Gen. 6:1-4: The Hybrid Seed of Angels

In this article I will be citing some early and ancient Jewish and Christian interpretations of Genesis 6:1-4, where the sons of God that came into the daughters of human beings to have sex with them are explicitly identified as angels. It was during this time that the Nephilim appeared on earth and that children were born from this union.

Here is the passage in question:

“Now it happened, when men began to multiply on the face of the land, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were good in appearance; and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose. Then Yahweh said, ‘My Spirit shall not strive with man forever because he indeed is flesh; nevertheless his days shall be 120 years.’ The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.” Legacy Standard Bible (LSB)

I now proceed to the citations. All emphasis will be mine.

Jewish Sources

Book of Enoch/Watchers

Chapter 1

The Words of the Blessing of Enoch

1 The words of the blessing of Enoch, wherewith he blessed the elect and righteous, who will be living in the days of tribulation, when all the wicked and godless are to be removed.

2 And Enoch, a righteous man whose eyes were opened by God took up his parable and said, "I saw the vision of the Holy One in the heavens, which the angels showed me, and from them I heard everything, and from them I understood as I saw, but not for this generation, but for a remote one which is for to come."

3 Concerning the elect I said, and took up my parable concerning them: "The Holy Great One will come forth from His dwelling,

4 And the eternal God will tread upon the earth, even on Mount Sinai and will appear in the strength of His might from the heaven of heavens.

5 And all shall be smitten with fear and the Watchers shall quake, and great fear and trembling shall seize them unto the ends of the earth.

6 And the high mountains shall be shaken and the high hills shall be made low, and shall melt like wax before the flame.

7 And the earth shall be wholly rent in sunder and all that is upon the earth shall perish, and there shall be a judgement upon all.

8 But with the righteous He will make peace. And will protect the elect, And mercy shall be upon them. And they shall all belong to God, And they shall be prospered, And they shall all be blessed. And He will help them all, And light shall appear unto them, And He will make peace with them.

9 And behold! He cometh with ten thousands of His holy ones to execute judgement upon all, And to destroy all the ungodly: And to convict all flesh Of all the works of their ungodliness which they have ungodly committed, And of all the hard things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.

Chapter 2

The Creation

1 Observe ye everything that takes place in the heaven, how they do not change their orbits, and the luminaries which are in the heaven, how they all rise and set in order each in its season, and transgress not against their appointed order.

2 Behold ye the earth, and give heed to the things which take place upon it from first to last, how steadfast they are, how none of the things upon earth change, but all the works of God appear to you. Behold the summer and the winter, how the whole earth is filled with water, and clouds and dew and rain lie upon it.

3 Observe and see how in the winter all the trees seem as though they had withered and shed all their leaves, except fourteen trees, which do not lose their foliage but retain the old foliage from two to three years till the new comes.

4 And again, observe ye the days of summer how the sun is above the earth over against it. And you seek shade and shelter by reason of the heat of the sun, and the earth also burns with growing heat, and so you cannot tread on the earth, or on a rock by reason of its heat.

5 Observe ye how the trees cover themselves with green leaves and bear fruit: wherefore give ye heed and know with regard to all His works, and recognize how He that liveth for ever hath made them so.

6 And all His works go on thus from year to year for ever, and all the tasks which they accomplish for Him, and their tasks change not, but according as God hath ordained so is it done.

7 And behold how the sea and the rivers in like manner accomplish and change not their tasks from His commandments.

8 But ye have not been steadfast, nor done the commandments of the Lord, But ye have turned away and spoken proud and hard words With your impure mouths against His greatness. Oh, ye hard−hearted, ye shall find no peace.

9 Therefore shall ye execrate your days, and the years of your life shall perish, and the years of your destruction shall be multiplied in eternal abomination, and ye shall find no mercy.

10 In those days ye shall make your names an eternal abomination unto all the righteous, and by you shall all who curse, curse. All the sinners and godless shall imprecate by you. And for you, the godless there shall be a curse."

11 And all the righteous shall rejoice, and there shall be forgiveness of sins, and every mercy and peace and forbearance.

12 There shall be salvation unto them, a goodly light.

13 And for all of you sinners there shall be no salvation but on you all shall abide the curse of the beast.

14 But for the elect there shall be light and joy and peace, and they shall inherit the earth.

15 And then there shall be bestowed upon the elect wisdom, and they shall all live and never again sin either through ungodliness or through pride: But they who are wise shall be humble.

16 And they shall not again transgress, nor shall they sin all the days of their life, nor shall they die of anger or wrath but they shall complete the number of the days of their life.

17 And their lives shall be increased in peace, and the years of their joy shall be multiplied in eternal gladness and peace all the days of their life.

Chapter 3

Fallen Angels

1 And it came to pass when the children of men had multiplied that in those days were born unto them beautiful and comely daughters.

2 And the angels, the children of the heaven, saw and lusted after them, and said to one another: "Come, let us choose us wives from among the children of men and beget us children."

3 And Semjaza, who was their leader, said unto them: "I fear ye will not indeed agree to do this deed, and I alone shall have to pay the penalty of a great sin."

4 And they all answered him and said: "Let us all swear an oath, and all bind ourselves by mutual imprecations not to abandon this plan but to do this thing."

5 Then sware they all together and bound themselves by mutual imprecations upon it. And they were in all two hundred; who descended in the days of Jared on the summit of Mount Hermon, and they called it Mount Hermon, because they had sworn and bound themselves by mutual imprecations upon it.

6 And these are the names of their leaders: Samlazaz, their leader, Araklba, Rameel, Kokablel, Tamlel, Ramlel, Danel, Ezeqeel, Baraqijal, Asael, Armaros, Batarel, Ananel, Zaqlel, Samsapeel, Satarel, Turel, Jomjael, Sariel. These are their chiefs of tens.

7 And all the others together with them took unto themselves wives, and each chose for himself one, and they began to go in unto them and to defile themselves with them.

8 And they taught them charms and enchantments, and the cutting of roots, and made them acquainted with plants.

9 And they became pregnant, and they bare great giants, whose height was three thousand ells: Who consumed all the acquisitions of men. And when men could no longer sustain them, the giants turned against them and devoured mankind.

10 And they began to sin against birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another's flesh, and drink the blood. Then the earth laid accusation against the lawless ones.

11 And Azazel taught men to make swords, and knives, and shields, and breastplates, and made known to them the metals of the earth and the art of working them, and bracelets, and ornaments, and the use of antimony, and the beautifying of the eyelids, and all kinds of costly stones, and all colouring tinctures.

12 And there arose much godlessness, and they committed fornication, and they were led astray, and became corrupt in all their ways.

13 Semjaza taught enchantments and root−cuttings, Armaros the resolving of enchantments, Baraqijal taught astrology, Kokabel the constellations, Ezeqeel the knowledge of the clouds, Araqiel the signs of the earth, Shamsiel the signs of the sun, and Sariel the course of the moon.

14 And as men perished, they cried, and their cry went up to heaven. (The Complete Book of Enoch, Standard English Version)

Josephus

The Antiquities of the Jews, Book 1, Chapter 3

Concerning the Flood; and after what Manner Noah was saved in an Ark, with his Kindred, and afterward dwelt in the Plain of Shinar.

