to within one hundred and twenty years (as Josephus understood, Antiquities 1, 3, 2), since it is reliably known that for a long time even after the flood, humanity lived for more than 120 years, sometimes reaching up to 500, and one should see in them the period appointed by God for repentance and correction of people, during which the righteous Noah prophesied about the flood and made appropriate preparations for it (1 Pet. 3:20 ). Gen.6:4. At that time there were giants on earth, Pre-Flood humanity is called “giants”, in true nephilim – “nephilim”. Although, indeed, in Scripture this term sometimes serves as a designation for giants or giants (Num. 13:33–34), the main meaning of this root is “to destroy, to overthrow,” and in the form nif, “to cause to fall, to seduce, to corrupt.” Therefore, in these primitive “Nephilim” one can see people who were not only distinguished by extraordinary physical strength and height, but also people who deliberately violated the truth and oppressed the weak. There were similar personalities among the Cainites before, probably from the era of Tubalcain, who invented weapons, and Lamech, who sang a victory hymn to him; Since the time of the mixing of the Sethites with the Cainites, these “Nephilim” have especially multiplied as a result of general corruption and the fall of all moral foundations. These are strong, glorious people from ancient times. Here we are talking about the fruits of mixed marriages, which, in contrast to the “nephilim,” in the Hebrew text are called “gibborim” (strong). The last name, according to biblical usage, means an outstanding personality (2 Kings 17:10; Dan. 11:3), an elite warrior, a person superior to others in his strength (1 Kings 11:28). From this it is obvious that the descendants of mixed clans (Sithites with Cainites) were superior to their prototypes, both in physical and immoral properties. Calling these “gibborim” from ancient times “glorious people,” the writer of everyday life probably meant here the fact that they, under the name of “heroes of antiquity,” gained worldwide fame in the universal traditions of mankind (Bar. 3:26–28). Gen.6:5. all the thoughts and thoughts of their hearts were evil at all times; The root of the deep corruption of pre-Flood humanity is indicated in the damage to the heart, and since the latter, according to the biblical view, is considered the central focus of all conscious human activity, its corruption is tantamount to contamination of the very source of life (Matthew 15:19). Gen.6:6. and the Lord repented that he had created man on earth, The concept of the property of repentance attributed to God can be borrowed from the story of Saul, where repentance is attributed to God twice (1 Sam. 15:11, 35) and where, meanwhile, Samuel says about God that He is not a man so that He should repent (1 Sam. 15:29). From this it is clear that when it is spoken of Him as a man, it is because, in the words of Aben Ezra, the law speaks in the language of the sons of men, that is, in the language of simple, popular meaning (Filaret). In particular, God’s “repentance” - as if a special way of changing the unchangeable - is the highest expression of the thought of extreme divine regret, reaching, as it were, to the point that the unchangeable Being itself seemed ready to change. and He was grieved in His heart. Like the previous one, this is the same humanoid expression. “The sorrow of God is the foreknowledge of the impossibility of a person, created with free will, who deliberately and persistently abuses it, to return to the good path; Therefore, where the sorrow of God is spoken of, such as, for example, about cities that incurred the wrath of God (Matt. 11:20-26; Luke 10:13), one must understand that the sentence of God’s eternal truth has been completed, that this race, or man, must perish so that evil is not perpetuated” (Vlastov). Gen.6:7. And the Lord said: I will destroy from the face of the earth man whom I have created, from man to beast, and the creeping thing, and the birds of the air, I will destroy, for I have repented that I created them. Here is given a stronger expression of the same thought - about the deep discrepancy between the actions of human freedom and the plans of divine providence and the desires of the Almighty to destroy this disharmony. At the same time, the sad fate of man, according to the verdict of the divine court, was to be shared by the entire world of living beings around him, since, according to the teaching of Scripture, there is a very close, moral connection between the fate of man and the life of nature; hence, the fall and rise of man is reflected in a corresponding way on the rest of creation. And this was not, strictly speaking, the extermination of mankind (since the righteous Noah and his family were saved and revived him), but only