[102] I can not for a moment entertain the monstrous supposition of many expositors that the "sons of God" of these passages are angels, and the "Nephelim" hybrids between angels and men.
[103] See Lange's "Commentary on Genesis."
[104] The Russian surveys of 1836 made it one hundred and eight English feet; but later authorities reduce it to eighty-three feet six inches below the Black Sea.
[105] Kitto's "Bible Illustrations"—Book of Job.
[106] See article "Rephaim" in Kitto's "Journal of Sacred Literature." But Gesenius and others regard it, not as an ethnic name, but as a term for the "shades" or spirits of the dead. See Conant on Job.
[107] On the Biblical view of this subject, the so-called Aryan mythology, common to India and Greece, is either a derivative from the Cushite civilization, or a spontaneous growth of the Japetic stock scattered by the Cushite empire. The Semitic and Hamitic mythologies are derived from the primeval cherubic worship of Eden, corrupted and mixed with deification of natural objects and stages of the creative work, and with adoration of deified ancestors and heroes.
[108] Genesis 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th chapters. See also our previous remarks on the deluge.
[109] Genesis iv.
[110] Japheth is "enlargement," his sons are Scythians and inhabitants of the isles, varying in language and nationality; and Noah predicts, "God shall enlarge Japheth, he shall dwell in the tents of Shem, Ham shall be his servant." These are surely characteristic ethnological traits for a period so early. On the rationalist view, it may be supposed that this prediction was not written until the characters in question had developed themselves; but since the greatest enlargement of Japheth has occurred since the discovery of America, there would be quite as good ground for maintaining that Noah's prophecy was interpolated after the time of Columbus.
[111] The language of this people, the stem of the Indo-European languages, is, though in a later form, probably that of the Aryan or Persepolitan part of the trilingual inscriptions at Behistun and elsewhere in Persia.