1. NOW THIS posterity of Seth continued to esteem God as the Lord of the universe, and to have an entire regard to virtue, for seven generations; but in process of time they were perverted, and forsook the practices of their forefathers, and did neither pay those honours to God which were appointed them, nor had they any concern to do justice towards men. But for what degree of zeal they had formerly shown for virtue, they now showed by their actions a double degree of wickedness; whereby they made God to be their enemy; for many angels * This notion, that the fallen angels were, in some sense, the fathers of the old giants, was the constant opinion of antiquity. of God accompanied with women, and begat sons that proved unjust, and despisers of all that was good, on account of the confidence they had in their own strength; for the tradition is, That these men did what resembled the acts of those whom the Grecians call giants. But Noah was very uneasy at what they did; and, being displeased at their conduct, persuaded them to change their dispositions and their acts for the better; but seeing they did not yield to him, but were slaves to their wicked pleasures, he was afraid they would kill him, together with his wife and children, and those they had married; so he departed out of that land.

Book of Jubilees

Chapter 4

And in the second week of the tenth jubilee Mahalalel took unto him to wife Dînâh, the daughter of Barâkî’êl the daughter of his father's brother, and she bare him a son in the third week in the sixth year, and he called his name Jared; for in his days the angels of the Lord descended on the earth, those who are named the Watchers, that they should instruct the children of men, and that they should do judgment and uprightness on the earth.

And in the eleventh jubilee Jared took to himself a wife, and her name was Bâraka, the daughter of Râsûjâl, a daughter of his father's brother, in the fourth week of this jubilee, and she bare him a son in the fifth week, in the fourth year of the jubilee, and he called his name Enoch.

And he was the first among men that are born on earth who learnt writing and knowledge and wisdom and who wrote down the signs of heaven according to the order of their months in a book, that men might know the seasons of the years according to the order of their separate months.

And he was the first to write a testimony, and he testified to the sons of men among the generations of the earth, and recounted the weeks of the jubilees, and made known to them the days of the years, and set in order the months and recounted the Sabbaths of the years as we made (them) known to him.

And what was and what will be he saw in a vision of his sleep, as it will happen to the children of men throughout their generations until the day of judgment; he saw and understood everything, and wrote his testimony, and placed the testimony on earth for all the children of men and for their generations.

And in the twelfth jubilee, in the seventh week thereof, he took to himself a wife, and her name was Ednî, the daughter of Dânêl, the daughter of his father's brother, and in the sixth year in this week she bare him a son and he called his name Methuselah.

And he was moreover with the angels of God these six jubilees of years, and they showed him everything which is on earth and in the heavens, the rule of the sun, and he wrote down everything.

And he testified to the Watchers, who had sinned with the daughters of men; for these had begun to unite themselves, so as to be defiled, with the daughters of men, and Enoch testified against (them) all.

And he was taken from amongst the children of men, and we conducted him into the Garden of Eden in majesty and honour, and behold there he writeth down the condemnation and judgment of the world, and all the wickedness of the children of men.

And on account of it (God) brought the waters of the flood upon all the land of Eden; for there he was set as a sign and that he should testify against all the children of men, that he should recount all the deeds of the generations until the day of condemnation.

And he burnt the incense of the sanctuary, (even) sweet spices, acceptable before the Lord on the Mount.

For the Lord hath four places on the earth, the Garden of Eden, and the Mount of the East, and this mountain on which thou art this day, Mount Sinai, and Mount Zion (which) will be sanctified in the new creation for a sanctification of the earth; through it will the earth be sanctified from all (its) guilt and its uncleanness throughout the generations of the world.

And in the fourteenth jubilee Methuselah took unto himself a wife, Ednâ the daughter of ’Âzrîâl, the daughter of his father's brother, in the third week, in the first year of this week, and he begat a son and called his name Lamech.

And in the fifteenth jubilee in the third week Lamech took to himself a wife, and her name was Bêtênôs the daughter of Bârâkî’îl, the daughter of his father's brother, and in this week she bare him a son and he called his name Noah, saying, "This one will comfort me for my trouble and all my work, and for the ground which the Lord hath cursed."

And at the close of the nineteenth jubilee, in the seventh week in the sixth year thereof, Adam died, and all his sons buried him in the land of his creation, and he was the first to be buried in the earth.

And he lacked seventy years of one thousand years; for one thousand years are as one day in the testimony of the heavens and therefore was it written concerning the tree of knowledge: "On the day that ye eat thereof ye will die."

For this reason he did not complete the years of this day; for he died during it.

At the close of this jubilee Cain was killed after him in the same year; for his house fell upon him and he died in the midst of his house, and he was killed by its stones, for with a stone he had killed Abel, and by a stone was he killed in righteous judgment.

For this reason it was ordained on the heavenly tables: "With the instrument with which a man killeth his neighbour with the same shall he be killed; after the manner that he wounded him, in like manner shall they deal with him."

And in the twenty-fifth jubilee Noah took to himself a wife, and her name was ’Ĕmzârâ, the daughter of Râkê’êl, the daughter of his father's brother, in the first year in the fifth week: and in the third year thereof she bare him Shem, in the fifth year thereof she bare him Ham, and in the first year in the sixth week she bare him Japheth.

Chapter 5 

And it came to pass when the children of men began to multiply on the face of the earth and daughters were born unto them, that the angels of God saw them on a certain year of this jubilee, that they were beautiful to look upon; and they took themselves wives of all whom they chose, and they bare unto them sons and they were giants.

And lawlessness increased on the earth and all flesh corrupted its way, alike men and cattle and beasts and birds and everything that walketh on the earth–all of them corrupted their ways and their orders, and they began to devour each other, and lawlessness increased on the earth and every imagination of the thoughts of all men (was) thus evil continually.

And God looked upon the earth, and behold it was corrupt, and all flesh had corrupted its orders, and all that were upon the earth had wrought all manner of evil before His eyes.

And He said: "I shall destroy man and all flesh upon the face of the earth which I have created."

But Noah found grace before the eyes of the Lord.

And against the angels whom He had sent upon the earth, He was exceedingly wroth, and He gave commandment to root them out of all their dominion, and He bade us to bind them in the depths of the earth, and behold they are bound in the midst of them, and are (kept) separate.

And against their sons went forth a command from before His face that they should be smitten with the sword, and be removed from under heaven.

And He said "My spirit will not always abide on man; for they also are flesh and their days shall be one hundred and twenty years."

And He sent His sword into their midst that each should slay his neighbour, and they began to slay each other till they all fell by the sword and were destroyed from the earth.

And their fathers were witnesses (of their destruction), and after this they were bound in the depths of the earth for ever, until the day of the great condemnation when judgment is executed on all those who have corrupted their ways and their works before the Lord.

And He destroyed all from their places, and there was not left one of them whom He judged not according to all their wickedness.

And He made for all His works a new and righteous nature, so that they should not sin in their whole nature for ever, but should be all righteous each in his kind alway.

And the judgment of all is ordained and written on the heavenly tables in righteousness--even (the judgment of) all who depart from the path which is ordained for them to walk in; and if they walk not therein judgment is written down for every creature and for every kind.

And there is nothing in heaven or on earth, or in light or in darkness, or in Sheol or in the depth, or in the place of darkness (which is not judged); and all their judgments are ordained and written and engraved.

In regard to all He will judge, the great according to his greatness, and the small according to his smallness, and each according to his way.

And He is not one who will regard the person (of any), nor is He one who will receive gifts, if He saith that He will execute judgment on each: if one gave everything that is on the earth, He will not regard the gifts or the person (of any), nor accept anything at his hands, for He is a righteous judge.