the eradication of the evil that reigned on earth by washing in the waters of the global flood (3 Ezra 3:8–9; 1 Pet 3:20–21). Gen.6:8. Noah found grace in the sight of the Lord [God]. A phrase that is completely similar to what was previously said about Enoch “and Enoch please God” (Gen. 5:24) (Slavic, LXX) and has corresponding parallels in other places in the Bible (Luke 1:30; Acts 7:46, etc.). This is the beginning of a new biblical section - the story of righteous Noah and the global flood (Gen. 6:9–9:29). Noah was a righteous man and blameless in his generation; that is, he was morally pure and whole (tamim - in Hebrew), standing out from among his vicious contemporaries, whose unsightly moral characteristics are given to us by Jesus Christ himself and the apostles (Matt. 24:37–38 and parallels, cf. 1 Pet. 3:20). The very same review about Noah is repeated almost verbatim. places of Scripture (Ezek. 14:19–20; Sir. 44:16; Heb. 11:7). The conclusion of Noah’s characterization is a feature already familiar to us from the story of Enoch (Gen. 5.24). In the sacred language of the Bible, this is a special form in which a completely moral character was usually revealed among sinful contemporaries. Gen.6:10–13. Noah gave birth to three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth. But the earth was corrupted before the face of God, and the earth was filled with atrocities. And [the Lord] God looked upon the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had perverted its way on the earth. The four verses concluding in this section represent an almost literal repetition of the above in the verses of Gen. 5:32, 6:5–7. But this should not confuse anyone: since in Art. 9. this chapter, as we noted, a new story began - the story of Noah and the flood, which initially constituted a special and independent narrative, then such a repetition is more than natural; and the amazing coincidence in content is only new evidence of the truth of the very events that serve as the subject of the narratives under consideration. And [the Lord] God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh is come before Me, for the earth is filled with evildoings from them; and behold, I will destroy them from the earth. Many commentators, not without reason, assume that here we are talking about the end of that one hundred and twenty-year period that was appointed by God for the repentance of people and during which He waited in vain for their correction (1 Pet. 3:19-20; 2 Pet. 3:9-15). Gen.6:14. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood; In the Hebrew text this "ark" is designated by the term teba, which is again applied in the Bible to the basket in which Moses was saved (Ex. 2:5); from which one can think that Noah’s ark of colossal size is a type of such a primitive structure. The very “gopher” tree from which the ark was built belongs to a species of light, resinous trees, like cedar or cypress (Ex. 27:1, 30:1). In the construction of a wooden ark, where the primitive world, represented by its representatives, escaped death from the water element, the Church Fathers see a symbolic foreshadowing of the tree of the cross and the water of baptism, through which New Testament humanity finds its salvation. make compartments in the ark Literally from Hebrew - “nest” (kinnim) or cage, apparently for birds and animals, which, according to divine command, Noah was to place in the ark. Gen.6:15. And make it this way: the length of the ark is three hundred cubits; its breadth is fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. Based on these readings, we still cannot get an accurate idea of ​​the size and capacity of the ark, mainly because the cubit, as a measure of length, was not a stable metric value and its dimensions allowed strong fluctuations, as can be seen from the Holy Scripture itself (Num. 35:4, 5; 1 Kings 7:15; Ezek. 40:5, 43:13). According to Metropolitan. Philaret, the longitude of the ark inside it was approximately 500 feet, width - 80 feet. and the height is 50 feet, with which the calculations of one French scientist agree quite well, determining the length of the ark to be 156 meters, width 26 meters. and a height of 16 meters. The capacity of such a structure, according to the calculations of specialists (for example, Vice Admiral Thevenard) was quite sufficient for its purpose, that is, to accommodate Noah’s family and a minimum number of all animal genera with a supply of annual food necessary for everyone. Gen.6:16. And thou shalt make a hole in the ark, and thou shalt make it a cubit at the top, and thou shalt make a door into the ark at the side thereof; arrange the lower, second and third [housing] in it. The details of the construction of the ark further convince us that it was not at all like our modern ships, but rather resembled a large