When Giants Were Upon the Earth: The Watchers the Nephilim and the Biblical Cosmic War of the Seed Read online

  The Appendices of

  Chronicles of the Nephilim

  When Giants Were

  Upon the Earth

  The Watchers, the Nephilim, and

  the Biblical Cosmic War of the Seed

  By Brian Godawa

  WHEN GIANTS WERE UPON THE EARTH

  3rd Edition

  Copyright © 2014, Brian Godawa

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without prior written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews.

  Embedded Pictures Publishing

  9830 Vidor Drive #302

  Los Angeles, CA 90035

  310.948.0224

  www.embeddedpictures.com

  ISBN: 978-0-9911434-4-3 (paperback)

  ISBN: 978-0-9911434-5-0 (ebook)

  Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. Wheaton: Standard Bible Society, 2001, unless indicated NASB.

  NASB Scripture quotations taken from New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.

  Other books by the Author

  Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom

  and Discernment (Intervarsity Press)

  Word Pictures: Knowing God Through Story and Imagination (Intervarsity Press)

  Myth Became Fact: Storytelling, Imagination

  & Apologetics in the Bible

  Chronicles of the Nephilim

  Noah Primeval

  Enoch Primordial

  Gilgamesh Immortal

  Abraham Allegiant

  Joshua Valiant

  Caleb Vigilant

  David Ascendant

  Jesus Triumphant

  Jerusalem Judgment

  Chronicles of the Nephilim For Young Adults

  Enoch Primordial: Young Adult Edition

  Noah Primeval: Young Adult Edition

  Gilgamesh Immortal: Young Adult Edition

  Abraham Allegiant: Young Adult Edition

  Joshua Valiant: Young Adult Edition

  Caleb Vigilant: Young Adult Edition

  David Ascendant: Young Adult Edition

  Jesus Triumphant: Young Adult Edition

  Jerusalem Judgment: Young Adult Edition

  For more information and products by the author:

  www.godawa.com

  www.ChroniclesOfTheNephilim.com

  Dedicated to

  The fans of Chronicles of the Nephilim

  Table of Contents

  Foreword By Michael S. Heiser

  Preface

  The Book of Enoch: Scripture, Heresy, or What? (new)

  NOAH PRIMEVAL APPENDICES

  The Sons of God (newly expanded)

  The Nephilim (newly expanded)

  Leviathan

  Mesopotamian Cosmic Geography in the Bible

  ENOCH PRIMORDIAL APPENDIX

  Retelling Biblical Stories and the Mythic Imagination

  GILGAMESH IMMORTAL APPENDIX

  Gilgamesh and the Bible

  ABRAHAM ALLEGIANT APPENDIX

  Between the Lines: In Defense of Ancient Traditions

  JOSHUA VALIANT APPENDIX

  Mythical Monsters in the Bible

  CALEB VIGILANT APPENDIX

  Canaanite Baal and Old Testament Storytelling Polemics

  DAVID ASCENDANT APPENDIX

  Goliath Was Not Alone

  JESUS TRIUMPHANT APPENDICES

  Jesus and the Cosmic War

  The Geography of Hades 311

  Foreword

  By Dr. Michael S. Heiser

  The believing Church is in crisis.

  I’m not talking about the current socio-political hostility that is progressively marginalizing and even villainizing Christianity. I’m speaking of something more lethal—an internal predicament. The Church has historically held its ground against enemy attack and emerged stronger. But it’s the enemy from within that’s a greater concern. Christianity is in danger of morphing from the “pillar and buttress of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:15) to a shallow parody of itself or a meaningless amalgam of disconnected Bible verses and incoherent hokum. If it happens, we’ll have only ourselves to blame.

  I’ve been a Christian for over thirty years. I wear the hats of lay person, elder, scholar, professor, writer, novelist, speaker, and blogger. Everything I do and have done as a Christian has been oriented by that thing believers claim to consider inspired, divine revelation: the Bible. In more than three decades of personal engagement with the biblical text and observation of many versions of public, private, and celebrity Christianity, I’ve gained some perspective.

  As a biblical studies professor, I’ve seen the current generation and the one to follow in my classrooms. There are glimmers of hope, but the view isn’t inspiring. As a scholar, I’ve had steady interaction with fellow academics in biblical studies and theology. Besides listening to themselves talk, scholars enjoy talking to other scholars. Academic societies are like country clubs for geeks. Sadly, few conversations are about specifically helping the person in the pew get better access to primary sources so they can sift through the intellectual rubbish they see on the internet or YouTube (or church). As a key content contributor to the nation’s largest and most successful Bible software company, I’ve learned a lot about the Christian consumer. I know what pastors and lay people read and don’t read, what is preached or not preached. God help us. Lastly, as someone whose fiction has vaulted him inside the fringe communities of religion, parapsychology, and the paranormal, I no longer have to wonder what it would be like if Erich von Däniken led a Bible study, or if Billy Graham and Shirley MacLaine had children together.