Zohar

וְלָא עוֹד אֶלָּא דְּעַזָּא וַעֲזָאֵל הֲווּ מְקַטְרְגֵי עֲלֵיהּ בְּזִמְנָא דְּאָמַר שְׁכִינְתָּא לְקוּדְשָׁא בְּרִיךְ הוּא נַעֲשֶׂה אָדָם, אָמְרוּ מָה אָדָם וַתֵּדָעֵהוּ. מָה אַתְּ בָּעֵי לְמִבְרֵי אָדָם, וַתֵּדָעֵהוּ דְּעֲתִיד לְמֶחֱטֵי קַמָּךְ בְּאִתְּתָא דִילֵיהּ דְּאִיהִי חשֶׁךְ. דְּאוֹר (מ"י דף כ"ח) אִיהוּ דְּכוּרָא וְחשֶׁךְ נוּקְבָא שְׂמָאלָא חשֶׁךְ דִּבְרִיאָה. בְּהַהוּא זִמְנָא שְׁכִינְתָּא אֲמָרַת לוֹן בְּהַאי דְּאַתּוּן מְקַטְרְגִין אַתּוּן עֲתִידִים לְמִנְפַּל. כְּדִכְתִיב וַיִּרְאוּ בְּנֵי הָאֱלהִים אֶת בְּנוֹת הָאָדָם כִּי טוֹבוֹת הֵנָּה וְגו' (חשקו בהון) וְטָעוּ בְהוֹן וְאַפִּיל לוֹן שְׁכִינְתָּא מִקְּדוּשָׁה דִּלְהוֹן.  

Nay more, Uzza and Azael actually opposed it. For when the Shekinah said to God “Let us make man”, they said, “What is man that thou shouldst know him? Why desirest thou to create man, who, as thou knowest, will sin before thee through his wife, who is the darkness to his light, light being male and darkness female?” The Shekinah answered them: “You yourselves shall commit the very crime of which you accuse him”; and so it is written, “and the sons of God saw the daughters of man that they were comely”, and they went astray after them and were degraded by the Shekinah from their holy estate.’

אָמְרוּ חַבְרַיָּיא רִבִּי רִבִּי, אַדְּהָכִי (נ"א אי הכי) עַזָּא וַעֲזָאֵל לָא הֲווּ מְשַׁקְרִין בְּמִלּוּלַיְיהוּ. דְּוַדַּאי בְּנוּקְבָא עֲתִיד אָדָם לְמֶחֱטֵי. אָמַר לְהוּ הָכִי אָמְרָה שְׁכִינְתָּא אַתּוּן אִזְדַּמַּנְתּוּן לְקַטְרְגָא קֳדָמַי יַתִּיר מֵחֵילָא דִּמְרוֹמָא, אִי אַתּוּן הֲוֵיתוּן שַׁפִּירִין מֵאָדָם בְּעוֹבָדַיְיכוּ יָאוֹת לְכוּ לְקַטְרְגָא עֲלֵיהּ. אֲבָל אִיהוּ עֲתִיד לְמֶחֱטֵי בְּאִתְּתָא חָדָא, אַתּוּן בִּנְשִׁין סַגִּיאִין. חִבָּתֵיכוֹן יַתִּיר מִבְּנֵי נְשָׁא כְּמָה דִּכְתִיב וַיִּרְאוּ בְּנֵי הָאֱלהִים אֶת בְּנוֹת הָאָדָם וְגו', אֶת בַּת הָאָדָם לא נֶאֱמַר, אֶלָּא אֶת בְּנוֹת הָאָדָם. וְלא עוֹד אֶלָּא אִם אָדָם חָב הָא אַקְדִּים לֵיהּ תְּשׁוּבָה לְאַהֲדָרָא לְמָארֵיהּ לְאַתְקָנָא בַּמֶּה דְּחָב.  

Said the colleagues: ‘Rabbi, after all, Uzza and Azael were not wrong, because man was really destined to sin through woman.’ He replied, ‘What the Shekinah said was this: “You have spoken worse of man than all the rest of the heavenly host. If you were more virtuous than man, you would have a right to accuse him. But whereas he will sin with one woman, you will sin with many women, as it is written, ‘and the sons of God saw the daughters of man’- not a daughter, but daughters; and further, if man sinned, he was ready to repent and to return to his Master and repair his wrong.” (Zohar, Bereshit 16)

Christian Sources

New Testament Writings

“For if God did not spare angels who sinned, but cast them into the pit and delivered them to chains of darkness, being kept for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in its corrupt lust and despise authority.

“Daring, self-willed, they do not tremble when they blaspheme glorious ones, whereas angels who are greater in strength and power do not bring a reviling judgment against them before the Lord. But these, like unreasoning animals, born as creatures of instinct to be captured and killed, blaspheming where they have no knowledge, will in the destruction of those creatures also be destroyed, suffering unrighteousness as the wages of their unrighteousness, considering it a pleasure to revel in the daytime—they are stains and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, as they feast with you, having eyes full of adultery and unceasing sin, enticing unstable souls, having a heart trained in greed—they are accursed children. Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray, having followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but he received a rebuke for his own lawlessness, for a mute donkey, speaking out with a voice of a man, restrained the madness of the prophet.” 2 Peter 2:4-16 LSB

“Now I want to remind you, though you know all things, that Jesus, having once saved a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe. And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, having indulged in the same way as these in gross sexual immorality and having gone after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire.

“Yet in the same way these men, also by dreaming, defile the flesh, and reject authority, and blaspheme glorious ones. But Michael the archangel, when he, disputing with the devil, was arguing about the body of Moses, did not dare pronounce against him a blasphemous judgment, but said, ‘The Lord rebuke you!’ But these men blaspheme the things which they do not understand; and the things which they know by instinct, like unreasoning animals, by these things they are destroyed. Woe to them! For they have gone the way of Cain, and for pay they have poured themselves into the error of Balaam, and perished in the rebellion of Korah. These are the men who are hidden reefs in your love feasts when they feast with you without fear, caring for themselves; clouds without water, carried along by winds; autumn trees without fruit, doubly dead, uprooted; wild waves of the sea, casting up their own shame like foam; wandering stars, for whom the black darkness has been reserved forever.

“But Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, also prophesied about these men, saying, ‘Behold, the Lord came with many thousands of His holy ones, to execute judgment upon all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.’” Jude 1:5-15 LSB

There are good reasons to believe that both Peter and Jude are referring to the sons of God of Genesis 6:1-4. First, the examples they give of God’s destruction of the wicked can all be found in the Hebrew Bible. I.e., the stories of Noah and the flood, Sodom and Gomorrah, and Israel’s exodus and punishment in the desert are all found in the Pentateuch. This means that the readers are expected to be able to locate the fall of the angels there as well, and Gen. 6:1-4 is the only place where they would be able to do so.

Second, Jude states that the gross sexual immorality of Sodom and Gomorrah in going after strange flesh, i.e., unnatural relations, was similar to the sin of the angels. This means that the angels were also guilty of committing gross sexual perversion. Now what could be more perverted than angelic beings having sex with human women? After all, it doesn’t get any more unnatural than that!

Third, Jude quotes Enoch 1:9 in vv. 14-15, the very book where the sons of God are explicitly identified as angels. Therefore, Jude’s readers could not help but make the connection between the fallen angels of v. 6 and the heavenly beings of Gen. 6:1-4.

