← The Deep End With Lecrae
The Deep End With Lecrae
Bible Scholar Challenges Lecrae on Nephilim, Demons, & Book of Enoch
01:04:27
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- [00:00]
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Angelic beings slept with human women.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And made giants.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Now a couple things I can already anticipate. People are like, this dude is whack. This dude is wild.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
I know where you're going. For everybody who doesn't know where he's going, Shaq is in that. That's what he's trying to say.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
The Bible, it's not interested in answering our science questions. How come Eve doesn't freak out when the serpent starts talking the book of Enoch, that this is where things are gonna get wild. So Jude and second Peter actually quote the book of Eden.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
So why is it not canonized?
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
This is a great question. It's actually debated.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Do you think they all were decimated in the flood or are they still with us?
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Oh, man, you really messed me up.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
You already told me your answer by that, that pause told me I gotta go and tuck my kids in tonight. And tell them, be careful, there's nephilim out here. That's what you just said.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
The flood possibly was not a global flood. Okay? This is the deep end with Lecrae.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
All right, ladies and gentlemen, I gotta read this bio. Okay? I'm getting more into reading bios because people are way more interesting than I think you even realize. All right, so first of all, Dr. Joel Mutamali is a PhD, a theologian, a best selling author, one of the most credible voices on spiritual warfare in the evangelical world right now. And I can attest to this, all right? An Indian American, born in Chicago, raised partly in India, father of four is a hoops fanatic. He's Jordan over LeBron, so don't tune him out. Okay, now that you know this, stay with us. Okay? Stay with us. He's the kind of scholar who can go deep, but also make it very accessible for everyday people. He is the director of Theology and research at Proverbs 31 ministries. He does serious scholarship inside the Women's Bible Study organization, which is very interesting. And he is a co host on Therapy and Theology with Lisa Turquoise. Turkish. I always get her name wrong, but I greatly admire her. My mother read her book, Change youe Life. I'm just saying, I went to public school. Don't judge me. But he's also on a preaching team at Transformation Church with Pastor Derwin Gray. It's a different transformation if you guys. Not the one in Oklahoma, the one in North Carolina. Two different ones. He's got a new book, the Unseen Battle, and It is his PhD dissertation turned into a book. It's years in the making.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
And.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And this man studied under Dr. Michael Heiser, which is the scholar who pioneered the whole idea of the divine council worldview. If you don't know what that is, you're about to. When we start talking about demons and start talking about spirits and angels and nephilim and other realms, this is the guy you want to be talking to, not the creepy old person in the church who's telling you all kind of weird stuff. Talk to the studied theologian. So, Dr. Joel, we appreciate you being here, brother. Thank you, man.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Bro, I felt like I just ran a marathon with you on that one. My goodness. My goodness. But, I mean, all the details are pretty close. Pretty Right. Appreciate you.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
I. I actually, you know, I didn't know who you were specifically. Right. I would come across your commentary, your feeds on social media over the years and was like, yo, this dude is killing it, man. I don't know who this brown guy is killing it, but he's killing it.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Whatever it is.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Who is this guy? And then I read the unseen battle by Dr. Heiser, and I was like, unseen Realm. Unseen Realm. This is the Unseen Battle. Yeah. The Unseen Realm.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And I must have read that book twice.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Twice.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Just in a. In like two weeks.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Because I. I had never heard anything like this before. It blew my mind. And I was like, oh, my gosh, this is the vo. This is the guy. And then I learned, because we did an episode with the founder of Wikipedia.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right, right, right, right.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And he had some controversial takes.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
On Dr. Heiser.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
His views. And then you were like, gotta speak on this. And then I was like, yo, you studied under. Under high. Oh, what? So then I really tapped in, and I was. And I'd just been blown away, man. Like, blown away. So, yeah, man, I am. I'm extremely intrigued. I mean, I didn't talk about the most important aspect of your life with your father, your husband.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah. Four kids.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Four kids?
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Three. Three boys, 14, 13, and 11.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Oh, yeah.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
And then we've got a little girl. Her name is Amelia Jane. She turned 6 on Valentine's Day, but her nickname is MJ after. You already know.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
The greatest.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
The greatest.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
The greatest.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
The goat.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
I have friends who disagree, but it's okay.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
As long as you and I. First of all, I'm on the same page as the leading theologian on the Unseen Realm that's alive right now. So I think I'm doing all right.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
I don't even know what I'm supposed to say to that. I'm, like, lost. All right.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
I want to dive into. To some things because I think, you know, I want to get into your story, but before I do that, I gotta, like, there's some stuff on the forefront of my brain that I don't want to forget. So. A lot of us feel like we know about Genesis. Yeah, Right. We read Genesis and we look at it and we see, like, yeah, God made the earth. There's a talking snake, and then there's a flood, and then Adam and Eve are here, and then they mess up, and then, you know. You know, that's the kind of the gist of Genesis for us.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And, you know, we know about the fall of Adam and Eve, but that's the gist of. What are we not seeing.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah, right.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
We know about one fall. Apparently there's more than one fall.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Two more.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And apparently a talking snake is. Is not the gist of the book.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right, Right.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
So walk us through like, your. What we're not seeing, what the average Christian sees and what we're missing.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah. So I think we actually have a mutual friend in our boy, Hakeem Bradley.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
That's right.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right. And so, Hakeem, if you're list, love you, but I'm still going to disagree with you. Hakeem is like a Hebrew scholar, and, you know, I'm a biblical theology guy. I like to look at the Bible as one cohesive story. So I want to read the Old Testament, led the New Testament, and then I want to see how the New Testament is really fulfilling the seeds that are planted in the Old Testament and Often what happens is Hebrew scholars, they'll say, you know, the most important chapters of Genesis are Genesis chapters one through 11. And this is where I disagree with Hakeem, because I'll be like, bro, why do you always leave out my boy Abram? Like, Abraham starts in Genesis 12. And actually, I think that we really need to read Genesis chapters 1 through 12 in order to rightly understand the rest of the story of Scripture. And so, you know, some of this comes from my doctoral advisor, Dr. Mike Heiser. I remember Mike once said, he's like, hey, if you ask a modern, just everyday believer, why is there so much evil in the world? You know, they'd be like, well, Genesis 3, the fall, of course, because. But if you ask the exact same question to a person who lived in the time period of what's referred to the second temple, you know, we have Malachi, and then you go to Matthew, and we call that, like, the 400 years of silence. But in the actual historical time period, it was anything but silent. There's a whole bunch of writing and literature and thinking and theologizing and processing that's taking place of, who is this God? Yahweh? How did we, the people of God, get ourselves in this predicament where we're now underneath the oppressive rule of Rome? What about the promises that God has made to all of us? And so they're thinking deeply about this. This is actually where a lot of demonology, angelology, all of this thought was being written and produced. And so for the people of that time, which, I mean, they're way closer to the original story than we are, they would be like, well, you know, Genesis 3 is an issue, but please don't forget Genesis 6 and this issue of the sons of God that, see, the daughters of man, desire them, take them, and then the offspring are these