Reading from Genesis 6, Biblical students understand Nefilim to be a rebellious group of angels who lusted after the daughters of men and slept with them resulting in a race of wicked giants who fell from grace and helped God make up His mind to wipe out everyone, including these Nefilim, from the face of Earth in a Great Flood.
However, on close reading, Genesis does not directly accuse the Nefilim of anything, nor does it say they were giants. They are simply bundled with “men” as all being wicked. So how did the tradition arise that these offspring of man and angel were giants and that they were so wicked that it prompted God to unleash the Flood? Regarding their stature, the biblical tradition was that the Nefilim were wiped out in a Flood that only Noah and his family survived, hence the Israelites’ shock (Numbers 13:32-33) when a group sent out to spy on the indigenous Canaanites discovered that the Anakim, “the descendants of Anak” lived there (who, an evident redactor “clarifies” for us in verse 33, are part of the Nephilim” ) – even the Nefilim phemselves: “men of great size…and we were [like]grasshoppers in their sight”. From this, it is clear that they were indeed giants.
