Was God Cruel to Flood the Earth

[Ramez5]

And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Gen 6:5

Reading the Old Testament, this 2nd year of seeking the Lord, from my heart, has been incredibly eye opening! I have never read the account of Genesis except to run through the 'same old book' and stories over and over.. as part of a bible reading plan or something.

I am now though--how I want to learn more of God's word and to hear from His heart each day. I'm shocked to realize just how much there is to learn! But we have to slow down and pay attention.

One of the things I have been doing in my reading, is looking up the answers to my most pressing questions. All these years I've wondered about things like.. did Angels marry women on earth (as some of suggested) and have 'super warriors' or.. were there really Giants in the days before the flood? It's so easy to brush over these things as if they weren't important.
And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.Gen 6:1,2,4

Reading the commentaries makes a lot of this much clearer. I feel so foolish for having never taken the trouble to settle these questions for myself. With today's online resources, we need not be in the dark about things like this.

Why do we need answers? Because every day, all over the world, non-Christians are wondering, "how could God be so cruel to send a flood and kill all of those 'innocent' people?' and other questions like them.

And I don't know about you, but even as a child, I had some of those questions.

How bad was it really?
We ought to know the answer to that question.

Our world gets more and more wicked with every passing day. It is hard for me to fathom that with each passing year, we get closer and closer to a cultural 'Sodom and Gomorrah'. 40 years ago, it would be hard to have imagined our culture could change so much.

In my life time we have gone
from a God-honoring culture to a godless one.

In my life time it has been declared that God is dead, that there is no God, that the bible isn't true--in fact it's just a fairy tale or good literature, that there are no moral absolutes, that man is evolved from an animal, that Jesus is just a good man. Prayer has been removed from public schools, the Sabbath no longer is honored.. even by professing Christians, the Ten commandments, the nativity,marriage.. everything a Christian culture once thought normal and unshakeable has been shot down.

In it's place, we have the opposite of all that was once good. We still have laws.. but those get turned into a shadow of their former glory...being twisted and ignored for the most part or barely enforced.

So yes, we have to explain some of this to non-Christians and sometimes to our average church member too.

We cannot help but be concerned for our culture in it's present state as compared to the days of Noah. It's eerily similar. Sin matters. It's that simple.

So when I started reading, I couldn't help but want to find out a bit more. We need to understand the depth of the potential for sin in ourselves and the world! It can get really bad. And that is what is described in only a few short sentences in Genesis 6. It's so short, that we don't stop to meditate on this fact or dig further.

So here are a few answers to those pressing questions in Genesis 6

Did angels marry women on earth?

The sons of God were simply the children of the line of Seth who loved God and whose family line was Holy. The daughters of men were the daughters of Cain.. all his children were "earthly and governed by the flesh, degenerate sons of a degenerate father."


In other words the godly line of children were intermarrying with the ungodly.
As there is a distinction made here between men and those called the sons of God, it is generally supposed that the immediate posterity of Cain and that of Seth are intended. The first were mere men, such as fallen nature may produce, degenerate sons of a degenerate father, governed by the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eye, and the pride of life. The others were sons of God, not angels, as some have dreamed, but such as were, according to our Lord's doctrine, born again, born from above, John 3:3, John 3:5,John 3:6, etc., and made children of God by the influence of the Holy Spirit, Galatians 5:6. The former were apostates from the true religion, the latter were those among whom it was preserved and cultivated. Dr. Wall supposes the first verses of this chapter should be paraphrased thus:
"When men began to multiply on the earth, the chief men took wives of all the handsome poor women they chose. There were tyrants in the earth in those days; and also after the antediluvian days powerful men had unlawful connections with the inferior women, and the children which sprang from this illicit commerce were the renowned heroes of antiquity, of whom the heathens made their gods."

Were there really Giants or 'Super heroes' -- Who are the 'men of renown'?

There were giants in the earth - נפלים nephilim, from נפל naphal, "he fell." Those who had apostatized or fallen from the true religion. The Septuagint translate the original word by γιγαντες, which literally signifies earth-born, and which we, following them, term giants, without having any reference to the meaning of the word, which we generally conceive to signify persons of enormous stature. But the word when properly understood makes a very just distinction between the sons of men and the sons of God; those were the nephilim, the fallen earth-born men, with the animal and devilish mind. These were the sons of God, who were born from above; children of the kingdom, because children of God. Clarkes Commentary
If you could imagine Godly young men marrying earthly, sensuous, immoral young women (of barbarian fathers), you get an idea of what Gen.6:1 is describing.