enigmatic figures called the Nephilim. And then the Greek translation refers to them as giants. And. And this is the precursor to the flood narrative. And then they'd also be like, yo. Also, don't forget Genesis 11. Like, where do we get the idea of the gods of the nations? Well, the gods of the nations come from Genesis 11, right? In light of the postlude, there's this section in Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9 that says that God brought the sons God down and he allotted the nations based off of the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the sons of God. And this is where you get the idea of the gods of the nations, which is really the backdrop for the entire Old Testament. So, like, a couple things that I think are really important. One, when we read Genesis, sometimes we let our modern 21st century desire for science and facts to actually be the interpretive lens by which we read the text. The Bible is not, at least from my perspective, at least, Genesis, for sure, chapters one through 12. It's not interested in answering our science questions. Like it answers some science questions, but that's not the author's intended meaning. Right around this time, there are these competing myths that are being present, and each of these competing myths, they're all telling a counterfeit story. But the thing about counterfeit stories is, in order to really gain traction, you gotta have vestiges of the truth. You gotta have, like, little pieces in there where you go, wait, wait, that sounds right. That. That looks right. That feels right. And yet there's a sideways scheme that's also taking place. And so there's this story called the Pneuma Elish in Mesopotamian literature, which was the story of how creation comes into existence through this massive conflict between the deity and Tiamat. And Tiamat is the sea dragon kind of thing. And. And it's, like, broken in half. And that's where the boundaries. And then out of the blood of a different deity is how humanity comes about. But this is wild in the Mesopotamian literature. In the New Malish, humanity was created as slaves in order to do the work of the deities. Right? Okay, think about all of that. And now think about Genesis, chapter three, Genesis one and two. It's like, wait a minute. The uncreated creator creates. The Hebrew phrase for formless and empty is toho va boho. It means wasteland and wilderness. So in the midst of chaos, and there's the sea, which is an image of chaos and destruction and death. This good God comes in and creates order in the midst of chaos. And then he creates a series of separations through boundaries in order to cultivate a garden that he places on top of a mountain, which is, again, wild. Like, we think about mountains today. Cray. It's like, oh, great place to take an Instagram picture. Go on a hike, right? In the ancient world, the mountains were the place where God met with humanity. At the peak of the mountain was where the gods would plant gardens. I mean, by the way, where do you get the idea of Mount Olympus? They're just plagiarizing the biblical text, right? And so you have this. And God plants this garden, and he always desires to have his family with him. Adam and Eve are placed in the garden of Eden. But then they're not alone. They have these spiritual beings that are present as well. And this garden is not just a garden. It's a divine throne room. And God is king, and part of his kingdom is his prerogative to have a supernatural family and also a human family, and they're present in Eden. I was like, how come Eve doesn't freak out when the serpent starts talking?
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Right?
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Like, how come we just read past that? Like, oh, yeah, of course serpents talk, right? The Hebrew word for serpent there is nakash. And that word has in mind three things. It has in mind a literal serpent. It has in mind a fiery bronze image, and it also has in mind a guardian cherub or a cherubim. And it's like, well, why does Eve not freak out when the serpent starts talking? Because the issue. And this is all spiritual warfare. This is cosmic conflict. The issue isn't the appearance of the serpent. The issue is the substance of what comes out of the serpent's mouth. And so then we love to present.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
When you say that.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah. So when Adam and Eve are. They're used to spiritual beings coming through, hanging out. They're used to seraphim and cherubim and sons of God, and these spiritual, disembodied spiritual beings were present and active. Think about, like, it was routine for Yahweh. This is Genesis 3. To walk with Adam and Eve in the cool of the evening breeze.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
There you go.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Each of these details matters. The cool of the evening breeze lets us know that it's the end of the day. Why does God wait to come and talk to Adam and Eve till the end of the day? Because they had been doing stuff all day. They had been creating and they had been naming animals, and they had been tasked with stewardship and vocation and responsibility. And at the end of the day, it's almost like God comes back as like, hey, let's have a conversation. How'd it go? What surprised you?
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And not to cut you off, but my ADD brain kicked in, and I just thought you said, okay, disembodied beings.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
So they don't have a consistent physical. Physical form. So is the assumption then that they're taking the form of other things that. That do have bodies?
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, like, and this isn't a newer novel idea, think about the angelic figures that show up to Abram. Right? It's angelic beings that are corporeal for a moment, you know, and they look human. They. They. Their language that the scriptures give us is that they look, like men, you know, they sit and they eat with. With Abram. They are walking alongside of him. You've got the story of Jacob who wrestles with Elohim, with. With God.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
I mean, I don't know about you, but it'd be really hard to wrestle with the non physical thing. That's right. Non physical being. Right. And it's so physical that. That God touches the hip of Jacob and his hip dislocates and he walks for the rest of his days with a limp. Right?
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
And so. Yeah, I think so.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
So the snake, the serpent. Because some people say it's not literally a serpent, and others will say, no, it's a serpent.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
But what I have, I have. Can I speculate a little bit?
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay, go for it.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay. So this was what we're here for. Okay. This is what gets me a little bit in trouble every now and then. I'm not like the everyday average kind of scholar, theologian guy. I'm happy to speculate every now and then. And this is my speculation of what has taken place in the Garden of Eden. Particularly. I do think that there is a physical serpent that is there. And I do think that there was a rebellion that took place prior to what we're seeing the story of the Garden of Eden. Okay. We're not given the details of what all that is, but that seems to be that we're zeroing in on a moment. But there's stuff that's happened prior to it. Right. And so what it seems to me is that the reason why God gives Adam and Eve a task to guard. The Hebrew word is shemar. To guard Eden. That's the exact same word that's used of the Levitical priesthood in order to protect the temple. It's the same word that's used of the watchman on. On the walls in Nehemiah to protect the city. And it's a word that's used to cultivate and care for a garden. Right, so that's the word that's used for Adam and Eve. Why give them that task? Why give them a task to guard or to protect? Unless there is something on the outside to protect from. Right, so this is now where I go into speculation. I think probably what's happening is there's a disembodied spiritual being who we have come to know as the Hasatan, the Satan, and creates an unhappy alliance with a physical, literal being called a serpent. Right. This, if I were to write like a fiction book one day, this is kind of like the area I'D go. It says that all of the animals were brought to Adam to be a suitable helper, but not one of them was found. But there's a detail about the serpent that the serpent was crafty. The Hebrew word is a room that it was, you know, it was wise, but it was kind of like, wise in a sneaky kind of way. This is just me, you know, so please, y', all don't. Don't email me about this. Just. This is just speculation. What if the serpent, like, made. It's like the Bachelor, right? The serpent, like, was like, I made top three. Like, maybe I could be one of the. And then it's like, nope, no helper suitable. Now the serpent's ticked off, angry, frustrated. And now a spiritual being comes in. It's like, hey, let me take your form. You know, I got something. And we can have a little bit of an unholy alliance that happens here and now. We can catch Eve and Adam off guard. And the reason why I think there's some legs to this is what's fascinating to me is that the judgment, the consequence is given in Genesis 3 to both humanity and the serpent. In a physical sense, the serpent has to crawl on its belly and to eat the dust. The Hebrew word for humanity is Adam. The Hebrew word for soil is Adam. There's a plan. Words here. The very thing that the serpent thinks that it was going to devour and crush, right? Humanity is the very thing it's going to be forced to now eat and consume in, like, this reversal that takes place. And so, yeah, I think that Eve is not surprised because it was routine to have spiritual beings around and there's animals around. But I think Eve was not aware of the deep level of deception that was going to come. And the reason why she should have been aware is because she should have relied back on God's words to her, not the deceptive words of the enemy.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay, so the Joel take is that hey, or the Joel speculation. Speculation, shall I say, is that, hey, you know, there was a draft and to see who could be a suitable helper for man. And serpent was like, I know I'm getting drafted, right?
