Fun House of Mazes and Mirrors

In studying the Pentateuch, something interesting I’ve come across (something that always seemed strange to me) are the people referred to as “sons of the gods” and “daughters of men.”  The idea is that some supernatural beings had sex with human women, something that was seen as evil to God—and yet, what does that even mean? 

In historical context, however, the text makes a lot more sense…. In Canaan and Babylon, fertility cults were quite the norm, and very important to their cultures. Men would go into the temples and have sex with the goddesses—through temple prostitutes. In return, it was thought, there would be an increase in crops and fertility for livestock and the women back at home. 

But… here’s the important part:  It meant that young girls were being made into prostitutes. Therefore, when we read in Genesis 6 that God was extremely angry over the gods and men intermarrying, we can see that God is angry at this practice.

God is saying—NO! This is not right. Men should not be trying to have sex with a goddess. It is evil—it is abominable. These women should not be prostitute slaves to a non-god. As Gordon Wendham puts it: “We therefore could read Genesis 6:1-4 as an outspoken attack on these ideas [fertility goddesses]: far from sacred prostitution enhancing human and agricultural fertility it led to the flood and near extinction of the race.”

God is NOT okay with prostitution. He is NOT okay with men manipulating women. And He is NOT okay with trying to manipulate the world.

That is all for now. I just found it interesting that so much depth could be in a section I usually just gloss over as weird and odd… Peace and love.