Genesis 6:2 describes men who saw that certain women were attractive and then took whichever ones they wanted as wives, and it sits at the start of a passage about human wickedness spreading across the earth. The identity of the “sons of God” is the main debate, and readers across church history have answered it differently, so the verse rewards careful reading rather than a quick answer. The narrator, Moses in the traditional view, is describing events before the flood to the people of Israel.
God’s sons saw that men’s daughters were beautiful, and they took any that they wanted for themselves as wives.
Genesis 6:2 (WEB)
What Genesis 6:2 Means
The phrase “sons of God” (in Hebrew, benei ha-elohim) is the key term. The same expression appears in Job 1:6 and Job 38:7 for heavenly beings in God’s court, which is why many readers take it to mean angelic or divine figures. Others read it as a title for the godly line of Seth, descendants of the faithful ancestor named in Genesis 4:26 and 5:1 to 32, which is an older tradition in the Christian church.
The verb “saw” points to the reason for what follows. These men did not simply notice women; they looked with desire and then acted on it by “taking” wives without restraint, choosing “any that they wanted.” The verse describes a pattern of self-directed appetite. It does not, on its own, spell out every detail of what happened next, and the verses after it add the flood’s background, not a full explanation.
The Context of Genesis 6:2
Genesis is traditionally attributed to Moses and was written for Israel as they prepared to enter the promised land. Its early chapters establish the wider story: creation, the fall, the spread of sin, and God’s commitment to bless the world through one family. Chapter 6 falls right after the genealogy in chapter 5 that ends with Noah, which is why the verse feels like a turn in the story from long lives and quiet faithfulness toward mounting corruption.
Verse 3 has God limit human days to 120 years, and verse 5 states that “the wickedness of man was great in the earth” and that every intention of the human heart was “only evil” continually. Read alongside those lines, verse 2 functions as one example of a wider moral collapse rather than an isolated oddity. That framing helps explain why the passage moves quickly from marriage choices to divine judgment.
Key Phrases in Genesis 6:2
Genesis 6:5
The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of man’s heart was continually only evil.
(WEB)
This verse, which follows directly in the flood narrative, shows the wider human condition that Genesis 6:2 illustrates. Reading them together makes clear that the disordered desire in verse 2 is a symptom of a heart turned away from God.
Proverbs 5:18
Let your spring be blessed. Rejoice in the wife of your youth.
(WEB)
Proverbs describes marriage as a source of lasting joy and a fountain of blessing rooted in faithfulness. Set beside Genesis 6:2, it shows the contrast between a relationship entered with commitment and one entered by grasping whatever pleases.
A Short Prayer From Genesis 6:2
Lord, you see the desires in my heart more clearly than I do. When I notice what attracts me, help me to pause and ask whether I am seeking what is good or simply taking what I want. Teach me to treat other people with honesty and respect, and keep me from using them for my own satisfaction. Shape my wants according to your kindness, and let my choices show faithfulness to you and care for those around me. Amen.