  I’ve spent some time in the past few years wondering about how it came to this and what to do about it. That’s where Brian Godawa and his work come in. He’s trying to be part of the remedy for some of what ails us. The present book, along with his Chronicles of the Nephilim fantasy series from which its content derives, are demonstrations of the sincerity of his efforts. But before I explain why I whole-heartedly believe that’s the case, I need to give you the lay of the Christian land as I see it. You’ll only know Brian is part of the solution when you clearly grasp the problems.

  Believing Christianity operates in three realms. I have friends and enemies in all of them. Let’s imagine them as three concentric circles.

  In the outermost ring, the largest, we have what happens in church. This is where we find pastors and their congregations, the laity. Part of this ring is composed of folks with a long attachment to the faith. Church is where they go to hear about the Bible, to hear stories and truths from their childhood. It’s a familiar community. The rest of the population are seekers or newcomers. These are folks who are there due to intellectual curiosity, a personal relationship, or the need to redefine community.

  Because this ring has the most people, one might expect to find the most engagement with the Bible. That simply isn’t true, especially today. Few read the Bible with regularity. That’s what church is for, isn’t it? One would also think the pastor’s primary distraction is fixing this problem of biblical illiteracy. Not so. Whether generational believers or seekers, the focus has become what is known in church growth circles as “felt needs.” Where biblical knowledge is not a felt need, where it fails to stimulate the intellect and the imagination, the Bible won’t be the priority.

&nbsp
; This is one crisis.

  Churches have become places with little tolerance for serious biblical content. That’s impractical, so the mantra goes—what felt need does it address? As time goes on, people become conditioned to expecting little from the Bible. Preaching gets reduced to Bible stories with adult illustrations. The Bible no longer surprises or stimulates. It is stripped of both its wonder and transformative power. In the absence of a divine revelation that holds our attention and motivates us as spiritual warriors, we’ve created an evangelical Gnosticism—we’re on our own for a spiritual buzz, and so we’ll get it where we can.

  Moving inwardly, the next ring is occupied by those largely self-exiled from the outermost ring. The motivations vary, but boredom and intellectual atrophy are the most common. They want to learn Scripture in a serious way. They know that Bible reading isn’t Bible study. They’ve been going to church for a solid meal for years, and the intravenous drip they get isn’t cutting it. They’re starving for content. Who can blame them?

  Those who emerge as teachers in this space know more than most anyone in the outermost ring, even most pastors. But they are not scholars, despite the fact that most who occupy this ring look at them that way, and they come to fancy themselves as such. Scholars are taught and tested by other scholars. The teachers in this realm are self taught and tested by no one. Neither they, nor the people who follow them, know what they don’t know.

  Since these teachers occupy the top of the intellectual pecking order that emerges in this realm, they cannot know when they stray from sound method, teaching, and theology. If they have sufficient humility to desire such accountability, they may never find it, since most scholars have long detached themselves from such assistance. But the greater concern are those who are intoxicated by the idea of having a following. These are the theological hipsters and hucksters of the current generation. Their devotees are not equipped to challenge them, and have become accustomed to filter anything anyone else says through the wise sage that commands their attention. They can say anything to their pupils, no matter how outlandish or idiosyncratic and get away with it.

  That’s another crisis.

  The final (and smallest) ring is the innermost—the domain of the scholars. Here we find the deepest engagement with Scripture and, as I hinted earlier, the farthest detachment from the people who need the fruit of their labors.

  The irony is that, despite the greatest depth in scriptural knowledge, this ring has the most dysfunction when it comes to ministry—the other two rings. This is expected with respect to non-confessional scholars, but it’s also common within the evangelical ranks.

  There are naturally exceptions, but all too often the brightest minds who have the most time and expertise for engaging Scripture cloister themselves and become fixated on reputation within the guild. They overwhelmingly view the nonsense absorbed (and taught) in the other two rings as simply not worth their time. Many who have discovered blogging and social media use it to debate among or congratulate themselves in cyberspace. The web is a just new way to avoid the biblically unwashed masses.

  This is also a crisis.

  Brian Godawa offers a remedy to each crisis. The Chronicles of the Nephilim does the impossible—it turns serious academic scholarship in ancient primary sources into engaging entertainment. Fiction and fantasy are tried-and-true vehicles for transmitting theological truths and biblical concepts. This is what reaches the masses.

  Brian’s work also addresses what’s wrong with the other two realms. Each volume of The Chronicles of the Nephilim contains resources and commentary for exploring the biblical text in its own context. When Giants Were Upon the Earth collects all that information and expands on it. It’s a biblical-theological feast.

