Page:Keil and Delitzsch,Biblical commentary the old testament the pentateuch, trad James Martin, volume 1, 1885.djvu/132

and “daughters of men” (האדם בנות). Three different views have been entertained from the very earliest times: the “sons of God” being regarded as ( a) the sons of princes, ( b) angels, ( c) the Sethites or godly men; and the “daughters of men,” as the daughters ( a) of people of the lower orders, ( b) of mankind generally, ( c) of the Cainites, or of the rest of mankind as contrasted with the godly or the children of God. Of these three views, the first, although it has become the traditional one in orthodox rabbinical Judaism, may be dismissed at once as not warranted by the usages of the language, and as altogether unscriptural. The second, on the contrary, may be defended on two plausible grounds: first, the fact that the “sons of God,” in Job 1:6; Job 2:1, and Job 38:7, and in Dan 3:25, are unquestionably angels (also אלים בּני in Psa 29:1 and Psa 89:7); and secondly, the antithesis, “sons of God” and “daughters of men.” Apart from the context and tenor of the passage, these two points would lead us most naturally to regard the “sons of God” as angels, in distinction from men and the daughters of men. But this explanation, though the first to suggest itself, can only lay claim to be received as the correct one, provided the language itself admits of no other. Now that is not the case. For it is not to angels only that the term “sons of Elohim,” or “sons of Elim,” is applied; but in Psa 73:15, in an address to Elohim, the godly are called “the generation of Thy sons,” i.e., sons of Elohim; in Deu 32:5 the Israelites are called His (God's) sons, and in Hos 1:10, “sons of the living God;” and in Psa 80:17, Israel is spoken of as the son, whom Elohim has made strong. These passages show that the expression “sons of God” cannot be elucidated by philological means, but must be interpreted by theology alone. Moreover, even when it is applied to the angels, it is questionable whether it is to be understood in a physical or ethical sense. The notion that “it is employed in a physical sense as nomen naturae, instead of angels as nomen officii, and presupposes generation of a physical kind,” we must reject as an unscriptural and gnostic error. According to the scriptural view, the heavenly spirits are creatures of God, and not begotten from the divine essence. Moreover, all the other terms applied to the angels are ethical in their character. But if the title “sons of God” cannot involve the notion of physical generation, it cannot be restricted to celestial spirits, but is