St. Justin Martyr

Second Apology

Chapter 5. How the angels transgressed

But if this idea take possession of some one, that if we acknowledge God as our helper, we should not, as we say, be oppressed and persecuted by the wicked; this, too, I will solve. God, when He had made the whole world, and subjected things earthly to man, and arranged the heavenly elements for the increase of fruits and rotation of the seasons, and appointed this divine law — for these things also He evidently made for man — committed the care of men and of all things under heaven to angels whom He appointed over them. But the angels transgressed this appointment, and were captivated by love of women, and begot children who are those that are called demons; and besides, they afterwards subdued the human race to themselves, partly by magical writings, and partly by fears and the punishments they occasioned, and partly by teaching them to offer sacrifices, and incense, and libations, of which things they stood in need after they were enslaved by lustful passions; and among men they sowed murders, wars, adulteries, intemperate deeds, and all wickedness. Whence also the poets and mythologists, not knowing that it was the angels and those demons who had been begotten by them that did these things to men, and women, and cities, and nations, which they related, ascribed them to god himself, and to those who were accounted to be his very offspring, and to the offspring of those who were called his brothers, Neptune and Pluto, and to the children again of these their offspring. For whatever name each of the angels had given to himself and his children, by that name they called them.

St. Irenaeus

Adversus haereses, Book IV, Chapter 36 The prophets were sent from one and the same Father from Whom the Son was sent.

3. And therefore did the Lord say to His disciples, to make us become good workmen: Take heed to yourselves, and watch continually upon every occasion, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that day shall come upon you unawares; for as a snare shall it come upon all dwelling upon the face of the earth. Luke 21:34-35 Let your loins, therefore, be girded about, and your lights burning, and you like to men who wait for their lord, when he shall return from the wedding. Luke 12:35-36 For as it was in the days of Noe, they ate and drank, they bought and sold, they married and were given in marriage, and they knew not, until Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all; as also it was in the days of Lot, they ate and drank, they bought and sold, they planted and built, until the time that Lot went out of Sodom; it rained fire from heaven, and destroyed them all: so shall it also be at the coming of the Son of man. Luke 17:26, etc. Watch therefore, for you know not in what day your Lord shall come. Matthew 24:42 [In these passages] He declares one and the same Lord, who in the times of Noah brought the deluge because of man's disobedience, and who also in the days of Lot rained fire from heaven because of the multitude of sinners among the Sodomites, and who, on account of this same disobedience and similar sins, will bring on the day of judgment at the end of time (in novissimo); on which day He declares that it shall be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrha than for that city and house which shall not receive the word of His apostles. And you, Capernaum, He said, is it that you shall be exalted to heaven? You shall go down to hell. For if the mighty works which have been done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained unto this day. Verily I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for Sodom in the day of judgment than for you. Matthew 11:23-24

4. Since the Son of God is always one and the same, He gives to those who believe in Him a well of water John 4:14 [springing up] to eternal life, but He causes the unfruitful fig-tree immediately to dry up; and in the days of Noah He justly brought on the deluge for the purpose of extinguishing that most infamous race of men then existent, who could not bring forth fruit to God, since the angels that sinned had commingled with them, and [acted as He did] in order that He might put a check upon the sins of these men, but [that at the same time] He might preserve the archetype, the formation of Adam. And it was He who rained fire and brimstone from heaven, in the days of Lot, upon Sodom and Gomorrha, an example of the righteous judgment of God, that all may know, that every tree that brings not forth good fruit shall be cut down, and cast into the fire. Matthew 3:10 And it is He who uses [the words], that it will be more tolerable for Sodom in the general judgment than for those who beheld His wonders, and did not believe in Him, nor receive His doctrine. Matthew 11:24; Luke 10:12 For as He gave by His advent a greater privilege to those who believed on Him, and who do His will, so also did He point out that those who did not believe in Him should have a more severe punishment in the judgment; thus extending equal justice to all, and being to exact more from those to whom He gives the more; the more, however, not because He reveals the knowledge of another Father, as I have shown so fully and so repeatedly, but because He has, by means of His advent, poured upon the human race the greater gift of paternal grace.

Athenagoras

A Plea for the Christians

Chapter 24. Concerning the Angels and Giants.

What need is there, in speaking to you who have searched into every department of knowledge, to mention the poets, or to examine opinions of another kind? Let it suffice to say thus much. If the poets and philosophers did not acknowledge that there is one God, and concerning these gods were not of opinion, some that they are demons, others that they are matter, and others that they once were men, — there might be some show of reason for our being harassed as we are, since we employ language which makes a distinction between God and matter, and the natures of the two. For, as we acknowledge a God, and a Son his Logos, and a Holy Spirit, united in essence — the Father, the Son, the Spirit, because the Son is the Intelligence, Reason, Wisdom of the Father, and the Spirit an effluence, as light from fire; so also do we apprehend the existence of other powers, which exercise dominion about matter, and by means of it, and one in particular, which is hostile to God: not that anything is really opposed to God, like strife to friendship, according to Empedocles, and night to day, according to the appearing and disappearing of the stars (for even if anything had placed itself in opposition to God, it would have ceased to exist, its structure being destroyed by the power and might of God), but that to the good that is in God, which belongs of necessity to Him, and co-exists with Him, as color with body, without which it has no existence (not as being part of it, but as an attendant property co-existing with it, united and blended, just as it is natural for fire to be yellow and the ether dark blue) — to the good that is in God, I say, the spirit which is about matter, who was created by God, just as the other angels were created by Him, and entrusted with the control of matter and the forms of matter, is opposed. For this is the office of the angels — to exercise providence for God over the things created and ordered by Him; so that God may have the universal and general providence of the whole, while the particular parts are provided for by the angels appointed over them. Just as with men, who have freedom of choice as to both virtue and vice (for you would not either honour the good or punish the bad, unless vice and virtue were in their own power; and some are diligent in the matters entrusted to them by you, and others faithless), so is it among the angels. Some, free agents, you will observe, such as they were created by God, continued in those things for which God had made and over which He had ordained them; but some outraged both the constitution of their nature and the government entrusted to them: namely, this ruler of matter and its various forms, and others of those who were placed about this first firmament (you know that we say nothing without witnesses, but state the things which have been declared by the prophets); these fell into impure love of virgins, and were subjugated by the flesh, and he became negligent and wicked in the management of the things entrusted to him. Of these lovers of virgins, therefore, were begotten those who are called giants. And if something has been said by the poets, too, about the giants, be not surprised at this: worldly wisdom and divine differ as much from each other as truth and plausibility: the one is of heaven and the other of earth; and indeed, according to the prince of matter, —

We know we oft speak lies that look like truths.

Chapter 25. The Poets and Philosophers Have Denied a Divine Providence.

These angels, then, who have fallen from heaven, and haunt the air and the earth, and are no longer able to rise to heavenly things, and the souls of the giants, which are the demons who wander about the world, perform actions similar, the one (that is, the demons) to the natures they have received, the other (that is, the angels) to the appetites they have indulged. But the prince of matter, as may be seen merely from what transpires, exercises a control and management contrary to the good that is in God: — 

Ofttimes this anxious thought has crossed my mind, Whether 'tis chance or deity that rules The small affairs of men; and, spite of hope As well as justice, drives to exile some Stripped of all means of life, while others still Continue to enjoy prosperity.

Prosperity and adversity, contrary to hope and justice, made it impossible for Euripides to say to whom belongs the administration of earthly affairs, which is of such a kind that one might say of it:— 

How then, while seeing these things, can we say There is a race of gods, or yield to laws?

