Were there really giants (Nephilim)?
Question 8015
The Bible speaks clearly about giants existing in ancient times. The Hebrew word נְפִילִים (Nephilim) appears in Genesis 6:4 and Numbers 13:33, and these were real, physical beings that walked the earth. But were they genuinely historical, or are we reading ancient mythology? Let’s examine what Scripture actually says and what evidence supports these accounts.
The Biblical Evidence
Genesis 6:4 tells us: “The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.” Now, there’s been endless debate about who exactly the “sons of God” were—whether they were fallen angels, other spiritual creatures, the godly line of Seth, or human rulers*. But what’s not debatable is that the Nephilim existed. They were there. The text states it as plain fact.
*Whilst speculation can be tempting, the evidence here is thin, and we should be careful not to turn uncertain ideas into doctrines or use them as tests of someone’s faith. Obsessing over such matters can distract us from what is clear and essential. As Mark Twain once observed, “It ain’t the parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.”
Then we meet them again in Numbers 13:33, when the twelve spies return from Canaan: “And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.” The spies weren’t hallucinating. They saw real giants—men so large that grown Hebrew men felt like insects beside them. That’s not poetic exaggeration when you’re giving a military reconnaissance report. These were genuinely enormous people.
But the Bible doesn’t stop there. After the Flood, we keep encountering giant peoples throughout Scripture. The Rephaim were scattered across the Transjordan region. King Og of Bashan was one of them, and his bed was thirteen and a half feet long and six feet wide (Deuteronomy 3:11). That’s not normal human dimensions. The Emim terrified the Moabites (Deuteronomy 2:10-11). The Zamzummim frightened the Ammonites (Deuteronomy 2:20-21). The Anakim made the Israelite spies feel like grasshoppers.
And then there’s Goliath. First Samuel 17:4 tells us he was “six cubits and a span”—that’s over nine feet tall. His armour weighed 125 pounds (over 56kg), and the iron point of his spear weighed fifteen pounds (6.8kg). David wasn’t facing off against someone slightly taller than average. This was a genuine giant. And Goliath had brothers who were also giants—one had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot (2 Samuel 21:20).
Think about it practically. Why would God go to such lengths to describe Og’s bed dimensions? Why give us Goliath’s height and the weight of his armour? Because these details mattered; these were historical facts being recorded for us.
The Pre-Flood World
Something extraordinary was happening before the Flood. Genesis 6:1-4 describes conditions that God found so intolerable that He sent the worldwide Flood to judge the earth. The Nephilim were part of this corrupted world. Whatever their exact origin, they represented a perversion of God’s created order.
When God said in Genesis 6:3, “My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years,” He was announcing a time limit before judgement (another example, if I might add, of grace before judgement). The wickedness was great, and the Nephilim were connected to it somehow. The Flood was God’s response—a complete reset of the world, preserving only Noah’s family and the animals on the Ark.
But here’s what catches people off guard: Genesis 6:4 says the Nephilim were on the earth “and also afterward.”! After what? After the Flood. This means that whatever produced the Nephilim before the Flood happened again afterward, or that the genetic traits survived through the Flood somehow. We don’t know precisely how, but we know they reappeared because Scripture tells us they did.
Post-Flood Giants
The land of Canaan was infested with giants when Israel arrived to take possession. This wasn’t coincidental. God had promised this land to Abraham’s descendants, and Satan knew it. Is it any wonder that the Promised Land was filled with giant warriors who would terrify God’s people? This was spiritual warfare playing out in physical reality.
The Anakim were descendants of Anak, and they were so fearsome that ten of the twelve spies said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are” (Numbers 13:31). Only Joshua and Caleb trusted God enough to say, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it” (Numbers 13:30). The faithless report led to forty years of wandering in the wilderness. Think about that. Giants were such a psychological weapon that they cost an entire generation their inheritance.
When Israel finally entered Canaan under Joshua, they had to systematically eliminate these giant peoples. Joshua 11:21-22 records: “And Joshua came at that time and cut off the Anakim from the hill country, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the hill country of Judah, and from all the hill country of Israel. Joshua devoted them to destruction with their cities. There was none of the Anakim left in the land of the people of Israel. Only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod did some remain.”
Notice where some remained: Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod—Philistine cities. And where did Goliath come from? Gath. This wasn’t random. There was a genetic line of giants that survived specifically in Philistine territory, and they became Israel’s enemies. Goliath wasn’t an isolated anomaly—he was part of a remnant population that God had commanded Israel to destroy but they hadn’t finished the job.
Physical Evidence and Ancient Accounts
Now, sceptics will say, “Show me the bones. Where are all these giant skeletons?” That’s a fair question, but let’s think it through. First, how many dinosaur fossils do we actually find intact? Fossilisation requires very specific conditions—rapid burial, the right minerals, protection from scavengers and weathering. Most creatures that have ever lived left no fossil trace whatsoever.
Second, giant human remains would be buried in post-Flood sediments, not the Flood layers themselves where most fossils are found. They’d be in more recent deposits that are constantly being disturbed by human activity, weathering, and recycling of sediments.
Third, there have been reports throughout history of unusually large human remains being discovered. The problem is documentation. Many finds from the 1800s and early 1900s were poorly recorded by modern archaeological standards. Some were lost, some were destroyed, and some simply weren’t preserved properly.
But we do have some intriguing evidence. In the 1950s, archaeologist Ralph Glidden excavated dozens of skeletons on the Channel Islands off California, some reportedly over seven feet tall, buried with unique artefacts. His findings were documented but the remains have since been reburied according to Native American protocols, making further study impossible.
