5) What does 'the Nephilim' actually mean??
	The Nephilim is derived from a passage in Genesis 6, though in many 
	printings the word 'giant' is used. My copy of 'The New American Bible'
	does feature it. It says:

	"Genesis 6: 		'Origin of the Nephilim'
	 (1) When men began to multiply on earth and daughters were born to
	 them, (2) the sons of heaven saw how beautiful the daughters of man
	 were, and so they took for their wives as many as they chose. (3)
	 Then the Lord said: 'My spirit shall not remain in man forever, since
	 he is flesh. His days shall comprise one hundred and twenty years.'
	 (4) At that time the Nephilim appeared on earth(as well as later),
	 after the sons of heaven had intercourse with duaghters of man,
	 who bore them sons. They were heros of old, the men of reknown." 

	God then wiped 'these' evil men from the earth with the great flood
	of which Noah survived on the Ark. So from this it can be speculated
	that the Nephilim epitimize men of evil, though they were the spawn
	of angels and man.
	There are comments in the bible on the passage which say:
	" 'As well as later': According to Numbers 13,33 when the Israelites
	 invaded Palestine and found there the tall aboriginal Anakim, they
	 likened them to the Nephilim. cf Deuteronomy 2,10. Perhaps the huge
	 megalithic structures in Palestine were thought to have been built
	 by a race of giants, whose super-human strength was attributed to
	 semi-divine origin. 'The heros of old': the legendary worties of
	 ancient mythology."

	Others have commented from a more mythological view point:
	  
	From: Michael Duvernois, duve@ellis.uchicago.edu 
	
	Briefly, the Nephilim were the gigantic off-spring of gods and mortal 
	women from the Book of Enoch.  They ravaged the Earth in a long war 
	with the angels and other various divine creatures. The Book of Enoch 
	is not a part of the bible proper, but is interesting reading (giants 
	and sea monsters, wars in heaven and on Earth, kinda like a Tolkein 
	clone mated with the book of Revelations).  

	And from a purely speculative view point:
	
	From: wg2b@andrew.cmu.edu  
    	As the cherubim are angels of love, and the seraphim are angels of 
    	wisdom, it would follow that the nephilim are the angels of death.

	The Eldritch Bitch(spiggy@cave.tcp.com) says:
	The Nephilim are major characters in the plot line of Madeline 
	l'Engel's "Many Waters" (the 4th in "The Wrinkle of Time" series).
	Also, look for allusion in Byrons' poem Manfred, act 3 (I think).
	Apocryphal texts contain many more stories than the Bible, but those
	references are harder to find.
	
    	Robert says:
    	The Nephilim allegedly refers to mythical beings which are believed
    	to be the off-spring of male fallen angels(not -Gods!) and mortal
    	women. He points out that it is a Hebrew word and singular/plural
    	so whether it refers to a single being or a group of people is unsure,
    	and no *real* information is available.