The same thing led Aristotle to say that the things below the heaven are not under the care of Providence, although the eternal providence of God concerns itself equally with us below —

The earth, let willingness move her or not, Must herbs produce, and thus sustain my flocks, —

and addresses itself to the deserving individually, according to truth and not according to opinion; and all other things, according to the general constitution of nature, are provided for by the law of reason. But because the demoniac movements and operations proceeding from the adverse spirit produce these disorderly sallies, and moreover move men, some in one way and some in another, as individuals and as nations, separately and in common, in accordance with the tendency of matter on the one hand, and of the affinity for divine things on the other, from within and from without — some who are of no mean reputation have therefore thought that this universe is constituted without any definite order, and is driven here and there by an irrational chance. But they do not understand, that of those things which belong to the constitution of the whole world there is nothing out of order or neglected, but that each one of them has been produced by reason, and that, therefore, they do not transgress the order prescribed to them; and that man himself, too, so far as He that made him is concerned, is well ordered, both by his original nature, which has one common character for all, and by the constitution of his body, which does not transgress the law imposed upon it, and by the termination of his life, which remains equal and common to all alike; but that, according to the character peculiar to himself and the operation of the ruling prince and of the demons his followers, he is impelled and moved in this direction or in that, notwithstanding that all possess in common the same original constitution of mind.

Tertullian

The Apology

Chapter 22

And we affirm indeed the existence of certain spiritual essences; nor is their name unfamiliar. The philosophers acknowledge there are demons; Socrates himself waiting on a demon's will. Why not? Since it is said an evil spirit attached itself specially to him even from his childhood — turning his mind no doubt from what was good. The poets are all acquainted with demons too; even the ignorant common people make frequent use of them in cursing. In fact, they call upon Satan, the demon-chief, in their execrations, as though from some instinctive soul-knowledge of him. Plato also admits the existence of angels. The dealers in magic, no less, come forward as witnesses to the existence of both kinds of spirits. We are instructed, moreover, by our sacred books how from certain angels, who fell of their own free-will, there sprang a more wicked demon-brood, condemned of God along with the authors of their race, and that chief we have referred to. It will for the present be enough, however, that some account is given of their work. Their great business is the ruin of mankind. So, from the very first, spiritual wickedness sought our destruction. They inflict, accordingly, upon our bodies diseases and other grievous calamities, while by violent assaults they hurry the soul into sudden and extraordinary excesses. Their marvellous subtleness and tenuity give them access to both parts of our nature. As spiritual, they can do no harm; for, invisible and intangible, we are not cognizant of their action save by its effects, as when some inexplicable, unseen poison in the breeze blights the apples and the grain while in the flower, or kills them in the bud, or destroys them when they have reached maturity; as though by the tainted atmosphere in some unknown way spreading abroad its pestilential exhalations. So, too, by an influence equally obscure, demons and angels breathe into the soul, and rouse up its corruptions with furious passions and vile excesses; or with cruel lusts accompanied by various errors, of which the worst is that by which these deities are commended to the favour of deceived and deluded human beings, that they may get their proper food of flesh-fumes and blood when that is offered up to idol-images. What is daintier food to the spirit of evil, than turning men's minds away from the true God by the illusions of a false divination? And here I explain how these illusions are managed. Every spirit is possessed of wings. This is a common property of both angels and demons. So they are everywhere in a single moment; the whole world is as one place to them; all that is done over the whole extent of it, it is as easy for them to know as to report. Their swiftness of motion is taken for divinity, because their nature is unknown. Thus they would have themselves thought sometimes the authors of the things which they announce; and sometimes, no doubt, the bad things are their doing, never the good. The purposes of God, too, they took up of old from the lips of the prophets, even as they spoke them; and they gather them still from their works, when they hear them read aloud. Thus getting, too, from this source some intimations of the future, they set themselves up as rivals of the true God, while they steal His divinations. But the skill with which their responses are shaped to meet events, your Crœsi and Pyrrhi know too well. On the other hand, it was in that way we have explained, the Pythian was able to declare that they were cooking a tortoise with the flesh of a lamb; in a moment he had been to Lydia. From dwelling in the air, and their nearness to the stars, and their commerce with the clouds, they have means of knowing the preparatory processes going on in these upper regions, and thus can give promise of the rains which they already feel. Very kind too, no doubt, they are in regard to the healing of diseases. For, first of all, they make you ill; then, to get a miracle out of it, they command the application of remedies either altogether new, or contrary to those in use, and straightway withdrawing hurtful influence, they are supposed to have wrought a cure. What need, then, to speak of their other artifices, or yet further of the deceptive power which they have as spirits: of these Castor apparitions, of water carried by a sieve, and a ship drawn along by a girdle, and a beard reddened by a touch, all done with the one object of showing that men should believe in the deity of stones, and not seek after the only true God?

On the Veiling of Virgins

Chapter 7. Of the Reasons Assigned by the Apostle for Bidding Women to Be Veiled

Turn we next to the examination of the reasons themselves which lead the apostle to teach that the female ought to be veiled, (to see) whether the self-same (reasons) apply to virgins likewise; so that hence also the community of the name between virgins and not-virgins may be established, while the self-same causes which necessitate the veil are found to exist in each case.

If the man is head of the woman, of course (he is) of the virgin too, from whom comes the woman who has married; unless the virgin is a third generic class, some monstrosity with a head of its own. If it is shameful for a woman to be shaven or shorn, of course it is so for a virgin. (Hence let the world, the rival of God, see to it, if it asserts that close-cut hair is graceful to a virgin in like manner as that flowing hair is to a boy.) To her, then, to whom it is equally unbecoming to be shaven or shorn, it is equally becoming to be covered. If the woman is the glory of the man, how much more the virgin, who is a glory withal to herself! If the woman is of the man, and for the sake of the man, that rib of Adam was first a virgin. If the woman ought to have power upon the head, all the more justly ought the virgin, to whom pertains the essence of the cause (assigned for this assertion). For if (it is) on account of the angels— those, to wit, whom we read of as having fallen from God and heaven on account of concupiscence after females— who can presume that it was bodies already defiled, and relics of human lust, which such angels yearned after, so as not rather to have been inflamed for virgins, whose bloom pleads an excuse for human lust likewise? For thus does Scripture withal suggest: And it came to pass, it says, when men had begun to grow more numerous upon the earth, there were withal daughters born them; but the sons of God, having descried the daughters of men, that they were fair, took to themselves wives of all whom they elected. For here the Greek name of women does seem to have the sense wives, inasmuch as mention is made of marriage. When, then, it says the daughters of men, it manifestly purports virgins, who would be still reckoned as belonging to their parents— for wedded women are called their husbands'— whereas it could have said the wives of men: in like manner not naming the angels adulterers, but husbands, while they take unwedded daughters of men, who it has above said were born, thus also signifying their virginity: first, born; but here, wedded to angels. Anything else I know not that they were except born and subsequently wedded. So perilous a face, then, ought to be shaded, which has cast stumbling-stones even so far as heaven: that, when standing in the presence of God, at whose bar it stands accused of the driving of the angels from their (native) confines, it may blush before the other angels as well; and may repress that former evil liberty of its head —(a liberty) now to be exhibited not even before human eyes. But even if they were females already contaminated whom those angels had desired, so much the more on account of the angels would it have been the duty of virgins to be veiled, as it would have been the more possible for virgins to have been the cause of the angels' sinning. If, moreover, the apostle further adds the prejudgment of nature, that redundancy of locks is an honour to a woman, because hair serves for a covering, of course it is most of all to a virgin that this is a distinction; for their very adornment properly consists in this, that, by being massed together upon the crown, it wholly covers the very citadel of the head with an encirclement of hair.

Clementine Homilies

Homily 8

Chapter XI. Cause of the Fall of Man

But they, because they had at first no experience of evils, being insensible to the gift of good things, were turned to ingratitude by abundance of food and luxuries, so that they even thought that there is no Providence, since they had not by previous labour got good things as the reward of righteousness, inasmuch as no one of them had fallen into any suffering or disease, or any other necessity; so that, as is usual for men afflicted on account of wicked transgression, they should look about for the God who is able to heal them. But immediately after their despite, which proceeded from fearlessness and secure luxury, a certain just punishment met them, as following from a certain arranged harmony, removing from them good things as having hurt them, and introducing evil things instead, as advantageous.