The result is a group of men of 'renown'.. mighty warriors (some good, most bad). So that's one mystery cleared up for me. You can read more about these 'giants' and men of 'renown' here.

All the commentaries agree there were no 'angelic' men marrying earthly women as this goes against Jesus' own words that angels are not able or given to marriage nor can they be.

But the result of this intermarriage of Seth's children with Cain's.. is that the godly were swallowed up for the most part by the ungodly.. and by the time of Noah, things were simply terrible.

How Bad was it really?
The wickedness of man was great - What an awful character does God give of the inhabitants of the antediluvian world! -Clark

1. They were flesh, (Genesis 6:3), wholly sensual, the desires of the mind overwhelmed and lost in the desires of the flesh, their souls no longer discerning their high destiny, but ever minding earthly things, so that they were sensualized, brutalized, and become flesh; incarnated so as not to retain God in their knowledge, and they lived, seeking their portion in this life.

2. They were in a state of wickedness. All was corrupt within, and all unrighteous without; neither the science nor practice of religion existed. Piety was gone, and every form of sound words had disappeared.

3. This wickedness was great רבה rabbah, "was multiplied;" it was continually increasing and multiplying increase by increase, so that the whole earth was corrupt before God, and was filled with violence, (Genesis 6:11); profligacy among the lower, and cruelty and oppression
among the higher classes, being only predominant.

4. All the imaginations of their thoughts were evil - the very first embryo of every idea, the figment of every thought, the very materials out of which perception, conception, and ideas were formed, were all evil; the fountain which produced them, with every thought, purpose, wish, desire, and motive, was incurably poisoned.

5. All these were evil without any mixture of good - the Spirit of God which strove with them was continually resisted, so that evil had its sovereign sway.

6. They were evil continually - there was no interval of good, no moment allowed for serious reflection, no holy purpose, no righteous act. What a finished picture of a fallen soul! Such a picture as God alone, who searches the heart and tries the spirit, could possibly give.

7. To complete the whole, God represents himself as repenting because he had made them, and as grieved at the heart because of their iniquities! Had not these been voluntary transgressions, crimes which they might have avoided, had they not grieved and quenched the Spirit of God, could he speak of them in the manner he does here?

8. So incensed is the most holy and the most merciful God, that he is determined to destroy the work of his hands: And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created; Genesis 6:7.

How great must the evil have been, and how provoking the transgressions, which obliged the most compassionate God, for the vindication of his own glory, to form this awful purpose!

Fools make a mock at sin, but none except fools.
Clarke's Commentary on the Bible

I am still reading this morning, but I had to pass along this 'background' to the flood from yesterday's reading because I just feel I never understood the depths of the depravity of man that causes the Lord to regret of having made man.

What is astonishing, is that after the flood, man turned out to be just as wicked. All he needed was enough time to get right back to that state.


So God simply decided never to destroy us again, not because men won't get that bad again, but because he chose not to. Man would forever be wicked and depraved. But God instead, chose a people for his own and rescued them from this fallen world.

"I establish My covenant with you; and all flesh shall never again be cut off by the water of the flood, neither shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth." God said, "This is the sign of the covenant which I am making between Me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all successive generations;…Gen.9:11

He will come again to judge the world for sin. So we mustn't fool ourselves into thinking that God doesn't care. He does. How patient he is with us!

Matthew 24:37-39

“When the Son of Man comes, it will be the same as what happened during Noah’s time. In those days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving their children to be married right up to the day Noah entered the boat. They knew nothing about what was happening until the flood came and destroyed them all.

“It will be the same when the Son of Man comes.


Our sin is no joking matter. It caused a massive flood and one day, it will require the destruction of this earth and heaven as we know it. Judgement will come. But we need not be judged! There is good news!

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16

Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank you for your great mercy! Thank you for making a plan to rescue us just as you did Noah. May we strive to 'enter in the narrow gate', accepting the gift of your Son's life, which paid our debt on a cross, so we could be set free from the penalty and grip of sin and death. May we never take sin lightly just because your mercy and patience are so great but instead, obey you and strive to cooperate with your sanctifying work in our lives. Amen.

[Mary Naeem]

Thanks Ramez

[walaa farouk]

Thanks Ramez