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
I'm crafty, right?
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Podcast Host (Craig)
I'm a crafty. Like, it's me, fam. I'm definitely going to the league. And he doesn't get drafted. And it's like, oh, shoot. Now, the. The. The question I. I wonder is this is. See this. Ah, this could go in so many ways. Is this a fallen world? Because is. Do you. Does the serpent have the capability of being. What does disappointment look like in a pre fallen world? Like.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah, yeah.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
You know what I mean?
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
So I think one of the things that messes us up is when we think of Eden, I think we use language that is imprecise.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
So we talk about Eden as if it was perfect.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
But perfect has in mind completion. Eden is not complete. Eden is the perfect building blocks in order to get to the completed state. Right.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Adam and Eve have all the things they need to build this kingdom of God. And so like, again, like, I just go back to like, and this is definitely hypothetical, but I just wonder what those talks with God would have been like. Like, would. Would Adam have been like at one point, him and Eva processing life. This is what like my wife and I do. I'm not cray. I'm not a runner for fun or a walker for no reason. Just so you know, my wife and I, we've been married for 16 years. That girl loves to walk for no reason. She's always wanting to walk. It could be 125 degrees outside.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Like, I will melt thinking about that. And she's like, let's go on a
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Podcast Host (Craig)
walking so she can eat cake.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
I don't know what it is, but it's, it's, it's a lot.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
And I don't want to do it. I know, I get it.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
But what I've noticed is the reason why she cares so deeply about walk, which, by the way, marriage adv. We notice that when we go on walks daily, our like, percentage of fighting decreases by like 75%. Because on those walks we talk.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
We're processing life.
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Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
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Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right. And so it's like, okay, what is God doing with that? I mean, he's walking. I almost always wonder, like, maybe Adam and Eve are like, interesting. There's like these animals and there's this one animal that has a big old mane about it. Right. And there's this other animal that has stripes on it. And like the one I think that with the mane needs to be lion. That's the name of the line. But this other one looks kind of like that, but has stripes. Maybe it's elephant. Maybe elephant. And. But I can't. I don't feel that. And they go on a walk and they present it to God. And God's like, have you ever thought about that big old animal with the trunk? It's like, oh, that could have been the elephant. Let's grab this one as tight. So this is kind of like, funny. And I'm making this exaggerative sure, sure. But the reason why I'm doing that is to try to point out that a lot of times we take the humanity of the biblical text out of it and we read it flat, like, as if life is not being lived, as if not there isn't confusion, as if there's not process to be made. And I think Eden is a place for creativity. It's new heavens and new earth. It's like our future existence is not disembodied, right? Like ethereal living. It is embodied. It is Jesus, who right now is in his resurrected body, you know, who invites us to a banquet, to eat, to participate in the new heavens and new earth.
- [23:09]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Why do you think? Well, okay, I gotta take another moment. Because listening to Joel talk about fighting spiritual battles is a reminder that faithfulness isn't just spiritual, it's responsibility. Right? Like it is a spiritual thing that we have to be mindful of, but it's also a daily responsibility. And I didn't fully understand what faithfulness looked like in every aspect of my life, especially when it came to taking care of my family until I had kids. Right? When you have kids, you understand responsibility from a different perspective. And something that was left off the plate for me was life insurance. So had kids started thinking differently about protection and provision. And Fabric by Gerber Life is term life insurance that you can get done today. It's made for busy parents just like you, all online on your schedule, right from your couch. You can be covered in under 10 minutes with no health exam required. If you got kids, especially if you're young and you're healthy, now's the time to lock in the low rates. Okay? Even if you have life insurance through your employer, it may not offer enough protection for your whole family and it may not follow you if you leave your job. And Fabric has flexible, high quality policies. They're going to fit your family, fit your budget. A million dollars in coverage for less than a dollar a day. Fabric's partner with Gerber Life is trusted by millions of families just like yours for over 50 years. No risk. There's no risk. A 30 day money back guarantee. Fabric also has free digital wheels, tools to invest in your kids future and more. And it's all right from your phone. So join the thousands of parents out there who trust Fabric to help build and protect their family. Apply today in just minutes@meatfabric.com Lecrae that's meatfabric.com LecraE policies issued by Western Southern Life Assurance Company not available in certain States prices subject to underwriting and health. Health questions. Timeout. Timeout. Time out. Okay, listen, my man Joel is a monster, is a beast at the unseen battles that we all have to deal with. He spent years studying what he calls the unseen battle, the spiritual warfare that plays out beneath the surface of everyday life. And one of the most overlooked fronts of that battle is what happens inside our own minds. Now, there's Christians out there who are spending years thinking they're broken or failing God because they're struggling with unwanted or distressing thoughts. But this isn't a spiritual failure. It could be due to a common but overlooked condition called religious ocd. I'm talking about thoughts that interrupt worship. Am I praying right? Will God forgive me if I make this mistake in prayer? I need to start over and do it perfectly this time. Or maybe a blasphemous image pops in your head and it makes you feel like you've sinned just for thinking it. Unwanted thoughts like that can be a sign of religious ocd, also known as scrupulosity ocd. It's a form of OCD that can turn your faith into a source of. Of constant guilt, doubt, fear. But because the condition is still widely misunderstood, a lot of people don't even know that it can show up this way or that it can center around their faith. But OCD isn't just about being neat and organized. OCD latches on to what you care about most. It causes a cycle of distressing, intrusive thoughts or behaviors done to get rid of anxiety that they're creating. So many people are silently struggling with religious ocd, thinking it's some sort of personal failure or lack of of faith, when that couldn't be further from the truth. It's a common type of ocd. It's highly treatable with the right kind of specialized therapy. And that is where no CD comes in. No CD is the world's leading OCD treatment provider. All of their licensed therapists are trained in erp, or Exposure and Response prevention therapy, the most effective treatment for ocd. And NO CD therapists deeply understand ocd, so they know that these thoughts don't mean anything, anything about you. In live virtual sessions, they're going to help you break free from OCD's grip while honoring your faith so you can get back to doing what matters most. No CD is covered by insurance for over 155 million Americans. They provide support between sessions, so you're not going to be alone. And if you think you might be struggling with religious OCD, don't wait. Head over to nocd.com, book a free 15 minute call with their team today and start reclaiming your faith from ocd. N O C d dot com. You talk about flattening it out. Right. And that's a very good observation. Right. We don't. I love cultural context. I don't think I look at the cultural context of some of the stories, specifically in Genesis, because I. I've heard so many vantage points that, well, this one could be figurative, this could be literal.
- [27:37]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Sure.
- [27:38]
Podcast Host (Craig)
This is Gilgamesh's. This is a remix of this.
- [27:42]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right.
- [27:42]
Podcast Host (Craig)
And you're like, so what? How do I insert cultural context, humanity in the midst of it all? And then let's be real. I mean, it's easy for us to embrace. Well, not easy for us. I would say there are some of us who. It's easy for us to embrace the idea of a supernatural realm and demons and so on and so forth. It's not as easy for us to embrace certain things that we see in Genesis for whatever reason.