Chapter XII. Metamorphoses of the Angels

For of the spirits who inhabit the heaven, the angels who dwell in the lowest region, being grieved at the ingratitude of men to God, asked that they might come into the life of men, that, really becoming men, by more intercourse they might convict those who had acted ungratefully towards Him, and might subject every one to adequate punishment. When, therefore, their petition was granted, they metamorphosed themselves into every nature; for, being of a more godlike substance, they are able easily to assume any form. So they became precious stones, and goodly pearl, and the most beauteous purple, and choice gold, and all matter that is held in most esteem. And they fell into the hands of some, and into the bosoms of others, and suffered themselves to be stolen by them. They also changed themselves into beasts and reptiles, and fishes and birds, and into whatsoever they pleased. These things also the poets among yourselves, by reason of fearlessness, sing, as they befell, attributing to one the many and diverse doings of all.

Chapter XIII. The Fall of the Angels

But when, having assumed these forms, they convicted as covetous those who stole them, and changed themselves into the nature of men, in order that, living holily, and showing the possibility of so living, they might subject the ungrateful to punishment, yet having become in all respects men, they also partook of human lust, and being brought under its subjection they fell into cohabitation with women; and being involved with them, and sunk in defilement and altogether emptied of their first power, were unable to turn back to the first purity of their proper nature, their members turned away from their fiery substance: for the fire itself, being extinguished by the weight of lust, and changed into flesh, they trode the impious path downward. For they themselves, being fettered with the bonds of flesh, were constrained and strongly bound; wherefore they have no more been able to ascend into the heavens.

Chapter XIV. Their Discoveries

For after the intercourse, being asked to show what they were before, and being no longer able to do so, on account of their being unable to do anything else after their defilement, yet wishing to please their mistresses, instead of themselves, they showed the bowels of the earth; I mean, the choice metals, gold, brass, silver, iron, and the like, with all the most precious stones. And along with these charmed stones, they delivered the arts of the things pertaining to each, and imparted the discovery of magic, and taught astronomy, and the powers of roots, and whatever was impossible to be found out by the human mind; also the melting of gold and silver, and the like, and the various dyeing of garments. And all things, in short, which are for the adornment and delight of women, are the discoveries of these demons bound in flesh.

Chapter XV. The Giants

But from their unhallowed intercourse spurious men sprang, much greater in stature than ordinary men, whom they afterwards called giants; not those dragon-footed giants who waged war against God, as those blasphemous myths of the Greeks do sing, but wild in manners, and greater than men in size, inasmuch as they were sprung of angels; yet less than angels, as they were born of women. Therefore God, knowing that they were barbarized to brutality, and that the world was not sufficient to satisfy them (for it was created according to the proportion of men and human use), that they might not through want of food turn, contrary to nature, to the eating of animals, and yet seem to be blameless, as having ventured upon this through necessity, the Almighty God rained manna upon them, suited to their various tastes; and they enjoyed all that they would. But they, on account of their bastard nature, not being pleased with purity of food, longed only after the taste of blood. Wherefore they first tasted flesh.

Chapter XVI. Cannibalism

And the men who were with them there for the first time were eager to do the like. Thus, although we are born neither good nor bad, we become one or the other; and having formed habits, we are with difficulty drawn from them. But when irrational animals fell short, these bastard men tasted also human flesh. For it was not a long step to the consumption of flesh like their own, having first tasted it in other forms.

Chapter XVII. The Flood

But by the shedding of much blood, the pure air being defiled with impure vapour, and sickening those who breathed it, rendered them liable to diseases, so that thenceforth men died prematurely. But the earth being by these means greatly defiled, these first teemed with poison-darting and deadly creatures. All things, therefore, going from bad to worse, on account of these brutal demons, God wished to cast them away like an evil leaven, lest each generation from a wicked seed, being like to that before it, and equally impious, should empty the world to come of saved men. And for this purpose, having warned a certain righteous man, with his three sons, together with their wives and their children, to save themselves in an ark, He sent a deluge of water, that all being destroyed, the purified world might be handed over to him who was saved in the ark, in order to a second beginning of life. And thus it came to pass.

Commodianus

Writings

II. God's Indignation.

In the law, the Lord of heaven, and earth, and sea has commanded, saying, Worship not vain gods made by your own hands out of wood or gold, lest my wrath destroy you for such things. The people before Moses, unskilled, abiding without law, and ignorant of God, prayed to gods that perished, after the likenesses of which they fashioned vain idols. The Lord having brought the Jews out of the land of Egypt, subsequently imposed on them a law; and the Omnipotent enjoined these things, that they should serve Him alone, and not those idols. Moreover, in that law is taught concerning the resurrection, and the hope of living in happiness again in the world, if vain idols be forsaken and not worshipped.

III. The Worship of Demons.

When Almighty God, to beautify the nature of the world, willed that that earth should be visited by angels, when they were sent down they despised His laws. Such was the beauty of women, that it turned them aside; so that, being contaminated, they could not return to heaven. Rebels from God, they uttered words against Him. Then the Highest uttered His judgment against them; and from their seed giants are said to have been born. By them arts were made known in the earth, and they taught the dyeing of wool, and everything which is done; and to them, when they died, men erected images. But the Almighty, because they were of an evil seed, did not approve that, when dead, they should be brought back from death. Whence wandering they now subvert many bodies, and it is such as these especially that you this day worship and pray to as gods.

IV. Saturn.

And Saturn the old, if he is a god, how does he grow old? Or if he was a god, why was he driven by his terrors to devour his children? But because he was not a god, he consumed the bowels of his sons in a monstrous madness. He was a king upon earth, born in the mount Olympus; and he was not divine, but called himself a god. He fell into weakness of mind, and swallowed a stone for his son. Thus he became a god; of late he is called Jupiter.

V. Jupiter.

This Jupiter was born to Saturn in the island of Breta; and when he was grown up, he deprived his father of the kingdom. He then deluded the wives and sisters of the nobles. Moreover, Pyracmon, a smith, had made for him a sceptre. In the beginning God made the heaven, the earth, and the sea. But that frightful creature, born in the midst of time, went forth as a youth from a cave, and was nourished by stealth. Behold, that God is the author of all things, not that Jupiter.

VI. Of the Same Jupiter's Thunderbolt.

You say, O fools, Jupiter thunders. It is he that hurls thunderbolts; and if it was childishness that thought thus, why for two hundred years have you been babies? And will you still be so always? Infancy is passed into maturity, old age does not enjoy trifles, the age of boyhood has departed; let the mind of youth in like manner depart. Your thoughts ought to belong to the character of men. You are then a fool, to believe that it is Jupiter that thunders. He, born on the earth, is nourished with goats' milk. Therefore if Saturn had devoured him, who was it in those times that sent rain when he was dead? Especially, if a god may be thought to be born of a mortal father, Saturn grew old on the earth, and on the earth he died. There was none that predicted his previous birth. Or if he thunders, the law would have been given by him. The stories that the poets feign seduce you. He, however, reigned in Crete, and there died. He who to you is the Almighty became Alcmena's lover; he himself would in like manner be in love with living men now if he were alive. You pray to unclean gods, and you call them heavenly who are born of mortal seed from those giants. You hear and you read that he was born in the earth: whence was it that that corrupter so well deserved to ascend into heaven? And the Cyclopes are said to have forged him a thunderbolt; for though he was immortal, he received arms from mortals. You have conveyed to heaven by your authority one guilty of so many crimes, and, moreover, a parricide of his own relations.

