Gen 6:3 | KD | STEP | The sentence of God upon the “sons of God” is also appropriate to men only. “ Jehovah said: My spirit shall not rule in men for ever; in their wandering they are flesh .” “The verb דּוּן = דּין signifies to rule (hence אדון the ruler), and to judge, as the consequence of ruling. רוּה is the divine spirit of life bestowed upon man, the principle of physical and ethical, natural and spiritual life. This His spirit God will withdraw from man, and thereby put an end to their life and conduct. בּשׁגּם is regarded by many as a particle, compounded of בּ, שׁ a contraction of אשׁר, and גּם (also), used in the sense of quoniam , because, (בּשׁ = בּאשׁר, as שׁ or שׁ = אשׁר Jdg 5:7; Jdg 6:17; Sol 1:7). But the objection to this explanation is, that the גּם, “because he also is flesh,” introduces an incongruous emphasis into the clause. We therefore prefer to regard שׁגּם as the inf . of שׁגג = שׁגה with the suffix: “ in their erring (that of men) he (man as a genus) is flesh; ” an explanation to which, to our mind, the extremely harsh change of number ( they, he ), is no objection, since many examples might be adduced of a similar change (vid., Hupfeld on ). Men, says God, have proved themselves by their erring and straying to be flesh, i.e., given up to the flesh, and incapable of being ruled by the Spirit of God and led back to the divine goal of their life. בּשׂר is used already in its ethical signification, like σάρξ in the New Testament, denoting not merely the natural corporeality of man, but his materiality as rendered ungodly by sin. “ Therefore his days shall be 120 years: ” this means, not that human life should in future never attain a greater age than 120 years, but that a respite of 120 years should still be granted to the human race. This sentence, as we may gather from the context, was made known to Noah in his 480th year, to be published by him as “preacher of righteousness” (2Pe 2:5) to the degenerate race. The reason why men had gone so far astray, that God determined to withdraw His spirit and give them up to destruction, was that the sons of God had taken wives of such of the daughters of men as they chose. Can this mean, because angels had formed marriages with the daughters of men? Even granting that such marriages, as being unnatural connections, would have led to the complete corruption of human nature; the men would in that case have been the tempted, and the real authors of the corruption would have been the angels. Why then should judgment fall upon the tempted alone? The judgments of God in the world are not executed with such partiality as this. And the supposition that nothing is said about the punishment of the angels, because the narrative has to do with the history of man, and the spiritual world is intentionally veiled as much as possible, does not meet the difficulty. If the sons of God were angels, the narrative is concerned not only with men, but with angels also; and it is not the custom of the Scriptures merely to relate the judgments which fall upon the tempted, and say nothing at all about the tempters. For the contrary, see Gen 3:14. If the “sons of God” were not men, so as to be included in the term אדם, the punishment would need to be specially pointed out in their case, and no deep revelations of the spiritual world would be required, since these celestial tempters would be living with men upon the earth, when they had taken wives from among their daughters. The judgments of God are not only free from all unrighteousness, but avoid every kind of partiality.

‏ Genesis 6:3

The sentence of God upon the “sons of God” is also appropriate to men only. “Jehovah said: My spirit shall not rule in men for ever; in their wandering they are flesh.” “The verb דּוּן = דּין signifies to rule (hence אדון the ruler), and to judge, as the consequence of ruling. רוּה is the divine spirit of life bestowed upon man, the principle of physical and ethical, natural and spiritual life. This His spirit God will withdraw from man, and thereby put an end to their life and conduct. בּשׁגּם is regarded by many as a particle, compounded of בּ, שׁ a contraction of אשׁר, and גּם (also), used in the sense of quoniam, because, (בּשׁ = בּאשׁר, as שׁ or שׁ = אשׁר Jdg 5:7; Jdg 6:17; Sol 1:7). But the objection to this explanation is, that the גּם, “because he also is flesh,” introduces an incongruous emphasis into the clause. We therefore prefer to regard שׁגּם as the inf. of שׁגג = שׁגה with the suffix: “in their erring (that of men) he (man as a genus) is flesh;” an explanation to which, to our mind, the extremely harsh change of number (they, he), is no objection, since many examples might be adduced of a similar change (vid., Hupfeld on Psa 5:10). Men, says God, have proved themselves by their erring and straying to be flesh, i.e., given up to the flesh, and incapable of being ruled by the Spirit of God and led back to the divine goal of their life. בּשׂר is used already in its ethical signification, like σάρξ in the New Testament, denoting not merely the natural corporeality of man, but his materiality as rendered ungodly by sin. “Therefore his days shall be 120 years:” this means, not that human life should in future never attain a greater age than 120 years, but that a respite of 120 years should still be granted to the human race. This sentence, as we may gather from the context, was made known to Noah in his 480th year, to be published by him as “preacher of righteousness” (2Pe 2:5) to the degenerate race. The reason why men had gone so far astray, that God determined to withdraw His spirit and give them up to destruction, was that the sons of God had taken wives of such of the daughters of men as they chose. Can this mean, because angels had formed marriages with the daughters of men? Even granting that such marriages, as being unnatural connections, would have led to the complete corruption of human nature; the men would in that case have been the tempted, and the real authors of the corruption would have been the angels. Why then should judgment fall upon the tempted alone? The judgments of God in the world are not executed with such partiality as this. And the supposition that nothing is said about the punishment of the angels, because the narrative has to do with the history of man, and the spiritual world is intentionally veiled as much as possible, does not meet the difficulty. If the sons of God were angels, the narrative is concerned not only with men, but with angels also; and it is not the custom of the Scriptures merely to relate the judgments which fall upon the tempted, and say nothing at all about the tempters. For the contrary, see Gen 3:14. If the “sons of God” were not men, so as to be included in the term אדם, the punishment would need to be specially pointed out in their case, and no deep revelations of the spiritual world would be required, since these celestial tempters would be living with men upon the earth, when they had taken wives from among their daughters. The judgments of God are not only free from all unrighteousness, but avoid every kind of partiality.