- [28:13]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
- [28:14]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Like, and I, I have to. I'm pointing to myself.
- [28:17]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
- [28:17]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Because I believe, and I've always believed, that there is a God who is wrapped in human flesh, who died for my sins and resurrected. I believe that. Yeah, that is supernatural. It doesn't make sense. It's. It's crazy to the scientific mind.
- [28:36]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
- [28:37]
Podcast Host (Craig)
But I've struggled historically. Not anymore. I've struggled historically to believe that there were giants walking the planet called Nephilim.
- [28:44]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right.
- [28:45]
Podcast Host (Craig)
And are they demons or are they not demons? Like, why is that?
- [28:48]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Why do.
- [28:49]
Podcast Host (Craig)
What is that tension for you? And then what the heck are Nephilim?
- [28:52]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah. I mean, first of all, I think you just nailed it. CS Lewis has this really great quote. I opened the unseen battle with this. It comes from Screwtape letters. And I'll summarize him. He's basically like, listen, the enemy loves one of two things. Loves our obsessive nature to the things of the spiritual, cosmic realm. Secondarily loves. If we act like none of that exists, like we're living in total neglect of it, then he loves to play in both spaces. And the language he uses is he loves it when we are passionate about, like the magicianship of it, or we become materialistic, like we demythologize the Bible and you just said it, bro. It's like, man, we as followers of Jesus, that our whole faith hinges on like this statement that we believe that God, God became man, didn't lose an ounce of his divinity, took upon humanity came to us through immaculate conception, through literal virgin birth, lived a perfect life, died on a real Roman cross, went to a grave on the third day, rose, defeated sin and death through death itself, and then hung out with the Homies for a period of 40 days just to prove the point, and then literally ascends to the right hand of the like, what part of that is not cosmic in nature?
- [29:59]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Sure.
- [30:00]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right. And yet why do we want to demythologize the rest of the Scriptures? And so I think discernment is really important that we're reading these texts in light of its natural context and that we take a look at the Hebrew language and the way that the authors are actually presenting this to us. One of the things I think is really important is that we take the biblical language on its own terms. And so how do we discern, like, when we need to use cultural context when we shouldn't? And I actually think it's based off of how the biblical writers themselves are communicating the text. So, for instance, in Genesis 6, one of the big debates is, are the sons of God human children, human men, or are they angelic beings? Right. And there's a reason why we want to demythologize it, honestly, because there's a lot of categories that this thing breaks for us. Why would angelic beings, how could they even have human sexual relations with women? That produces the nephilim. And then a lot of times what's quoted is the quote of Jesus in Matthew where Jesus says, well, we'll be like the angels, not given over to marriage. But what I think is so fascinating is notice what Jesus says and doesn't say. Jesus says that we'll be like the angels, not given over to marriage. He doesn't say anything about inability or ability of sexual relations. Right. And here's the other thing that I think is kind of fascinating. You have examples throughout the Old Testament of barren wombs that come alive. Right? This is an act of God that he does well. What does the enemy like to do? Often work in counterfeit ways to what God is doing. But then here's the other one. You have angelic beings that are physically eating, physically walking. They're being seen by others, like, as men. Another fascinating thing, we never find an example of a angelic being being referred to as a woman, but you see them always being referred to as a man. And the word that's used is not gender neutral. It is gendered. So at some point you're like, oh, they fit. So all of that to say, while we're trying to ask the question, how can it happen? The biblical text is less interested in giving us a science lesson on the cosmology of spiritual beings and more about it did happen, right? It did happen. And so in Genesis 6, a couple things that I want to do is, how do you know this? We want to use the clear parts of scripture in order to help determine and interpret the unclear parts of scripture. You know, so in Genesis 6, it's the Hebrew phrase Bene Elohim for sons of God. So I want to look and see, where does that Hebrew phrase bene Elohim show up throughout the rest of Scripture? Well, fascinating. In the book of Job, you have, which is in terms of dating, arguably dated very early. You know, it's one of these kind of prime, primordial, very early books that is written. And you have right off the gat, a divine council scene. In Job, chapter one, you have verse six. It says, one day the Bene Elohim, the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord and Satan, or the article is there. Hasatan also came with them. So it's like, wait a minute, is this a human earthly context? Did we transport some human sons up into the divine, like throw nuggets? I think 100% of biblical scholars and theologians and pastors, ministry leaders are so comfortable with saying, in this instance, sons of God are angelic beings.
- [33:46]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Right, right.
- [33:47]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Not just there. You also have in chapter two, one day the Bene Elohim, the sons of God show up. And it's not just there. Later in Job, chapter 38, this is a really important one. Job 38, 6. This is God. Kind of like finally, after a whole bunch of silence, he's like, job, let me just ask you some questions. Right? Let me. Let's just. And there's a really great Old Testament scholar named Eric Ortland. Do you know Ray Orland?
- [34:13]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Of course.
- [34:13]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Oh, Ray's like, brilliant Old Testament scholar. I kind of am convinced that Ray's family is the equivalent to, like, NFL families that have, you know, you got Gavin, you got Day, you got Eric's old time. You know, so he wrote a really great book on the book of Job. And. And he points out the Hebrew language on this. And he says when God speaks, he speaks as a father with a rhetorical device in order to draw a child into conversation. Often we read kind of God's speech with Job and it feels a little angry, like he's just going, that's not really. There's some familial language that's like, hey son, come on over, let's talk about this. Let's process this. And this is that context of chapter 38. And God says in verse six, what supports its foundations? Or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the Bene Elohim and all the sons of God shouted for joy. This isn't the only place. It also shows up in Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9. I said the sons of God with the allotment language there when the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. The Dead Sea Scrolls affirm the Septuagint translation of that verse which says the angels of God. There's a little bit of textual discrepancy because of an emendation in the Masoretic text. The Hebrew Bible has what's referred to the Masoretic text. Right. The Septuagint is the Hebrew Bible translated into Greek. Right. The Septuagint is actually dated a little bit earlier than the Masoretic text, which is kind of fascinating, which lets us know. And the Dead Sea Scrolls are hundreds of years earlier than even the Septuagint. And so when the Dead Sea Scrolls came out and affirmed the sons of God, reading it was like, wait a minute, that's like the earliest attested evidence for that. All that to say, okay, we now have multiple places in scripture where we find sons of God as angelic beings. Right? So how should we read Genesis 6, sons of God? I mean, kind of what's clear, right? And then the defense to this is we'll know they're human rulers. It's called the Setite view, you know, and the Setite view is this thought that the righteous line of Seth, those righteous men, they have an unholy evil relationship with the daughters of Cain. And the daughters of Cain are the women that are beautiful. And so the, the righteous line of Seth are the sons of God.
- [36:43]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Wait, wait, wait. To me it sounds like somebody just made this up.
- [36:47]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
No, no, no, it's not made up.
- [36:49]
Podcast Host (Craig)
So I'm, it's legit. I'm saying where did the Sethite view come from?
- [36:53]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Well, that's a whole, that, yeah, that's, that's a whole, that's a whole conversation. The set eyed view, you can kind of trace its origin all the way back to a guy named Julius Africanus and Augustine. Okay. And it's, but I'm saying I'm not
- [37:05]
Podcast Host (Craig)
going to look into scriptures and be like, oh, look at Seth sleeping with Cain's daughters.