  But don’t mistake the feast for smorgasbord theology. As someone Brian has tapped as a resource, I can tell you his focus is on peer-reviewed biblical scholarship. His sources are not his own opinions. He’s not grinding axes and “solving” conspiracies. He’s not pretending questions are answers. He knows the difference between supernatural possibilities grounded in the biblical text and sanctified speculation. He’s not building a fiefdom—he wants you to learn what he’s learned. That’s the purpose of this book. It’s a blessing to recommend it to you.

  Dr. Michael S. Heiser

  PhD, Hebrew Bible and Semitic Studies

  University of Wisconsin-Madison

  Academic Editor, Logos Bible Software

  Bellingham, WA

  Preface

  When I began writing Chronicles of the Nephilim, I never thought it would become such a vast enterprise that would change my life. It was like the opening of Elisha’s servant’s eyes to see the heavenly host I had been missing.

  This book began when I decided to add some appendices onto the first volume Noah Primeval. I thought it might provide some interest for those who wanted to explore the Biblical and ancient historical foundation behind the fiction of the novel.

  I’ve always been kind of “bipolar” in my love of both imagination and intellectual analysis. I was inspired by Michael Crichton novels because he used to provide an appendix at the end of each of his books explaining some of the real science behind his fictional morality tales about the dangers of unfettered science and technology. So I decided to mimic a master with my own appendices at the end of my novels.

  I didn’t realize what a strong and positive reaction I would get from that addition. A significant number of readers thanked me for providing the research I had done. Some even said they enjoyed the appendices as much as the novels. I thought I stumbled upon an effective helpful supplement, so I decided to do the same thing in every novel. I provided an appendix after each book that covered the Biblical and ancient Near Eastern research behind that particular story.

  What I soon realized was that the appendices were not merely unconnected pieces of scholarship. They were much like the novels. They created a theological progression of the very same Cosmic War of the Seed storyline that my Biblical fantasy novels were offering.

  I decided that I wanted to provide that more intellectual and theological development in a single unified volume for those who wanted to study the Biblical and ancient historical material exclusively.

  So I offer this compilation of all the appendices of the Chronicles of the Nephilim. To add some value, I have included some extra material not in the original appendices, such as my analysis of the book of 1 Enoch. But I have also included the appendices for the last two Chronicles, David Ascendant and Jesus Triumphant before the release of those novels.

  Of course, there will be some overlap of material in the chapters, but I kept them that way because each chapter provides a different context of the information that may shed new light the reader did not see in previous chapters.

  Enjoy.

  Imagine.

  Believe.

  Brian Godawa

  Author, Chronicles of the Nephilim

  March, 2014

  The Book of Enoch:

  Scripture, Heresy, or What?

  In recent years, there has been a rise of interest in the subject of giants called “Nephilim” and the Sons of God called “Watchers” in the Bible. Much of this interest swirls around the End Times crowd and involves speculation that approaches the absurd. Visions abound of an impending return to “the days of Noah,” with cloned Nephilim among us, the Antichrist coming in a UFO, and Watchers masquerading as alien saviors. It makes for fascinating and entertaining reading. But regardless of such flights of futuristic fanciful fantastique, the fact remains, the Bible does talk about a bizarre event in antediluvian days (before the Flood) that involves these strange Nephilim creatures – whatever they are.

  Genesis 6:1–4

  When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose. Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: 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 man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.[1]

  There is an ongoing historical controversy over what exactly happened in those ancient days. Several views have been held by orthodox Christian Church fathers and later theologians. The most popular view in ancient Judaism and the early Church was that the Sons of God were supernatural angelic beings who mated with human woman and their offspring were giants. More recent scholarly views argue that the Sons of God were either tyrannical kings who claimed divinity in their royal lineage, or human descendants from the “righteous” line of Seth who violated holiness and intermarried with the “unrighteous” line of the daughters of Cain. In these modern views, the Nephilim tend to be understood merely as mighty warriors of an ancient era.

  I will not be arguing for any of these views in this chapter, but rather, I will be addressing the ancient Book of Enoch because it has made a significant impact on the current Watchers/Nephilim controversy. The theological scandal is that the book includes a very clear supernatural interpretation of Genesis 6 with angelic Watchers mating with humans who birth giants that walk among us. But even more, it expands upon that view with a detailed story of how these Watchers influenced mankind with occultic revelations and how the patriarch Enoch condemned the Watchers and their giant offspring who had become violent bloodthirsty cannibals.

  If the book is a reliable source, it certainly adds to the controversial flames with this fantastic interpretation, but honest pursuers of truth should not discount any textual assessment because of a fear of undesired conclusions. We must follow the truth no matter where it leads us.