VII. Of the Septizonium and the Stars.

Your want of intelligence deceives you concerning the circle of the zone, and perchance from that you find out that you must pray to Jupiter. Saturn is told of there, but it is as a star, for he was driven forth by Jupiter, or let Jupiter be believed to be in the star. He who controlled the constellations of the pole, and the sower of the soil; he who made war with the Trojans, he loved the beautiful Venus. Or among the stars themselves Mars was caught with her by married jealousy: he is called the youthful god. Oh excessively foolish, to think that those who are born of Maia rule from the stars, or that they rule the entire nature of the world! Subjected to wounds, and themselves living under the dominion of the fates, obscene, inquisitive, warriors of an impious life; and they made sons, equally mortal with themselves, and were all terrible, foolish, strong, in the sevenfold girdle. If you worship the stars, worship also the twelve signs of the zodiac, as well the ram, the bull, the twins, as the fierce lion; and finally, they go on into fishes — cook them and you will prove them. A law without law is your refuge: what wishes to be, will prevail. A woman desires to be wanton; she seeks to live without restraint. You yourselves will be what you wish for, and pray to as gods and goddesses. Thus I worshipped while I went astray, and now I condemn it.

VIII. Of the Sun and Moon.

Concerning the Sun and Moon you are in error, although they are in our immediate presence; in that you, as I formerly did, think that you must pray to them. They, indeed, are among the stars; but they do not run of their own accord. The Omnipotent, when He established all things at first, placed them there with the stars, on the fourth day. And, indeed, He commanded in the law that none should worship them. You worship so many gods who promise nothing concerning life, whose law is not on the earth, nor are they themselves foretold. But a few priests seduce you, who say that any deity destined to die can be of service. Draw near now, read, and learn the truth.

IX. Mercury.

Let your Mercury be depicted with a Saraballum, and with wings on his helmet or his cap, and in other respects naked. I see a marvellous thing, a god flying with a little satchel. Run, poor creatures, with your lap spread open when he flies, that he may empty his satchel: be prepared from thence. Look on the painted one, since he will thus cast you money from on high: then dance securely. Vain man, are you not mad, to worship painted gods in heaven? If you know not how to live, continue to dwell with the beasts.

X. Neptune.

You make Neptune a god descended from Saturn; and he wields a trident that he may spear the fishes. It is plain by his being thus provided that he is a sea-god. Did not he himself with Apollo raise up walls for the Trojans? How did that poor stone-mason become a god? Did not he beget the cyclops-monster? And was he himself when dead unable to live again, though his structure admitted of this? Thus begotten, he begot who was already once dead.

XI. Apollo the Soothsaying and False.

You make Apollo a player on the cithara, and divine. Born at first of Maia, in the isle of Delos, subsequently, for offered wages, a builder, obeying the king Laomedon, he reared the walls of the Trojans. And he established himself, and you are seduced into thinking him a god, in whose bones the love of Cassandra burned, whom the virgin craftily sported with, and, though a divine being, he is deceived. By his office of augur he was able to know the double-hearted one. Moreover rejected, he, though divine, departed thence. Him the virgin burnt up with her beauty, whom he ought to have burnt up; while she ought first of all to have loved the god who thus lustfully began to love Daphne, and still follows her up, wishing to violate the maid. The fool loves in vain. Nor can he obtain her by running. Surely, if he were a god, he would come up with her through the air. She first came under the roof, and the divine being remained outside. The race of men deceive you, for they were of a sad way of life. Moreover, he is said to have fed the cattle of Admetus. While in imposed sports he threw the quoit into the air, he could not restrain it as it fell, and it killed his friend. That was the last day of his companion Hyacinthus. Had he been divine, he would have foreknown the death of his friend.

XII. Father Liber — Bacchus.

You yourselves say that Father Liber was assuredly twice begotten. First of all he was born in India of Proserpine and Jupiter, and waging war against the Titans, when his blood was shed, he expired even as one of mortal men. Again, restored from his death, in another womb Semele conceived him again of Jupiter, a second Maia, whose womb being divided, he is taken away near to birth from his dead mother, and as a nursling is given to be nourished to Nisus. From this being twice born he is called Dionysus; and his religion is falsely observed in vanity; and they celebrate his orgies such that now they themselves seem to be either foolhardy or burlesquers of Mimnermomerus. They conspire in evil; they practise beforehand with pretended heat, that they may deceive others into saying that a deity is present. Hence you manifestly see men living a life like his, violently excited with the wine which he himself had pressed out; they have given him divine honour in the midst of their drunken excess.

XIII. The Unconquered One.

The unconquered one was born from a rock, if he is regarded as a god. Now tell us, then, on the other hand, which is the first of these two. The rock has overcome the god: then the creator of the rock has to be sought after. Moreover, you still depict him also as a thief; although, if he were a god, he certainly did not live by theft. Assuredly he was of earth, and of a monstrous nature. And he turned other people's oxen into his caves; just as did Cacus, that son of Vulcan.

XIV. Sylvanus.

Whence, again, has Sylvanus appeared to be a god? Perhaps it is agreeable so to call him from this, that the pipe sings sweetly because he bestows the wood; for, perhaps, it might not be so. You have bought a venal master, when you shall have bought from him. Behold the wood fails! What is due to him? Are you not ashamed, O fool, to adore such pictures? Seek one God who will allow you to live after death. Depart from such as have become dead in life.

XV. Hercules.

Hercules, because he destroyed the monster of the Aventine Mount, who had been wont to steal the herds of Evander, is a god: the rustic mind of men, untaught also, when they wished to return thanks instead of praise to the absent thunderer, senselessly vowed victims as to a god to be besought, they made milky altars as a memorial to themselves. Thence it arises that he is worshipped in the ancient manner. But he is no god, although he was strong in arms.

XVI. Of the Gods and Goddesses.

You say that they are gods who are plainly cruel, and you say that genesis assigns the fates to you. Now, then, say to whom first of all sacred rites are paid. Between the ways on either side immature death is straying. If the fates give the generations, why do you pray to the god? You are vainly deceived who art seeking to beseech the manes, and you name them to be lords over you who are fabricated. Or, moreover, I know not what women you pray to as goddesses — Bellona and Nemesis the goddesses, together with the celestial Fury, the Virgins and Venus, for whom your wives are weak in the loins. Besides, there are in the lanes other demons which are not as yet numbered, and are worn on the neck, so that they themselves cannot give to themselves an account. Plagues ought rather to be exported to the ends of the earth.

XVII. Of Their Images.

A few wicked and empty poets delude you; while they seek with difficulty to procure their living, they adorn falsehood to be for others under the guise of mystery. Thence feigning to be smitten by some deity, they sing of his majesty, and weary themselves under his form. You have often seen the Dindymarii, with what a din they enter upon luxuries while they seek to feign the furies, or when they strike their backs with the filthy axe, although with their teaching they keep what they heal by their blood. Behold in what name they do not compel those who first of all unite themselves to them with a sound mind. But that they may take away a gift, they seek such minds. Thence see how all things are feigned. They cast a shadow over a simple people, lest they should believe, while they perish, the thing once for all proceeded in vanity from antiquity, that a prophet who uttered false things might be believed; but their majesty has spoken nought.