- [37:10]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
No, no, it's not explicit in the text. And that's one of the big exegetical issues that you have is where do you find sons of God synonymous with set sons? You don't. And you also have another issue. Where do you find the daughters of man being distinguished as the daughters of Cain? You don't find that. Right. And then you have another issue. How does it make any coherent sense that you have human to human relationship? And it's the human to human relationship that produces the Nephilim, the giants.
- [37:42]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Right.
- [37:42]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
It's like, wait, what? Like, how does that work?
- [37:45]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay, so let's just go down this rabbit hole of believing the sons of God are indeed angelic beings.
- [37:53]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yep.
- [37:54]
Podcast Host (Craig)
The daughters of man are human women. Angelic beings slept with human women.
- [38:00]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
- [38:01]
Podcast Host (Craig)
And made giants, and they made these
- [38:03]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
offspring called the Nephilim. Now, a couple things I can already anticipate, people are like, this dude is whack. This dude is wild. I cannot believe he's right. He's talking about speculating about snakes and. And like, astral projection into that we got over here. Okay, listen, this is not a new and novel idea. In fact, the earliest church tradition held an angelic view of Genesis 6. Philo, who is a contemporary of Jesus, a Jewish dude, he held to an angelic view. Right. Even some early church fathers, you have Irenaeus, Origen and Justin, like these dudes, Tertullian, these dudes held to an angelic view. You know, what ends up happening is Augustine and right before him, Julius Africanus. They hold to a human view because they're dealing with a heresy at the time. And Augustine was a Manichean and the Manichean kind of cult. They loved the book of Enoch and they loved kind of that whole thing. And so I actually think Augustine kind of had his own little personal kind of vendetta that he's trying to deal with, you know, and push away from. But in terms of church history, the earliest dating is an angelic view, right? Yeah. So now she's the. And you. You nailed it. Like, okay, what is going on with the nephew?
- [39:11]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Right.
- [39:11]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
And who are they? So I grew up in the church, Right. My grandparents are missionaries in India. They've been there for 65 years. Just faithfully servant, serving in India. Unique to have an Indian kid who was. All I've ever known is the story of Jesus, really. You know, and in all of that, like, grew up in the Chicagoland area and vacation Bible school is like the most epic thing. And there's this highlight reel of stories that vacation. But. Right. And I think the flood is One of them. No, on the flood. Right. For sure. Arguably a top three.
- [39:47]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Top three, for sure, for sure. Yeah.
- [39:49]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
How come nobody ever deals with Genesis 6:1 through 4 with the flood narrative
- [39:55]
Podcast Host (Craig)
in terms of the Nephilim being flooded, bro?
- [40:00]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
I mean, we love the flood because that's the.
- [40:03]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Now you've got to create many theologians who have to wrestle with the idea of half human, half angelic beings roaming the earth. And I mean, like, let me push fast forward really fast.
- [40:22]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
- [40:22]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Do you think they all were decimated in the flood, or are they still with us?
- [40:27]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Oh, man, you really messed me up. Okay. I think there's a little detail.
- [40:32]
Podcast Host (Craig)
You already told me your answer by that Paul's talking about. Told me that pause told me your answer. That pause told me. I got to go tuck my kids in tonight and tell them, be careful. There's Nephilim out here. That's what you just said.
- [40:43]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
No, no, no, Listen, here's what I think. I think the text in Genesis 6 or Genesis 6, 1, 4, it says that the Nephilim were on the. Were on the Earth in those days and in the days after. And you got to deal honestly with that, and you got to figure out what's going on with Joshua and the conquest. One of the things about Joshua and the conquest is he seems to be a part of. I'm not saying the entire conquest. I'm just saying a part of the conquest seems to be dealing with the leftover Nephilim that are referred to as giant clans. Right. This is why David fights Goliath. Goliath from Gath. What is Gath? A giant clan. Goliath has brothers that. Later. The David narrative tell us that he's got to deal with those Nephilim as well. Right. And so part of the issue is the issue of the flood. What happens with the flood? Blood, man, I know where you're going.
- [41:32]
Podcast Host (Craig)
I mean, just for everybody who doesn't know where he's going, Shaq is a Nephilim. That's what he's trying to say. And it's. It's why it's unfair for him to have been in the NBA because he's. Now, I'm just joking.
- [41:42]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
But honestly, if it's anybody, it's Wemby.
- [41:44]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Like Wimy's in that.
- [41:45]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
I mean, man, that man got handles.
- [41:48]
Podcast Host (Craig)
It's out of control.
- [41:48]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
He's shooting three pointers like it's a free throw.
- [41:50]
Podcast Host (Craig)
He's. It's out of control.
- [41:52]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
It's out of control.
- [41:53]
Podcast Host (Craig)
It's either. It's either Godly or demonic, I don't know which one.
- [41:56]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
We don't know which one. Or God is redeeming all things, and we're living in light of the cross. And so, you know what I'm saying?
- [42:01]
Podcast Host (Craig)
I like that, but. No, but go ahead.
- [42:03]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay, so here's. And. And this is a legitimate theological view. You can disagree with it. It doesn't deny the deity of Christ or the resurrection. But I think it's something that we ought to consider. Sure. What the flood possibly was not a global flood. It's a legit possibility that the flood, the Hebrew phrase kolaretz, the whole earth, is a phrase that's used elsewhere by the biblical authors to talk about the known world or the known land to the author at the time.
- [42:36]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Sure.
- [42:36]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right. So when it says the whole earth flooded, it could very well be that the whole earth is in the mind of the ancient writer and what they know of. And there's this cataclysmic, like, massive event that takes place, and it's a flood, it's a deluge. You've got science issues, you've got. Got miraculous issues with the global flood idea. And then you have a grammar issue because the colorect is actually used elsewhere. Right. And then you have the nephilim issue. So what I think happens with the flood is you have a globalized extreme event that changes the very nature of the biosphere of, like, the entire Earth. And with that, you can have pockets of places that were absolutely decimated by a flood, by a deluge, which also helps us make sense of how you can have the same story of the flood, some deluge, some kind of massive thing, along with the fragments of stories of these giants. In the Mesopotamian myth, it's the kalu, along with serpentine imagery in archaeological finds, iconography in archaeological dig. So it's like the question is, how do you find that in multiple places all over the world? Right. But there was no, like, FaceTime or Instagram or, like, any way to communicate,
- [43:51]
Podcast Host (Craig)
to say, to compare. That's exactly the reason why I tend to agree with that vantage point is because when you see even the writers of Genesis articulating. The landscape, the sky and the ocean below, they're functioning off their limited understanding of what our atmosphere and the Earth looks like.
- [44:21]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
100%. Their vantage point is Hebrew cosmology based off of what they can know and they can understand. And there's a sense that there's a theological term called accommodation, that God doesn't feel the need to correct their science.
- [44:34]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Right, right.
- [44:34]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
What he's trying to do is correct their theology. He's like, actually, what's more important than the science right now you'll get to the science. A couple hundred years, you'll figure that out. What really matters is don't be deceived by the gods of the nations. Right. And so the. The Genesis 6 and the Nephilim thing is really important because why are there only four verses in Genesis 6? Because the biblical author of the time doesn't feel the need to expand on a story that was already well known in the time period. Okay, so let's do a little bit. You do you cool with a little game? Like, little. Little teaser here?
