Page:A critical and exegetical commentary on Genesis (1910).djvu/242

 an element of disorder into the Creation which had to be checked by the special interposition of Yahwe (v.$3$).

The fragment belongs to the class of ætiological myths. The belief in Nĕphîlîm is proved only by Nu. 13$33$ (E?); but it is there seen to have been associated with a more widely attested tradition of a race of giants surviving into historic times, especially among the aboriginal populations of Canaan (Dt. 1$28$ 2$10. 11. 21$ 9$2$, Jos. 15$14$, Am. 2$9$ etc.). The question was naturally asked how such beings came to exist, and the passage before us supplied the answer. But while the ætiological motive may explain the retention of the fragment in Gn., it is not to be supposed that the myth originated solely in this reflexion. Its pagan colouring is too pronounced to permit of its being dissociated from two notions prevalent in antiquity and familiar to us from Greek and Latin literature: viz. (1) that among the early inhabitants of the earth were men of gigantic stature; and (2) that marriages of the gods with mortals were not only possible but common in the heroic age. Similar ideas were current among other peoples. The Ḳoran has frequent references to the peoples of 'Ad and Thamûd, primæval races noted for their giant stature and their daring impiety, to whom were attributed the erection of lofty buildings and the excavation of rock-dwellings, and who were believed to have been destroyed by a divine judgment. The legend appears also in the Phœnician traditions of Sanchuniathon, where it is followed by an obscure allusion to promiscuous sexual intercourse which appears to have some remote connexion with Gn. 6$2$.

That the source is J is not disputed. Di., indeed, following Schrader (Einl. 276), thinks it an extract from E which had passed through the hands of J; but borrowing by the original J from the other source is impossible, and the only positive trace of E would be the word , which in Nu. 13$2$ is by some critics assigned to E. That argument would at most prove overworking, and it is too slight to be considered.—The precise position of the fragment among the Yahwistic traditions