“The Nephilim were on the earth”
The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and afterward as well, when the sons of God had relations with the daughters of men. And they bore them children who became the mighty men of old, men of renown. (Genesis 6:4 BSB)
What it sounds like today
A cryptic mention of giants and mysterious 'sons of God,' seemingly from nowhere.
The cultural key
This is one of the most debated verses in the Bible, and honesty requires laying out the options rather than picking one. 'Sons of God' has been read three main ways: as angelic or divine beings who took human wives (the oldest reading, echoed in Jude), as the godly line of Seth intermarrying with the ungodly line of Cain, or as tyrant-kings who claimed divine descent. The 'Nephilim' are equally uncertain, linked by sound to 'falling' and translated 'giants' in Greek. The one clear note is 'men of renown', literally 'men of the name (shem)', the same grasping for a name that drives Babel.
Recovered meaning
The passage deliberately withholds as much as it tells, sketching a world where the line between heaven and earth is being violated just before the flood. Its point is not to satisfy curiosity about giants but to show a creation sliding into the chaos that judgment will answer.