- [45:06]
Podcast Host (Craig)
I like games.
- [45:07]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay. Okay, here we go. I wanna. I'm gonna make a statement to you, and this should be very easy for you, but I want you to interpret what I'm saying. Craig, who's the goat? MJ or LeBron?
- [45:17]
Podcast Host (Craig)
MJ.
- [45:18]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay, but when I say MJ, who am I referring to?
- [45:20]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Michael Jordan.
- [45:21]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
And how did you know I was talking about Michael Jordan, not Michael Jackson?
- [45:25]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Because you compared him to LeBron.
- [45:27]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right. And then when I say go, what do I mean?
- [45:29]
Podcast Host (Craig)
The greatest of all time.
- [45:30]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
But how do you know I meant greatest of all time? That's an acronym and not a furry animal?
- [45:34]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Because our cultural context gives us the understanding of what goat is.
- [45:38]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay, Now I want you to think about this. Think about this very clip that we had that statement right before it go. 500 years later, we're all confused. Okay? And what are people gonna have to do? They're gonna have to, like, go through the archives, find this. The stream of this thing called the Last Dance.
- [45:53]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
- [45:53]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
And they got to figure out, wait, is it an actual dance or not? It's not. What is this? Right. And they're gonna have to, what does it go up?
- [46:00]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Why is he. Is it an animal? Or what is it?
- [46:02]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah, 100%. So the reason for that is to say we actually do this right now. So. Well, because we're embedded into that story. The biblical authors are human. They're being inspired by the divine author. And the biblical authors themselves don't feel a need to be able to unpack an entire narrative that was already well known to the people of the time.
- [46:24]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Hold on. If I had an applause button, I'd hit that right now. You know that was fire, right? You know that was fire, but go ahead. I digress.
- [46:31]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
So what is that story? The story is the Mesopotamian story of the Apollo and the Flood narrative. And. And so Genesis 3. 6 and Genesis 11 in my view. And it's not really just my view. This is what many Semitic scholars, Hebrew scholars, Second Temple literature scholars. Mike was kind of famous for saying that he never had a new or novel idea. And I'm just like, Mike, I'm like, man, nothing that I'm saying is new. Nothing is like. Because honestly, new theology is often just heresy. And when trying to be heretics out here, you can disagree on secondary issues, but we want to find things that are rooted in cultural tradition, historic tradition, and in reception, history, how the story has been received throughout kind of time and space. And so these are ideas that are well known. The Book of Enoch. Now this is where things are going to get wild. The Book of Enoch is actually three different books. The first section of it, the Book of the Watchers, I think it's like chapters one through 36 is that section is the most historically reliable. The second two are kind of whack and wild and they're way later dated.
- [47:36]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Now why is it historically reliable?
- [47:38]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay, so the reason why it's more historically reliable is because of the writing and the correlation of the data points that the writing gives with other events that are taking place at that exact time period and how it's referring to those ideas earlier on. Another very big reason that I would argue that Enoch, particularly the Watchers, is more reliable is because how the New Testament itself interacts with Enoch. Right? So Jude, I think it's like 5 and 6 and second Peter actually quote the Book of Enoch.
- [48:11]
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- [50:14]
Podcast Host (Craig)
So why is it not canonized?
- [50:16]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
This is a great question. It's actually debated in, in the, in the first century church. There are some church fathers who wanted to canonize it, others who didn't want to canonize it, and in the place of larger disagreement, they opted not to canonize it. I actually agree, I actually agree with the idea of it not being canonized because there's too many issues, speculation, authorial questions. It's, it's pseudo pigraphical, which means it's just a fancy way of saying that it's a writing that is falsely attributed to like the wrong person, basically. And so you just have some questions and issues. But just because it's not canon doesn't mean it's not helpful. Okay? It's not valuable. Right? We just want to rightly read it. And so I actually had somebody, I was on with Sean McDowell on his podcast recently, and I had somebody who kind of commented, was like, hey, how does this make any sense? Why would we use the Book of Enoch, which is arguably written like late 2nd century, early 3rd century, as historical background information for Genesis 6, which is written like well before that. I mean, we're talking pre exilic period, right?
- [51:23]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [51:24]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Like how can we say that Enoch helps us translate? Here's how you can. There's a third story, and Genesis 6 is aware of this third story, and the Book of Enoch is aware of this third story. And Enoch, particularly the Book of The Watchers is actually using the exact same language as hyperlinks to this third story. This third story is the Mesopotamian myth. And this Mesopotamian myth is a contemporary of the Genesis 6 story. So basically, what the Book of Enoch is doing, I think it's doing a couple things for us. One, it is retrieving for us the perspective that was present in Genesis 6. Then it's transmitting that. Actually, the second thing is preserving it. So it's retrieving that story. It's preserving it so it doesn't get lost. Right now what it's doing is it's transmitting that story back to us so that we can be aware of it and the Book of Enoch, why it's so important, Craig, and this is all spiritual warfare stuff, which is so important, is the Book of Enoch kind of gives this background of the sin of the Watchers, which, by the way, the Hebrew word for watchers is actually Aramaic word that shows up in Daniel. Where is it in Daniel, chapter 10, where. No, it's earlier. Anyways, like Daniel 4, where the word watcher is used and it's referring to a holy one coming down from heaven. So you have the term watcher in the Book of Daniel. Not only do you have the term watch in the Book of Daniel, but then you have the Book of Enoch, which is actually referring to the sons of God as a synonymous term, which is these Watchers. What do the watchers do? So wild. The watchers do an unholy exchange. They exchange secret knowledge that they had in exchange for the human daughters. So in my book, in the unseen battle, when I get to this rebellion, the second rebellion, Genesis 6, I make an argument, and my view, my belief is that human sex trafficking has an origin story, and its origin story is Genesis, chapter six.
- [53:27]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay. You. There's a lot of falls, a lot of like. Like, I don't know, like crazy moments in the story of Genesis alone. Right, right. And. Well, one, I. Because you're talking about ancient spiritual warfare, I do want to dive into that.
- [53:47]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
- [53:47]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Right. I don't. I want to put a pen in there for a second, but I got it. I got it because I still. I don't feel like the question got answered.
- [53:56]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay.
- [53:56]
Podcast Host (Craig)
So I just. I need some little bit of clarity.
- [53:59]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah.
- [53:59]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah. Are Nephilim demons?
- [54:02]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Oh, yeah.
- [54:02]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Or are they just half human, half angels?
- [54:08]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah. Okay. You're right. I didn't answer the question because I got off on my own rabbit trails. Okay.
- [54:11]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Are Nephilim demons or half human, half angels?
