GIANTS in the BIBLE. — Gen. 6:4 recalls the antediluvian nēphilim, perhaps distinct from the “heroes” born of Sethites and Cainites. In Bar. 3:26–28; Eccli. 16:7; Sap. 14:6 (γίγαντες), their proud violence and wicked earthly cunning are described. This is what the Hebrew nēphilim expresses, from nāphal, in the sense of “to fall upon someone,” to attack with force (cf. Aquila ἐπιπέτοντες, Symmachus βιαῖοι).
The Greek version (Septuagint) has γίγαντες, which signifies precisely “strong, powerful, violent” (Aeschylus, Agam., 692). The ancient cosmogonies placed at the dawn of humanity a race of g., of extraordinary stature and strength, builders of cities, inventors of weapons, born from celestial beings united with mortals. Their memory remained in the popular imagination. Thus the explorers, in their exaggerated and defeatist report, would speak of the nēphilim seen in Canaan (Num. 13:33), in comparison with whom they were like locusts (cf. the irony of Deut. 9:2 regarding this report).
Jewish tradition considers the following to be a race of “g.”: 1) the Anakim (Num. 13:13, 28; Deut. 1:28; 2:10 ff., 21; 9:25), who inhabited the mountains of Judah, Hebron, Dabir, and Anab, defeated and destroyed by Joshua and consequently reduced to Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod (Ios. 11:21 f.). Perhaps Goliath was one of their descendants (I Sam. 17:4; cf. II Sam. 21:15–22). The term ἀπάξ = “man with a long neck” (Moore) became the name of their stock (Fernandez). 2) The Rephaim, who lived chiefly in Transjordan; the Emim of Moab, and the Zuzim and Zamzummim of Ammon (Deut. 2:10 f., 20 f.). They were handsome and ferocious men, taller than the Hebrews. In Deut. 3:11, the grandeur of the basalt sarcophagus (approximately 4.50 x 2 m.) of Og, king of Bashan, not of his “iron bed” (Vulgate), says nothing about Og’s actual stature. Modern scholars agree in attributing largely to popular imagination these biblical references to the “g.” who inhabited Canaan. Certainly the megalithic monuments—dolmens, cromlechs, etc.—attest the existence of a race endowed with extraordinary strength; these were the tribes of the Neolithic age encountered in Canaan by the Semitic invasions, whose remnants the Hebrews defeated and destroyed.