Hence, Israel is the people of YHWH, whereas the other nations are under the authority of other “gods,” which are really the rebellious divine beings of Genesis 6:1-4. But the LORD’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted heritage.” Heiser says these verses are referring to the dispersal of the nations after Babel and the “sons of God” is a reference to the other divine beings. Even though this “disinheriting of the nations” isn’t described in Genesis 11, it is described in Deuteronomy 32:8-9, which says, “When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God.As Heiser puts it, it is as if YHWH says, “If you don’t want to obey me, I’m not interested in being your god-I’ll match you up with some other god” (114). And so, He not only disperses humanity into various nations, but he disinherits them as His people and puts them under the authority of those rebellious divine beings-the lesser Elohim.
Then in Genesis 11, when humanity attempts to build a tower to heaven to gain power and fame, YHWH sees this as more rebellion.And the flood was thus God’s attempt to rid the world of the immorality and sin that these divine beings encouraged in the pre-flood world. Of course, the biblical writer switches the entire story around to say that it was rebellious divine beings against YHWH who had sex with women, and their offspring were not glorious kings, but violent giants (whom we come across in the Exodus and Conquest narratives).Even though they were punished into subterranean waters by the Babylonian god Marduk, they were nevertheless hailed as pre-flood cultural heroes in Babylon and Babylonian kings claimed to be descended from the apkallus. Genesis 6-8 as a whole is thus a variation of Mesopotamian flood stories that go something like this: divine beings known as apkallus, possessors of great knowledge, had sex with women, produced semi-divine offspring, and shared their supernatural knowledge with humanity.This supernatural interpretation of Genesis 6:1-4 is reflected in books like I Enoch. Genesis 6:1-4 is thus given as the set up and reason for the flood story in Genesis 6-8. angels) crossing that boundary between the supernatural and natural world, having sex with women, and fathering a race of giants known as the Nephilim (who later show up in the Exodus and Conquest narratives…more on that later). The story in Genesis 6:1-4 about the “sons of God” having sex with the “daughters of men” and fathering the Nephilim is about divine beings (i.e.Heiser’s take on Genesis 6-11 can be summarized in the following way: Genesis 6:1-4 to Genesis 11: From the Nephilim to Babel
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