Museums around the world have abnormally large human bones in their collections, though they’re usually explained as cases of gigantism—a medical condition causing excessive growth. But is every oversized skeleton just a medical abnormality, or were some populations genuinely larger on average?
It’s not just the Bible that speaks of giants. Ancient literature worldwide describes them. The Greek historian Josephus (37-100 AD) wrote about giants having “bodies so large, and countenances so entirely different from other men, that they were surprising to the sight” (Antiquities 1.3.1). He said their bones were still being displayed in his day.
The ancient Greek myths are filled with giants—the Titans, the Gigantes, the Cyclopes. Yes, these became increasingly mythologised over time, but myths often have kernels of historical truth at their core. When cultures worldwide, separated by vast distances, all have legends of giants, it suggests these stories stem from actual encounters with unusually large people.
Why Did Giants Exist?
From a biblical perspective, giants served several purposes in God’s redemptive plan. They demonstrated the extent of corruption in the pre-Flood world, justifying God’s judgment through the Flood. They tested Israel’s faith when entering Canaan—would they trust God or their own assessment of the military situation? They illustrated spiritual realities. Ephesians 6:12 says, “We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” The physical giants Israel faced were pictures of spiritual giants we all face.
The Genetic Question
How could humans grow so large? Well, the pre-Flood environment was dramatically different from today’s. Many creation scientists believe the earth had a greater atmospheric pressure and oxygen content, a stronger magnetic field, and protection from harmful cosmic radiation (of course, this is speculation). These conditions would have allowed both humans and animals to grow larger and live longer. The lifespans recorded in Genesis 5 show people living 900+ years before the Flood (this is not speculation!). After the Flood, lifespans dropped rapidly. This suggests major environmental changes that affected human genetics and health.
Additionally, the human genome contained more genetic variation in the past. We’ve lost information over time through mutations and genetic bottlenecks like the Flood. The early post-Flood population had genetic potential we’ve since lost. Some of that potential may have expressed itself in unusual size.
There’s also the possibility—and I’m not dogmatic about this—that fallen angels somehow corrupted human genetics before the Flood in an attempt to prevent the Messiah from coming through a pure human line. If Satan could corrupt all humanity genetically, then God’s promise of a human Redeemer in Genesis 3:15 would be nullified. This would explain why God preserved Noah’s family specifically—Genesis 6:9 says Noah was “a righteous man, blameless in his generation” and that he “walked with God.” The Hebrew word for “blameless” (תָּמִים, tamim) can mean physically unblemished as well as morally upright. Perhaps Noah’s family was genetically uncorrupted (though this would not explain how giants reappeared unless the sons of God came among people again).
I know that’s controversial. Some say angels can’t reproduce with humans. But Genesis 6:2 says “the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose.” The term “sons of God” (בְנֵי־הָאֱלֹהִים, bene ha-Elohim) in the Old Testament consistently refers to angels (Job 1:6, 2:1, 38:7). Jesus said angels don’t marry in heaven (Matthew 22:30), but that doesn’t mean fallen angels couldn’t violate the natural order on earth. Jude 6-7 speaks of angels who “did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling” and acted in a way similar to “Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire.”
Why Did Giants Disappear?
If giants existed, why don’t we have them today? Several reasons. God specifically commanded Israel to destroy the giant peoples in Canaan. They were under divine judgment. As populations interbred over centuries, the genes for extreme height were diluted. Environmental conditions changed after the Flood, making extreme size less sustainable. Giants required more food and resources. In a post-Flood world with harsher conditions and shorter lifespans, being gigantic became a disadvantage rather than an advantage.
The last biblical reference to giants is in 2 Samuel 21, during King David’s reign around 1000 BC. By then, they were rare remnants being hunted down. After that, they disappear from the biblical record. They went extinct, just like many other ancient peoples and creatures.
Addressing Scepticism
Critics say the giant accounts were exaggerations to make Israel’s victories seem more impressive. How can that fit the context? When the spies reported giants in Numbers 13, it caused panic and rebellion against God. It nearly prevented Israel from entering the Promised Land at all. If the biblical writers were fabricating stories to make Israel look good, reporting that they were terrified of giants and refused to trust God is surely an odd way to do it.
Others suggest the measurements were mistaken or that we’re misunderstanding the units. Perhaps a cubit was smaller than we think? But this doesn’t work because we have physical artefacts from the ancient world that confirm the measurements. Archaeological finds of ancient buildings, walls, and objects validate the cubit measurements used in Scripture.
Some say gigantism is just a rare medical disorder and that’s all these accounts refer to. But the Bible describes entire populations of giants, not isolated individuals with pituitary gland problems. The Anakim, Rephaim, Emim, and Zamzummim were peoples, not lone medical anomalies.
Conclusion
Were there really giants? Yes. The biblical testimony is clear and consistent. They existed before the Flood, reappeared after the Flood, and persisted in Canaan until Israel systematically destroyed them. The last remnants survived into King David’s time and then vanished.
We may not have museum displays of giant skeletons, but we do have the reliable testimony of Scripture, which records these beings matter-of-factly as part of history. We have reports from ancient historians. We have worldwide legends suggesting real encounters with unusually large people. And we have the physical measurements recorded in Scripture that make no sense if giants weren’t real.
More importantly, we need to ask ourselves: do we trust God’s Word? When Scripture states something clearly and repeatedly, do we believe it or do we demand external proof before we’ll accept it? The Nephilim and their giant descendants are part of biblical history. They played a role in demonstrating human wickedness before the Flood and testing Israel’s faith afterward.
The real question isn’t “Were there giants?” but rather “Will I trust what God has revealed?” The evidence is there for those willing to see it. Scripture doesn’t need defending—it needs believing.
“And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.” Numbers 13:33
