Hello F(r)iends,
As a teenager, I was introduced to the Greek gods and the various myths of the ancients. Even then I believed there were many similarities between the mythology of the Greeks and the “truth” of the bible. I would proclaim Zeus equivalent to God and Hades equivalent to Satan. I would see Hercules as Samson. I asked myself then if it was possible that the Greeks simply renamed god to something that was easier to pronounce–or a more familiar/Greek name. I looked to the Romans and their variants on the same god and thought to myself: “surely, the Greeks got confused with the name changes”. I later outgrew this theory and never seeked to reconcile the two mythologies. Much later I was introduced to Justin Martyr.
Justin Martyr, (100 A.D. - 165 A.D.), an early “church father” believed that the Greek gods were, in actuality, angels appointed to care for men. These angels turned away from god for the sake of women. These couplings produced children and it was these children that were worshiped by the Greeks as the gods of Olympus and the heroes like Achilles and Hercules.
[quote=“Justin Martyr, in The Second Apology,
CHAPTER V – HOW THE ANGELS TRANSGRESSED,”]
But if this idea take possession of some one that if we acknowledge God as our helper, we should not, as we say, be oppressed and persecuted by the wicked; this, too, I will solve. God, when He had made the whole world, and subjected things earthly to man, and arranged the heavenly elements for the increase of fruits and rotation of the seasons, and appointed this divine law–for these things also He evidently made for man–committed the care of men and of all things under heaven to angels whom He appointed over them. But the angels transgressed this appointment and were captivated by love of women, and begat children who are those that are called demons; and besides, they afterwards subdued the human race to themselves, partly by magical writings, and partly by fears and the punishments they occasioned, and partly by teaching them to offer sacrifices, and incense, and libations, of which things they stood in need after they were enslaved by lustful passions; and among men they sowed murders, wars, adulteries, intemperate deeds, and all wickedness. Whence also the poets and mythologists, not knowing that it was the angels and those demons who had been begotten by them that did these things to men, and women, and cities, and nations, which they related, ascribed them to god himself, and to those who were accounted to be his very offspring, and to the offspring of those who were called his brothers, Neptune and Pluto, and to the children again of these their offspring. For whatever name each of the angels had given to himself and his children, by that name they called them.
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The biblical basis for the theological theory begins with the Nephilim mentioned in the book of Genesis. The word Nephilim can be translated into “titans” or “giants”. Thus, Justin Martyr would parallel these Old Testament beings with the Titans of Greek Mythology. The particular story is contained in Genesis Chapter 6 (NIV): 1 When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the LORD said, “My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days will be a hundred and twenty years.” 4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.
Is there any other connection? Yes and no.
Sons of Israel?
Or sons of God?
With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, a fragment (4QDeutj) (http://www.bibleandscience.com/archaeology/dss.htm) apparently retains an earlier and perhaps more accurate form of the original text as the DSS version uses “sons of God”. Thus, it is possible that there may be more to Justin Martyr’s theology than just a singular reference in Genesis.
Any thoughts?
-Thirst