"My Spirit shall not be despised by men forever..." Obviously, there is a continuation of the previous narration: the fact itself was indicated there, and the corresponding assessment is given here; and if here the characters are clearly called men, then they (and not angels) were understood above. In particular, the words of the biblical text: "To My Spirit" contain an indication either of the inner, spiritual essence of human nature (with a blank reference to the history of the creation of man, II:6), or, what is even more likely, of the Holy Spirit, as the founding principle of all life in general (Genesis I:2) and of the religious-ethical life par excellence. Disdain for Him is precisely that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which, according to the Saviour, constitutes one of the most serious deadly sins (Mark III:29 [391]), since it characterizes such a degree of sinful hardening of a person that no correction becomes psychologically possible.

"For they are flesh..." This is the reason why people have neglected the divine Spirit and deserved punishment. The first word of this phrase is more accurately translated by Metropolitan Philaret: "in his error" – evidently, the biblical author was again pointing to the impious relationship between the Sethites and the Cainites. Since, by entering into such marriages, people bore witness to the decline of their higher, spiritual interests and to the dominance of lower, carnal ones, they themselves seemed to be transformed into that coarse flesh which, in the language of Holy Scripture, serves as a synonym for everything base, material, and sinful.

"Let their days be a hundred and twenty years..." These words cannot be understood in the sense of reducing human life to the limits of one hundred and twenty years (as understood by Josephus, Antiquities I, 3, 2), since it is reliably known that for a long time after the flood mankind lived more than 120 years, sometimes reaching up to 500, and in them we should see the period appointed by God for the repentance and correction of people, during which the righteous Noah prophesied about the flood and made appropriate preparations for it (1 Peter III:20 [392]).

4. At that time there were giants on the earth, especially from the time when the sons of God began to come to the daughters of men, and they began to bear children to them: they are strong, glorious men of old.

"At that time there were giants on the earth..." Pre-Flood mankind is called "Nephilim", in the true nephilim – "Nephilim". Though it is true that the term is sometimes used in Scripture to refer to giants or giants (Num. XIII:33-34), the basic meaning of the root is "to destroy, to overthrow," and in the form of niph it is "to cause to fall, to seduce, to corrupt." Therefore, in these primitive "Nephilim" one can see people who were not only distinguished by extraordinary physical strength and stature, but also persons who deliberately trampled on the truth and oppressed the weak. There had been such personalities among the Cainites before, probably since the time of Tubal-Cain, who invented weapons, and Lamech, who sang a victory hymn to him; From the time of the mixing of the Setites with the Cainites, these "Nephilim" especially multiplied as a result of the general corruption and the fall of all moral foundations.

"They were strong, illustrious people from ancient times..." Here we are talking about the fruits of mixed marriages, which, in contrast to "nephilim", are called "gibborim" (strong ones) in the Hebrew text. The latter name in biblical usage means an outstanding person (2 Kings XVII:10 [393]; Dan XI:3 [394]), a picked warrior, a man who surpasses others in strength (1 Kings XI:28 [395]). From this it is obvious that the descendants of mixed clans (Sethites and Cainites) surpassed their prototypes, both in physical and immoral qualities. Calling these "gibborim" from ancient times "glorious people", the writer of Genesis probably had in mind the fact that they, under the name of "heroes of antiquity", became world famous in the universal traditions of mankind (Var III:26-28 [396]).

5. And the Lord (God) saw that the wickedness of men was great on the earth, and that all the thoughts and thoughts of their hearts were evil all the time;

"All the thoughts and thoughts of their heart were evil at all times..." The root of the deep corruption of antediluvian mankind is indicated in the damage to the heart, and since the latter, according to the biblical view, is considered the central focus of all conscious human activity, its corruption is tantamount to the contamination of the very source of life (Matthew XV:19 [397]).

6. and the Lord repented that he had created man on earth, and grieved in his heart.

"And the Lord repented... and grieved in his heart..." The concept of the attribute of repentance attributed to God may be borrowed from the account of Saul, where repentance is ascribed twice to God (1 Samuel XV:11 [398] and 35 [399]), and where, meanwhile, Samuel says of God that He is not a man that He should repent (29 [400]). From this it is evident that when it is spoken of Him as a man, it is because, according to the expression of Aben Ezra, the law speaks in the language of the sons of men, i.e., in the language of the simple, popular sense (Philaret). In particular, God's "repentance" — as it were a special way of changing the unchangeable — is the highest expression of the thought of extreme divine regret, which seemed to reach the point that the unchangeable Being himself seemed ready to change.

"And he grieved in his heart..." Like the previous one, this is the same human-like expression. "The sorrow of God is the foresight of the impossibility of man, created with free will, consciously and persistently abusing it, to return to the good path; therefore, where it speaks of the sorrow of God, as, for example, of the cities that have incurred the wrath of God (Matthew XI:20-26 [401]; Luke X:13 [402]), it must be understood that the judgment of God's eternal righteousness has been fulfilled, that this generation, or man, must perish, so that evil may not be perpetuated" (Vlastov).

7. And the Lord said, "I will destroy from off the face of the earth the men whom I have created, from man to beast, and I will destroy the creeping things and the fowls of the air, for I have repented that I have created them."

"And the Lord said, I will destroy... for I have repented that I have created..." A stronger expression of the same idea is given here, of the profound discrepancy between the actions of human freedom and the plans of divine providence and the desires of the Almighty to destroy this disharmony.

At the same time, the sad fate of man, according to the verdict of the divine court, had to be shared by the entire world of living beings surrounding him, since between the fate of man and the life of nature, according to the teaching of the Scriptures, there is the closest, moral connection; hence the fall and rise of man is correspondingly reflected in the rest of creation. And this was not, strictly speaking, the destruction of mankind (since the righteous Noah and his family were saved and revived him), but only the eradication of the evil that reigned on earth by washing in the waters of the Flood (1 Ezra III:8-9 [403]; 1 Peter III:20-21 [392]).