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TOM - Where does nephilim Giants in Genesis Came From?
JOEL - In the days of Enoch the King James version of Genesis 6: 1-4 reads:
"And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.
There were giants 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 became mighty men which were of old, men of renown."
The Jerusalem Bible, a Roman Catholic work reads:
"When men had begun to be plentiful on the earth, and daughters had been born to them, the sons of God, looking at the daughters of men, saw that they were pleasing, so they married as many as they chose. Yahweh said, `My spirit must not for ever be disgraced in man, for he is but flesh; his life shall last no more than a hundred and twenty years.' The Nephilim were on the earth at that time (and even afterward) when the sons of God resorted to the daughters of man, and had children by them. These are the heroes of days gone by, the famous men."
Also in the Book of Moses:
And the giants of the land, also, stood afar off; and there went forth a curse upon all people that fought against God; (Moses 7:15)
And in those days there were giants on the earth, and they sought Noah to take away his life; but the Lord was with Noah, and the power of the Lord was upon him.(Moses 8:18)
Nephilim is one of four different Hebrew words translated "giants" in the King James Version of the Old Testament.
However, the giants Hebrew name, Nephilim, is apparently derived from the verb naphal, "fall"; they are therefore thought by rabbinical commentators to have been "fallen ones" (rather than persons of gigantic stature).
But another reference seems to confirm that these Nephilim were indeed some very large evil people. Moses had sent spies into Canaan:
"And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched unto the children of Israel, saying, The land, through which we have gone to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature.
And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight." (Num 13:32-33)
A Bible dictionary says that the Nephilim were giant demigods who lived in the days of Enoch. (New Analytical Bible and Dictionary of the Bible.)
Some believe that fallen angels bred with mortal women and resulted in these part devine and part human giants called Nephilim. However according to Elder Mark E Peterson:
"The Nephilim were described as giants—how big we do not know. Were they like Goliath? In any case, the giants who lived in Enoch's day were a depraved lot who sought to murder him. But part divine and part human they were not, for neither God, angels, nor 'the sons of the gods' consorted with earthly women as implied." (Mark E. Petersen, Noah and the Flood, pp. 27-29.)
Some have considered Nephilim a good description for Nephi of the Book of Mormom, since he himself said that was "large in stature" (1 Nephi 4:31)
Bottom line is I don't think anyone really knows for sure who they were or where they came from.
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