- [54:14]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Nephilim. The actual term is a term to describe the disembodied spirits of half angelic and half human beings. So the. The term Nephilim itself is translated in the Septuagint as gigas, which is giants. And because they are this unholy mixture, they are part spiritual being, but they're part human. And now their spiritual reality, after their body dies, it has nowhere to go. So the spirit is disembodied because it takes after its, you know, angelic kind of patronage. And in light of that, it's stranded on the earth. Now, this is well understood in Second Temple literature. There's a guy named Archie Wright who wrote an entire dissertation that became a book on this concept. And it's the origin of evil spirits in Second Temple literature. So when you're reading through Second Temple literature, the Book of Jubilees, the Book of Enoch, elsewhere, it tells us that, that these Nephilim become these warrior kings, but they're also savage. Like, they tear apart things, they're cannibals, they drink blood, which, by the way, is where we get the stories of vampires. That's a whole different side note. Like, all of these things are all present, but when they are killed, when they're taken care of, OG of Bashan in the Bible is considered a nephilim. Nimrod is. Is very likely of a Nephilim descendant. Goliath comes from the clan of the Nephilim. And so there are these terms in the Hebrew Bible. Nephilim, Anakim and Rephaim. And these three terms are all terms that are related to these beings, these unholy mixtures, half angelic and half human. And they create chaos. Now, if you have something that is half angelic and half human, what are they? They're unclean. That's why this is where things get really interesting in the New Testament, particularly in the Gospels. What the New Testament calls demon daimonion, in the Gospels particularly, it's actually not referring to the same beings of the sons of God. It's referring to the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim. So think about Legion. Think about Luke, chapter 4. Jesus comes and does a demon exorcism. And so interesting that the spiritual being, it freaks out when it sees Jesus and says, who? Like, what are you doing here? Right. We know we. And uses the plural tense. We know who you are. You're the Holy One of Israel. You know, has the time come? Like, they're terrified because they've been waiting for the time when the Mashiach, the anointed One would come. And then what does Jesus say? Jesus says later on in Luke, he says, if by the hand of God I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. So you literally have as a sign and a seal of the in breaking kingdom of God. We find demon exorcism in the Gospels. The whole idea of the Nephilim is that the Nephilim are these houses half breed spiritual beings, half spiritual, half human. And as a result, after they die, their spirits are aimless, they're wandering, they're trying to make sense of. And this is why they want to embody, this is why they want to possess. They have a feeling and they remember what it was like to be embodied. Right? This is also why I think they go chaotic and they go kind of mad because they're just trapped aimlessly.
- [57:54]
Podcast Host (Craig)
So what about the, the. The sons of God who actually slept with these women? Where does their spirit.
- [58:02]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
This is good. So the sons of God of Genesis 6, that is one rebellion, okay? The sons of God of Genesis 11, read in light of Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9, that is a different rebellion, okay? In Genesis 6, the sons of God that go into this unholy alliance, Second Peter tells us that they're actually trapped right now and they're imprisoned in Hades in the depths of Sheol.
- [58:28]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Right?
- [58:29]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Which is. I mean, I don't know if we have the time for all this stuff. But like, you know, when Jesus descends in Ephesians, in. I think it's Ephesians 4, it says that Jesus descended. What could it mean? That the one who descended, but that he had ascended as well. So the one who ascended had to descend. And he. And he went and he proclaimed the gospel to the spirits and he carried the captives free. What does that mean? Okay, The Greek word for proclaim, if I'm remembering correctly, it's Caruso. It has in mind the announcement of victory. Okay, so who are these spirits? These spirits in second Peter are. Refer to the same spirits of Genesis 6 who are trapped in Tartarus because of their rebellion. They're trapped in chains. So what does Jesus do? He comes down and he's like, gotcha. He's literally proclaiming his victory over sin and death and death has held captive the righteous out of the Old Testament. This is why Joseph, right before, like he dies, he looks at his, at his siblings. His brother's like, y', all, don't. Don't screw me over this time. Like, don't mess me up. Take my body with you. Don't Leave me in Egypt, bury me in the land of my fathers. And this is why David cries out. This is quoted in Acts, chapter two. Lord, don't leave your anointed one.
- [59:49]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
- [59:49]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
In the depths of Sheol. Right. Like. Like, I know that you're gonna come and rescue me.
- [59:54]
Podcast Host (Craig)
So. So the sons of God are trapped in hades. The.
- [59:58]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Genesis 6 sons of God.
- [60:00]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Genesis 6 sons of God. But I guess I'm just. I'm just trying to make a delineation. There's a actual hell that the disembodied spirits will be cast into forever.
- [60:11]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah. So now you're gonna. Now, now you're gonna get me.
- [60:13]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Is there a place that they go? Event. Are they destroyed, Are they annihilated? Or they.
- [60:17]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
What happens to them? We'll do. We'll do brief cosmology, right? Our. Our words matter. So in the same way that when we say God, people freak out when it's like. Which I think is the. The video that I reacted to. Right. Like, I think it was like, they're not gods, they're demons. And I'm like, well, read Deuteronomy 32:17. Let's read it. Let's look at Deuteronomy 32:17.
- [60:34]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Go. That's the verse I wanted to get to.
- [60:36]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay. Deuteronomy 32, 32:7.
- [60:38]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Go. 8 and 9 as well. Okay, 8 and 9.
- [60:41]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Okay. Okay, let's go 8 and 9. So Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9. And then I want to get back, back to this whole cosmology, cosmology. So in Deuteronomy 32:89, it says this. When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance and divided the human race, he set the boundaries of his peoples. When were the human race first divided? When were their bound? Tower of Babel.
- [61:03]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Tower of Babel.
- [61:04]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Genesis 11.
- [61:04]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yes.
- [61:05]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
By the way, when does the Jew Gentile distinction take place? The Tower of Babel. Why? Because of Jerome 32:89, it says this according to the numbers of the sons of God. So I kind of talked about this earlier. When the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, it affirmed the sons of God. Re reading, there's a New Testament scholar, G.B. caird, who, prior to the Dead Sea Scrolls, he was reading the Septuagint and he's like, yo, something is odd here. L. The Septuagint says, according to the angels of God, but the Masoretic text says sons of Israel. How. How does that work? And he hypothesized all the way back then, before the Dead Sea Scrolls that the Masoretic text was amended and it was probably a later scribe who out of a good desire wanted to preserve monotheism and was kind of worried about this whole sons of God thing and so amended it to sons of Israel. But then when you find the Dead Sea Scrolls and a lot of the Septuagints like nah, Sons of God is the right reading. Right? So right there I like to think of Deuteronomy 38 and 9. I was. I'm a marvel. I'm a nerd all the way through. I love Marvel. I remember the first time I watched Iron Man. I can't remember if it was one or two. And we were introduced to the whole concept of the end credits scene. Right? And I remember that theater lost its ever living mind when they found Thor's hammer. My goodness, people were losing it. Right. Well, I like to think of Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9 like the end credits scene of a Marvel movie. So you have the Tower of Babel situation that takes place and at the end of the Tower of Babel situation you have this post credit scene. And it's a glimpse into the heavenly realm. And it's Yahweh who says, hey, by the way, there's consequence for your rebell rebellion. So the nations are disinherited. However, I'm going to pick one family to be my family and they will be an inheritance until I reinherit the nations. Right. This is important. This is why Hakeem Levia. This is why Genesis 12 absolutely needs to be included in those first chapters. Because Genesis 12 is the story of Abram. Where does Abram come out of? Of Ur of the Chaldeans. Where is Ur of the Chaldeans located? Wild roughly the vicinity of Babel. So out of the epicenter of rebellion, God takes one family, pulls them out of their pagan theology and ideology and says, by the way, if you have faith in me and trust me, not only will I make your name great, which is directly connected to Genesis 11 because the people wanted to make their own name great with the, the building of the Ziggurat temple tower. God says to them, I will make you a blessing to the nations. Yeah, all the nations will be blessed through you.
