Between the fall and the flood, there are three passages that reveal to us the actual anticipation of the fulfillment of the promise of Genesis 3:15 regarding the coming of the seed of the woman that would save them from their sin and be victorious over the serpent. First, it’s in Eve’s exclamation at the birth of her first son. Most translations say something like, “I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord.” But most of that phrase is added by translators. As Arnold Fruchtenbaum points out, the literal rendering of the Hebrew phrase should be “I have gotten a man: Jehovah” (Genesis 4:1). She was expecting Cain to be their deliverer. Imagine her disappointment in her son!
In Genesis 5:21, the Righteous Enoch (the one who walked with God) named his son Methuselah. The name has been understood to mean that when he dies, “it” will refer to the flood. But it appears that a few generations later, Lamech, the father of Noah, misunderstood the prophecy to refer to his son Noah. Fruchtenbaum argues, “Lamech hopes that Noah, meaning ‘comfort,’ will be the longed-for Messiah. From the ages and years given in Genesis 5, Lamech was 56 years old when Adam died. Lamech would therefore have been given a clear firsthand account of all that happened in the Garden of Eden and all the words that God had spoken.” Lamech’s words at Noah’s birth make this clear: “(Lamech) called his name Noah, saying, ‘Out of the ground that the LORD has cursed, this one shall bring us relief from our work and the painful toil of our hands” (Genesis 5:29). He expected Noah to be the great deliverer. Like Eve. He was wrong.
In Genesis 6:1-4, we read about “sons of God” cohabitating with women and producing the Nephilim creatures. I believe they are fallen, angels. Peter and Jesus’ brother Jude both refer to them during the time of Noah as angels who left their domains. The prophecy talks to us of the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent, Satan. Let me rest on the comments of Arnold Fruchtenbaum (a Messianic Jew). Arnold writes, “In order to try to corrupt the Seed of the Woman, at Satan’s command, fallen evil angels, ‘the sons of God,’ intermarry with human women, foreshadowing the supernatural conception of the Antichrist… The results of these marriages were grotesque creatures—the Nephilim. It was the appearance of these diabolic creatures which brought the judgment of the flood upon the earth. By means of this flood God destroyed all the Nephilim and preserved a line through which Messiah would be born.”