chest, or box, or an enormous floating house, which had an almost flat roof (descending only one foot from the top) and was lighted by a single, more or less significant window at the top of it. In 1609, one Dutch Mennonite, a certain Peter Jansen, built a special vessel similar to the ark, only on a reduced scale, from which he was experimentally convinced that although such a ship is poorly suited for sailing, it is much more spacious than any other ship (almost a third) of a different type with the same cubic volume. Gen.6:17. And behold, I will bring a flood of water upon the earth, to destroy all flesh in which is the spirit of life under the heavens; These words are the first to definitely name a means or instrument of divine punishment over the primitive, corrupt world, which was the global flood (Is. 54:9). everything on earth will lose life. Since the whole earth has been corrupted and filled with the iniquities of those living on it, then all the perpetrators of its desecration perish on it, led by the first and most important among them - people. However, this global flood cannot be considered anything like personal revenge on the part of God to man: no, it was a necessary consequence of the spiritual death of primitive, morally degenerate humanity. This humanity was an exceptional “flesh”, as if it had forever lost its soul and represented a decaying corpse, the further preservation of which would not only be useless, but also positively harmful for the spiritual and moral atmosphere of the world. And so, the first world perishes in the waves of the flood in order to wash away the filth lying on it and begin to live on new (revived) principles. Gen.6:18. But I will establish My covenant with you, The union of God with man is here for the first time called by its special term “covenant” (berit). Confirming the existence of the covenant that was concluded by God in the first promise about the seed of the woman (Gen. 3:15), the Lord thereby clearly testifies that although He destroys almost all of humanity, He does not ruin His eternal covenants (Sir. 17:10); Only the evil seed of the serpent will perish, but the seed of the woman in the person of Noah will triumph in its victory (Wis. 10:4). and you shall enter into the ark, you, and your sons, and your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. Here is a complete list of all members of the Noah family who alone were saved from the flood, as the Apostle Peter confirms this in his two letters (1 Pet. 3:20; 2 Pet. 3:6). Gen.6:19–20. Bring also into the ark [of every livestock, and of every creeping thing, and] of every living creature, and of every flesh, in pairs, so that they may remain with you alive, let them be male and female. Of [all] birds according to their kind, and of [all] livestock according to their kind, and of every creeping thing on the earth according to their kind, of all, two by one they will come to you, so that they may remain alive [with you, male and female]. For the preservation and subsequent revival of animal life, God commands Noah to take with him into the ark one pair of each of their main clans. Based on the words of verse 20, one can think that these animals, driven by instinct in view of the impending thunderstorm of the flood, themselves approached the ark and sought salvation in it, which greatly facilitated Noah’s task. As for the expression of how such a number of animals could fit in one ark, it should be noted that, firstly, Noah, to save space and food, could choose only the youngest animals, and secondly, the number of main clan groups that had formed by the era of the flood was not yet so great as to create any insurmountable obstacle for Noah to place them in the ark. Gen.6:22. And Noah did everything: as [the Lord] God commanded him, so he did. In these words the best praise is given to Noah, as the Apostle Paul makes clear, saying: “By faith Noah, having received a revelation of things not yet seen, fearfully prepared an ark for the salvation of his house; by it he condemned (the whole) world, and became an heir of the righteousness of faith” (Heb. 11:7). “The construction of the ark (about which the holy narrator so simply expresses himself, conveying this purely calm, obedient fulfillment of the will of God) was, however, for Noah a profound test of his faith in God. All around was a depraved world and completely calm about its future (Matthew 24:37–38), a world that reproached Noah and mocked him during the many years of building the ark. Therefore, Noah had to be transported with his entire thought and soul into the future, and this faith, which saved him from death, was the highest merit of his spiritual life and prefigured that state of the human soul when it is saved from eternal death by faith, receiving holy baptism” (Vlastov). You might be interested in: