Tuesday, July 5, 2016

Hate what God hates: Demons and Vampires

At the Flood, sinful angels abandoned their earthly families
royalty free image

In our previous column we spoke of a certain school of thought among vampire devotees that holds that vampirism dates back to a pre-flood biblical account.

The Genesis account tells us about 'sons of God' that sinned by cohabiting with 'daughters of men' and siring offspring called mighty men, or men of renown.

Since God clearly expressed disapproval of this action, ‘men of renown’ may have been either their opinion of themselves or a title given to them by others; but not by God. 
The original language of the Bible calls them nephilim, a word that has its roots in the Hebrew word “naphal,” that is, to fall. To be grammatically correct, the tense of the word “naphal” used here is causative; so a correct translation would be “cause to fall.” Since it is a noun, it would be ‘individuals who cause falling'. In other words, those who knock people down.
Some churches teach that the 'sons of God' were the good guys, descended from Adam's good son Seth. The 'daughters of men' must have been descendants of Adam's bad son, Cain. But that explanation doesn't track.
The Bible book of Job explains who the 'sons of God' were. In Job 1:6, 2:1, and 38:7 it is crystal clear that 'sons of God' are angels. Jude 6 says of some angels that they "forsook their own proper abode", meaning either that they left heaven or left their place in God's arrangement. 1 Peter 3:19, 20 adds the detail that these  spirit creatures made their wrong move "while the ark was being constructed." So the 'sons of God' marrying 'daughters of men' has to refer to angels leaving heaven and marrying human women in the time before the Flood. The texts in Jude and 1 Peter make it clear that this move was wicked from God's viewpoint. 

But still, what does any of this have to do with vampires? 
It’s about the blood.

Blood comes up early in the Bible. When Cain killed Abel, God told Cain, “the voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground.”

Now, God could have said, ‘Your brother’s flesh is crying out;’ or He could have mentioned Abel’s sweat, tears, skin, or hair follicles; but He didn’t. He specified that it was Abel’s blood. So from very early in man’s history, blood represented life.

Vampire legend agrees with this, that is, that blood equals life. Vampires are said to derive immortality from drinking the blood of others.

Blood is also spoken of as inheritance. Your son or grandson is spoken of as being ‘of your blood.’ At the Flood, the nephilim, the blood relatives of those sinful angels, all drowned. Their formerly angelic fathers, having created for themselves bodies with the very human 
needs of eating and breathing, had to abandon those human-like bodies to avoid drowning, but there was no way for them to 'dematerialize' their blood - their wives and kids. Those all drowned. 
The former angels were not accepted back into God’s heavenly family. That made them demons, joining Satan in his rebellion against God. To this day, they remain angry about God killing off their blood relatives, their nephilim kids. One way they show this is by inducing humans to commemorate their death every Halloween.

But the vampires, Bill; what about the vampires?

Okay. There’s an interesting Bible passage that is set right after the Flood. Noah is told by God that, from this point in history forward, things are going to be different. “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed.” (Genesis 9: 6) While this is clearly God decreeing capital punishment for murder, notice that, once again, “blood” is used to represent life. In fact, some Bible versions render this verse, “Whoever takes a man's life, by man will his life be taken.” 
This same account speaks about consuming blood: "You shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood.” (Genesis 9: 4)

And here’s where the vampires come in. There is an old non-biblical text called the Book of Enoch. It is a collection of old Jewish myths and legends that seems to have been written about one or two centuries before Christ, though the writer pretends he is the pre-flood character Enoch. In it, the Flood account is embellished with the following bits:

1. Noah had daughters as well as sons. The daughters were married to nephilim. Jehovah’s edict was that none of the nephilim’s bloodline was to survive the Flood, but the daughters begged their father to let their husbands on the ark; and like any daddy with his daughters, Noah acceded to their wishes, and thus the bloodline of the nephilim, the sons of the demons, survived the Flood. Keep in mind this is myth, not fact.

2. The command regarding the sacredness of blood from Genesis chapter 9 is worded this way in the book of Enoch: “God said to Noah: “Flesh with its lifeblood still in it you shall not eat. For your own lifeblood, too, I will demand an accounting. And if anyone partakes of any blood, I will set myself against that one who partakes of blood and cut him off from among his people. Since the life of a living body is in its blood, I have made you put it on the altar, so that atonement may thereby be made for your own lives, because it is the blood, as the seat of life, that makes atonement." (Up to this point it is almost straight out of the Bible. But then it adds,) "The blood is for the gods alone.”

Some modern-day vampire aficionados believe that vampires are descendants of these nephilim. And they believe that these nephilim, being descended from gods, keep themselves alive by consuming blood.

If you are a student of the Bible, you can easily see the problems with both of these ideas. First, the Bible is very clear about Flood survivors. “You shall go into the ark - you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you.” (Genesis 6:18) No mention of daughters. And Peter makes it even clearer. “God waited patiently in the days of Noah, while the ark was being built. In it, few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water.” (1 Peter 3:20) 

Eight souls: Noah, his wife, his three sons, their wives. No daughters, no nephilim

Furthermore, though it is not specifically stated in the Bible, there is one school of thought that, like many hybrids, the nephilim may have been unable to produce any offspring, so these mythical 'daughters of Noah' would have remained childless.

Secondly, what about that expression, “blood is for the gods alone.” Gods, plural? All Bible students know there is only one true God, so any reference to “gods” is speaking of false gods. Those angels that sinned by acting on their perverted lust for human females no doubt liked – and still like – to think of themselves as gods and their nephilim offspring as demi-gods which, by comparison to puny humans, they were. But they themselves are puny compared to the true God. And they know it.

There is, in fact, a universal struggle going on between God and these phony gods. It is imperative that we side with the victor in this struggle. I read a comment from one vampire vamper that ‘If God were able to stop Satan, he would have done it by now, so I choose to follow Satan.’ 
In my day (I'm an old codger, remember?) that kind of thinking was called 'cutting off your nose to spite your face.'

In point of fact, the vampire lie is older than Noah and the Flood. It goes all the way back to Eve, and it hasn't changed:
  •  God has been lying to you.
  •  Eat this, it will make you like God.
  •  You’ll never die.
You’d think by now Satan would have come up with some new material.

Feel free to leave a polite comment. 
 
 Bill K. Underwood is a freelance columnist and author of several books, including three novels. His latest book is 99 ways to Fire Your Boss. All are available from his page on Amazon.com.

2 comments:

  1. Love this Bill! Well written👍

    ReplyDelete
  2. Well written. Proof the Book of Enoch wasn't "ever" inspired by Jehovah to be part of his divine Book.

    ReplyDelete