Genesis 6:4

"The Nephilim were in the earth in those days, and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them; the same were the mighty men that were of old, the men of renown."

"The Nephilim were in the earth in those days ..." This is a citation of the time when the unlawful marriages proliferated and represents those marriages as "an event that followed the appearance of the Nephilim."[7] We must therefore disagree with Willis who thought that the context here "suggests that the Nephilim were the children born to the sons of God and the daughters of men, and who became the mighty men of old."[8] On the other hand, the Nephilim existed before and after the sinful marriages came into view.

"The mighty men that were of old ..." Some of the older versions render this word as "giants" instead of mighty men. Although it is likely that the men in view were men of great physical stature, the thought appears to pertain more to their exploits of daring and violent deeds. This could be a reference to the Nephilim already mentioned, but Keil and others thought that the reference is to the sons of the mixed marriages. In neither case, is there any reference to angelic or superhuman progenitors of these mighty men. Such views are due solely to the error of "commentators who have been obliged to insert them here to save their angelic marriages!"[9] As to the meaning of "mighty men," the most probable interpretation "is that which understands them as men of violence, roving, lawless gallants."[10] "The term in Hebrew implies not so much the idea of great stature as of reckless ferocity, impious, and daring characters, who spread devastation and carnage far and wide."[11] The current century has witnessed the appearance of the same type of "mighty men": Kaiser Wilhelm, Benito Mussolini (Il Duce), Adolph Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Mao Tse-tung, etc. Such men were referred to in this verse as "men of renown"! Some dependable exegetes believe that the teaching here indicates that these (or at least some of them) were posterity produced by the mixed marriages, but, if that is the understanding of the place, there could have been no connection between these "men of renown" and the Nephilim, already mentioned as existing when those marriages occurred. In any case, the alleged union between supernatural and human beings is absolutely foreign to everything in the Bible, and particularly to this passage.