1Yahweh appeared to him by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day. 2He lifted up his eyes and looked, and saw that three men stood near him. When he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself to the earth, 3and said, “My lord, if now I have found favor in your sight, please don’t go away from your servant. 4Now let a little water be fetched, wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. 5I will get a piece of bread so you can refresh your heart. After that you may go your way, now that you have come to your servant.”
They said, “Very well, do as you have said.”
6Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah, and said, “Quickly prepare three seahs of fine meal, knead it, and make cakes.” 7Abraham ran to the herd, and fetched a tender and good calf, and gave it to the servant. He hurried to dress it. 8He took butter, milk, and the calf which he had dressed, and set it before them. He stood by them under the tree, and they ate.
9They asked him, “Where is Sarah, your wife?”
He said, “There, in the tent.”
10He said, “I will certainly return to you at about this time next year; and behold, Sarah your wife will have a son.”
Sarah heard in the tent door, which was behind him. 11Now Abraham and Sarah were old, well advanced in age. Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. 12Sarah laughed within herself, saying, “After I have grown old will I have pleasure, my lord being old also?”
13Yahweh said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh, saying, ‘Will I really bear a child when I am old?’ 14Is anything too hard for Yahweh? At the set time I will return to you, when the season comes around, and Sarah will have a son.”
15Then Sarah denied it, saying, “I didn’t laugh,” for she was afraid.
He said, “No, but you did laugh.”
16The men rose up from there, and looked toward Sodom. Abraham went with them to see them on their way. 17Yahweh said, “Will I hide from Abraham what I do, 18since Abraham will surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed in him? 19For I have known him, to the end that he may command his children and his household after him, that they may keep the way of Yahweh, to do righteousness and justice; to the end that Yahweh may bring on Abraham that which he has spoken of him.” 20Yahweh said, “Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grievous, 21I will go down now, and see whether their deeds are as bad as the reports which have come to me. If not, I will know.”
22The men turned from there, and went toward Sodom, but Abraham stood yet before Yahweh. 23Abraham came near, and said, “Will you consume the righteous with the wicked? 24What if there are fifty righteous within the city? Will you consume and not spare the place for the fifty righteous who are in it? 25May it be far from you to do things like that, to kill the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous should be like the wicked. May that be far from you. Shouldn’t the Judge of all the earth do right?”
26Yahweh said, “If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare the whole place for their sake.” 27Abraham answered, “See now, I have taken it on myself to speak to the Lord, although I am dust and ashes. 28What if there will lack five of the fifty righteous? Will you destroy all the city for lack of five?”
He said, “I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.”
29He spoke to him yet again, and said, “What if there are forty found there?”
He said, “I will not do it for the forty’s sake.”
30He said, “Oh don’t let the Lord be angry, and I will speak. What if there are thirty found there?”
He said, “I will not do it if I find thirty there.”
31He said, “See now, I have taken it on myself to speak to the Lord. What if there are twenty found there?”
He said, “I will not destroy it for the twenty’s sake.”
32He said, “Oh don’t let the Lord be angry, and I will speak just once more. What if ten are found there?”
He said, “I will not destroy it for the ten’s sake.”
33Yahweh went his way as soon as he had finished communing with Abraham, and Abraham returned to his place.
"The oldest, and likely the most widely held, interpretation is that the “sons of God” are fallen angels (demons). This was the interpretation most favored in ancient Judaism and the early church (cf. 1 Pet. 3:19, 20; 2 Pet. 2:4; Jude 6). The phrase “sons of God” is clearly used elsewhere of angelic hosts in God’s heavenly court (cf. Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7). Moreover, the narrator seems to contrast “man” and “the daughters of man” with the “sons of God” in Genesis 6:1, 2."
"This position is not without difficulties, however, the most substantial of which is the idea of fallen angels having physical relations with women. Scripture gives instances of angels engaging in human activities such as eating (Gen. 18:1, 2, 8; 19:1, 5), but surely sexual intercourse is a step beyond! Jesus makes a similar point in Matthew 22:30: “For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.” William F. Cook, Who Are the Sons of God in Genesis 6? Some of these church fathers were Justin Martyr, Eusebius, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Commodianus. Douglas et al. 2011, p. 1384
Most early church fathers in the first three centuries believed that the sons of God were angels who had unnatural sex with women and bore children. This perspective changed with St. Augustine of Hippo, who argued in the City of God that the sons of God were descendants of Seth.
The argument that Jesus taught that angels in heaven did not marry has no impact on the Genesis 6 passage since the angels in Gen 6, as accepted by Jude and Peter, were not unfallen angels in heaven but evil angels who were part of the fallen angels, or unfallen angels involved in human activity before the flood, who also fell. The ability to have sex and bear children appears to be a major argument against the "angel" view, but one must remember that angels in Gen 18 came in human form, along with Yahweh, ate food and drank, and had their feet washed. Moreover, in the New Testament, angels always appear in a male human form." See my article, Will We Eat and Drink in the Coming Kingdom of God? An Interpretation with Origen, Cerinthus, the Church Fathers, and the Literal Interpretation of the Scriptures on the Nature of the Millennial Kingdom.
6. And the angels who kept not their first estate but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness the judgment of the great day.
The strongest text that associates the sons of God in Genesis 6:1-4 is the Book of Enoch (6:11), referenced by the writer Jude in 1:6: "When the son of men had multiplied, in those days, beautiful and comely daughters were born to them. 2/ And the watchers, the sons of heaven, saw them and desired them. And they said to one another, "Come, let us choose for ourselves wives from the daughters of men, and let us beget children for ourselves."[1]
The ancients had many traditions of deities cast out from heaven. See notes on Genesis xi. 8. Jove, deceived by the goddess Ate, is represented by Homer as having cast her forth, forbidding her return to Olympus with an oath.
"From his ambrosial head, where perch'd she sat,
He snatched the fiery goddess of debate,
The dread, the irrevocable oath he swore,
The immortal seats should ne'er behold her more;
And whirl'd her headlong down, for ever driven
From bright Olympus and the starry heaven." Il 1. xix. v. 126
Jove declares that any deity who interferes in the strife between the Greeks and
Trojans—
"Far, oh far, from steep Olympus thrown,
Low in the dark Tartarean gulph shall groan,
With burning chains fixed to the brazen floors,
And lock'd by Hell's inexorable doors.''-Hom. ll, 1. xix v. v.3.
" With enduring chains
He bound Prometheus, train'd in shifting wiles,
With galling shackles fixing him aloft."-Hes. Theog. v. 521.
[1] George W. E. Nickelsburg and James C. VanderKam, 1 Enoch: A New Translation (Minneapolis: Fortress Press), p. 23.