XVIII. Of Ammydates and the Great God.

We have already said many things of an abominable superstition, and yet we follow up the subject, lest we should be said to have passed anything over. And the worshippers worshipped their Ammydates after their manner. He was great to them when there was gold in the temple. They placed their heads under his power, as if he were present. It came to the highest point that Cæsar took away the gold. The deity failed, or fled, or passed away into fire. The author of this wickedness is manifest who formed this same god, and falsely prophesying seduces so many and so great men, and only was silent about Him who was accustomed to be divine. For voices broke forth, as if with a changed mind, as if the wooden god were speaking into his ear. Say now yourselves if they are not false deities? From that prodigy how many has that prophet destroyed? He forgot to prophesy who before was accustomed to prophesy; so those prodigies are feigned among those who are greedy of wine, whose damnable audacity feigns deities, for they were carried about, and such an image was dried up. For both he himself is silent, and no one prophesies concerning him at all. But you wish to ruin yourselves.

XIX. Of the Vain Nemesiaci.

Is it not ignominy, that a prudent man should be seduced and worship such a one, or say that a log is Diana? You trust a man who in the morning is drunk, costive, and ready to perish, who by art speaks falsely what is seen by him. While he lives strictly, he feeds on his own bowels. A detestable one defiles all the citizens; and he has attached to himself — a similar gathering being made — those with whom he feigns the history, that he may adorn a god. He is ignorant how to prophesy for himself; for others he dares it. He places it on his shoulder when he pleases, and again he places it down. Whirling round, he is turned by himself with the tree of the two-forked one, as if you would think that he was inspired with the deity of the wood. You do not worship the gods whom they themselves falsely announce; you worship the priests themselves, fearing them vainly. But if you are strong in heart, flee at once from the shrines of death.

XX. The Titans.

You say that the Titans are to you Tutans. You ask that these fierce ones should be silent under your roof, as so many Lares, shrines, images made like to a Titan. For you foolishly adore those who have died by an evil death, not reading their own law. They themselves speak not, and you dare to call them gods who are melted out of a brazen vessel; you should rather melt them into little vessels for yourselves.

XXI. The Montesiani.

You call the mountains also gods. Let them rule in gold, darkened by evil, and aiding with an averted mind. For if a pure spirit and a serene mind remained to you, you yourself ought to examine for yourself concerning them. You have become senseless as a man, if you think that these can save you, whether they rule or whether they cease. If you seek anything healthy, seek rather the righteousness of the law, that brings the help of salvation, and says that you are becoming eternal. For what you shall follow in vanity rejoices you for a time. You are glad for a brief space, and afterwards bewail in the depths. Withdraw yourself from these, if you will rise again with Christ.

XXII. The Dulness of the Age.

Alas, I grieve, citizens, that you are thus blinded by the world. One runs to the lot; another gazes on the birds; another, having shed the blood of bleating animals, calls forth the manes, and credulously desires to hear vain responses. When so many leaders and kings have taken counsel concerning life, what benefit has it been to them to have known even its portents? Learn, I beg you, citizens, what is good; beware of idol-fanes. Seek, indeed, all of you, in the law of the Omnipotent. Thus it has pleased the Lord of lords Himself in the heavens, that demons should wander in the world for our discipline. And yet, on the other hand, He has sent out His mandates, that they who forsake their altars shall become inhabitants of heaven. Whence I am not careful to argue this in a small treatise. The law teaches; it calls on you in your midst. Consider for yourselves. You have entered upon two roads; decide upon the right one...

XXIV. Of Those Who Live Between the Two.

You who thinkest that, by living doubtfully between the two, you are on your guard, go on your way stript of law, broken down by luxury. You are looking forward vainly to so many things, why do you seek unjust things? And whatever you have done shall there remain to you when dead. Consider, you foolish one, you were not, and lo, you are seen. You know not whence you have proceeded, nor whence you are nourished. You avoid the excellent and benignant God of your life, and your Governor, who would rather wish you to live. You turn yourself to yourself, and give your back to God. You drown yourself in darkness, while you think you are abiding in light. Why do you run in the synagogue to the Pharisees, that He may become merciful to you, whom you of your own accord deny? Thence you go abroad again; you seek healthful things. You wish to live between both ways, but thence you shall perish. And, moreover, you say, Who is He who has redeemed from death, that we may believe in Him, since there punishments are awarded? Ah! not thus, O malignant man, shall it be as you think. For to him who has lived well there is advantage after death. You, however, when one day you die, shall be taken away in an evil place. But they who believe in Christ shall be led into a good place, and those to whom that delight is given are caressed; but to you who are of a double mind, against you is punishment without the body. The course of the tormentor stirs you up to cry out against your brother.

XXV. They Who Fear and Will Not Believe.

How long, O foolish man, will you not acknowledge Christ? You avoid the fertile field, and cast your seeds on the sterile one. You seek to abide in the wood where the thief is delaying. You say, I also am of God; and you wander out of doors. Now at length, after so many invitations, enter within the palace. Now is the harvest ripe, and the time so many times prepared. Lo, now reap! What! Do you not repent? Thence now, if you have not, gather the seasonable wines. The time of believing to life is present in the time of death. The first law of God is the foundation of the subsequent law. You, indeed, it assigned to believe in the second law. Nor are threats from Himself, but from it, powerful over you. Now astounded, swear that you will believe in Christ; for the Old Testament proclaims concerning Him. For it is needful only to believe in Him who was dead, to be able to rise again to live for all time. Therefore, if you are one who disbelieves that these things shall be, at length he shall be overcome in his guilt in the second death. I will declare things to come in few words in this little treatise. In it can be known when hope must be preferred. Still I exhort you as quickly as possible to believe in Christ.

St. Jerome

The Book of Hebrew Questions on Genesis

6:2

(Chapter VI - Verse 2) But the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were fair. The Hebrew word Elohim (), is of common gender: and both God and gods are called by this name. Hence, Aquila, in the plural number, dared to call them Sons of gods, understanding them to mean the Holy Ones or Angels. For God stands in the assembly of gods: but in the midst of them He judgeth gods. (Alternate reading: judgeth). (Psalm LXXXI, 1). Therefore, Symmachus, following a similar interpretation, says: The sons of the powerful saw the daughters of men, and so on.

6:3

(Version 3.) And the Lord God said: My spirit will not dwell in these men forever, because they are flesh. In Hebrew, it is written, My spirit will not judge these men forever, because they are flesh: that is, because the condition of man is fragile, I will not subject them to eternal torment; but here I will restore to them what they deserve. Therefore, it signifies not severity, as it is read in our codices, but rather the mercy of God, while the sinner is visited here for his crime. And an angry God speaks to some: I will not visit their daughters, when they have fornicated, and their wives, when they have committed adultery (Hosea IV, 14). And in another place: I will visit their iniquities with a rod, and their sins with scourges: nevertheless, I will not take away my mercy from them (Ps. LXXXVIII, 33).

Furthermore, so that it does not appear cruel on His part for not giving a place of repentance to sinners, He added: But their days shall be one hundred and twenty years. This is, they will have 120 years to do penance. Therefore, human life, as many err, is not condensed into 120 years: but to that generation, 120 years were given for penance. For we find that after the flood, Abraham lived for 175 years, and others for over 200 and 300 years. But because they refused to do penance, God did not want to wait for the appointed time: but with 20 years cut off, He brought about the flood in the 100th year designated for doing penance.

6:4

(Version 4.) Now there were giants upon the earth in those days. For after the sons of God went in to the daughters of men, and they brought forth children, these are the mighty men of old, men of renown. For falling ones, or giants, Symmachus interpreted them as violent ones. And it is fitting for the name of falling ones to apply to angels and the children of the saints.