- [63:44]
Podcast Host (Craig)
What if, if I'm. If I'm sitting here listening to you, I can take this as just a theological overview, but what does this mean for me as somebody who's stumbling upon this reality that God has taken this person who, who was coming from Babel essentially pagan, did not have a perspective like what Are the implications of that if I'm exegete that to today's time?
- [64:15]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Well, let's be very real. We're living in the mo. I hate to say most divided, but we're living in such a stinking divided time. Christians are divided against each other, believers and non believers. I mean, political ideology, I mean, you've got all kinds of issues where even we're taking man, I gotta be careful. But like we're taking biblical virtues like humility and empathy and compassion and grace, and we're weaponizing these things in ways that are not even boundaried, by the way that the, the gospel, the biblical text actually frames these things. And the question is why? And I would just argue it's because it's the presence of dark powers that want to keep humanity divided. Every battle battle has a prize in mind. So what is the. The prize for this cosmic unseen battle that you and I are in? The prize has always been, is and will always be about the people made in the image and likeness of God. The, the Abrahamic Covenant of Genesis 12, 15, 17 and 27 and 22 is so important because it reminds us that God is a good father who is determined to have his family back together. Together. And the dark powers have created a counterfeit household. Ephesians 1, the prince of the power of the air. He's the, the ruler who's at work in our world right now. And the children of this ruler are referred to as the sons of disobedience. You have a contrast between the sons of disobedience versus the sons of God. Right. And so I think that like, that's the very practical thing. This is Ephesians 2, the dividing wall of hostility y has been torn down.
- [65:51]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Good.
- [65:51]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
So that those who were far out, those who were once sojourners and strangers. Well, when did that happen? Genesis 11. Those who were once far off would be brought near. And, and this is really important, that they would form. The Greek phrase here is Oas. They would form the household of God. And, and, and in that the temple would grow the Greek tensing there. There. It has in mind a temple that is in the process of being built. It's not a completed temple, which means today, when the nations of the world come into a right relationship to God. Colossians 1:13. They've been transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of light. That this is another brick being built onto the temple. And it's made not of brick and mortar like the Tower of Babel. Right, Right. And it's not to manipulate God to come down, which is what the people are doing with the Ziggurat temple tower. Now the spirit of God willingly comes down. And not only willingly comes down, but indwells the people of God who are the temple of God. And this is Second Corinthians chapter five. That Christ might make his appeal in and through us because we're ambassadors of Christ. And so it's like yeah man, we're talking about Nephilim, we're talking about giants. And we can get back there because there's that whole Deuteronomy 32:17 with the, the Elohim and we got to do that. But like it would be a massive miss in my view to talk about all of that and miss the fact that all these dark powers, they hate us. And they are so well aware that there is no way they will ever defeat the uncreated creator. So you want to know how you can mess up one who can never be defeated? Here's how you. It's like for me, I. My, my heart hurts. It like literally physically is in pain when my kids aren't at home.
- [67:43]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
- [67:43]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Right. Like they're in basketball practice and lacrosse and. Dude. And there's something so beautiful when everybody gets back. Even if it's like just 30 minutes at night.
- [67:50]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
- [67:50]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
And everybody's at home and we're just like chopping it up and figuring out the day. It's like the house is back together.
- [67:55]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Yeah.
- [67:56]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Like all is as it should be. Can you imagine what these dark powers want to do? They want to grieve the heart of God by separating.
- [68:04]
Podcast Host (Craig)
That's good, man. Man. So I want to, I want to ask some specific questions about demons and their power and what they do. But I want to, I want to, I want to stop here. We're going to do a part two cuz. Because I, I just. There's so much. So as we, as we stop there, we're going to keep going. So there'll be a part two to this because we're going to stop here. Put a pin in it. We're going to get to Deuteronomy 32:17 on the next, on the next part. Part. But I just have a couple questions before we walk away because. Because the next part two we're going to get into demons and, and their, their real impact in this world and just the, the spiritual cosmology of, of things. But I, I guess you, you. No, I'm not asking that question because we're going to ask it on the next One my biggest. Why, why, why is MJ the goat?
- [69:06]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
It's, it's. It's the easiest question for me to answer.
- [69:10]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay.
- [69:11]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
All the questions that we asked today.
- [69:12]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Okay, okay.
- [69:13]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Because MJ won three championships in a row.
- [69:16]
Podcast Host (Craig)
In a row.
- [69:16]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Took a break to play baseball. Baseball was horrible, y'. All. You ever watch him play baseball?
- [69:21]
Podcast Host (Craig)
I have.
- [69:21]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Like, it was bad, bro. Like, I. I grew up in Chicago, right? Takes two, two years off, comes back, repeats the three pieces, right? He not only wins all offensive MVPs, he also gets a defensive all player MVP in there as well. Which, by the way, never switches teams, stays consistent to the one team. The Wizards thing is a whole different situation. We got to use that. Wizards is like, it's kind of like the book of Enoch, right? It's just not canon.
- [69:48]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Speculative.
- [69:49]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
It's a little bit speculative. Not only that, but when you take a look at his dominance, I think this is the thing that's really never really talked about is Jordan. Single handedly, if you can imagine that Jordan ran through a shack in Orlando and a penny before he got hurt. I mean, not only that, but you think Karl Malone, you think John Stockton, you think Hakeem Elijah went. You think, I mean, we could go through the greats, those Charles Barkley, these dudes, if they played in any other era, they're at least getting one.
- [70:25]
Podcast Host (Craig)
One.
- [70:26]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
Yeah, they're at least getting one.
- [70:27]
Podcast Host (Craig)
That's true.
- [70:28]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
So you have the greatness of an individual that so overshadows every other player of the time that it actually diminishes their own notoriety in such a way. And so I just think it's like, it's. It's on. And also, like, I mean, come on, you. It's like true stories don't need to be defended, right? Like Jordan. Jordan never have to walk around being like, I'm the greatest of all time. Right? But I know somebody else who's always trying to.
- [70:52]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Oh, hello. All right.
- [70:55]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
No, but I love. Hey, but hey, listen, I'm a big LeBron fan. Like, I think LeBron's great. I think that he's the second greatest basketball player of all time. Because I think Kobe is just 1B to Jordan's 1A. Like a real replica of. Of Jordan.
- [71:07]
Podcast Host (Craig)
Interesting take.
- [71:08]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
And I think that, you know, LeBron is a family guy and you know, what he's done for his kids is like, come on, are we being serious right now? Like, we should not diminish that. But the greatest of all time on the basketball court. Yeah, y' all gotta miss me. With that. Stop.
- [71:22]
Podcast Host (Craig)
So we're gonna get. We're gonna. We're gonna pick up and we're going to talk about not just basketball, but we're going to talk about demons and what they are and how they impact us and why they would make us believe Jordan is not the goat. See y' all on the next episode of the Deep End. The Bleacher Report app is your destination for sports right now. The NBA's heating up, March Madness is here, and MLB is almost back. Every day there's a new headline, a
- [71:51]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
new highlight, a new moment you've got
- [71:53]
Podcast Host (Craig)
to see for yourself.
- [71:54]
Dr. Joel Mutamali
That's why I stay locked in with
- [71:56]
Podcast Host (Craig)
the Bleacher report app. For me, it's about staying connected to my sports. I can follow the teams I care about. Get real time. Scores, breaking news and highlights all in one place. Download the Bleacher report app today so you never miss a moment.