When I say “aliens,” what most people tend conjure up in their heads are images of Martians, little green men or odd-looking, super-intelligent beings from another planet. Yes, aliens are far more of a cultural phenomenon than a major biblical talking point, but here we will address two questions: Generally, what does the Bible have to say about aliens? Are they real or secular hocus-pocus?
Let us begin by defining terms. According to some Bible translations, the word “alien” does not appear in the text. But in others, the original Hebrew or Greek is translated as the English word “alien.” For example, the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) translates Exodus 22:21 as:
You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt.
A similar translation can be found in Exodus 23:9 and Leviticus 19:33-34. (And for an example in the New Testament, see Ephesians 2:19). The Hebrew word for alien is ger (גֵּר), which simply refers to a stranger or foreigner; that is, one who is of a different geographical or cultural group. Of course, when popular culture uses the word “alien,” they tend not to use the word in the sense of another human who is merely a foreigner. The tend to refer to an extraterrestrial, a being that comes from another world. The question then becomes: Does the Bible make reference to beings that come from a different world? And the answer is, of course it does. In fact, not only does the Bible refer to beings from a different place, the text also refers to beings who are of a totally different, non-material nature. And who are these beings? God and angels.
In general, the Bible tells us about three different categories of beings: First, uncreated spiritual beings. God is the only One in this category. Second, created spiritual beings. Angels are in this category, which includes Satan and demons; they are merely fallen angels. The third category of beings is created material beings. This includes you and me.
God is a non-material Spirit (John 4:24) who is uncreated, eternal, holy, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent. This list of divine attributes is not exhaustive, but the point is that the Lord is unlike us in so many ways. Furthermore, the fact that God is holy (Leviticus 20:26; Isaiah 6:3) means that He is separate from or other than us. Hence, there is nothing more alien to a sinful man than a holy God. This helps to explain why when anyone comes close to the Lord in the Bible, the entire experience is traumatic. For example, Isaiah sees the Lord sitting upon a throne, and he responds by saying (Isaiah 6:5):
Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!
As another example, when the apostle John sees a vision of the exalted Christ, he falls to his feet like a dead man (Revelation 1:17). People fall in dread because the divine nature of sinless perfection both is foreign to us and exposes our own radical sinfulness. God Himself even chides the wicked who sinfully think He is like men. Thus, in Psalm 50:21 God says, “You thought that I was just like you.” The implication of course is that the Creator is very much distinct and separate from the created.
The point is that because of who God is, compared to humans, He differs in both nature and character to the point of incompatibility. It therefore took an act of divine power for Jesus to incarnate: that is, God, remaining who He was, became what He was not. Hence, divinity is alien to humankind. Angels are not divine but are primarily spiritual creatures and have some attributes communicated to them by God; this makes them alien to humankind as well. So, what does the Bible have to say about aliens? That they are very real. God and angels are proof of that. Let us also not forget that, thinking biblically, there is an entire spiritual realm not of this world that does influence the material world. On the one hand, the kingdom of God is the ultimate example of righteous, otherworldly forces animating and persuading our natural reality. On the other hand, there are also evil spiritual forces that influence our world. Accordingly, the apostle Paul makes clear to us that spiritual warfare is fought against alien forces:
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. (Ephesians 6:10-12)
What I hope I have made clear is that if we start from the Word of God, Christians have a firm foundation upon which they can think biblically about “aliens” and otherworldly forces in our world. The next question then becomes, if we start from a secular standpoint and hypothesize that non-human, biological extraterrestrials exist—like Martians or little green men from another planet—what happens when we test that idea by the Word of God? What I think you end up with is hocus-pocus.
Allow me to explain. If we remain faithful Bible expositors and extract meaning from the text as opposed to injecting meaning into the text, it is clear that the Bible does not explicitly mention extraterrestrials. Indeed, silence is not an argument, but that does not mean men ought to speak when the Lord has said nothing. Consequently, what I will say is that, based upon what God has revealed, the hypothesis that extraterrestrials exist poses a massive redemption problem. Consider what the apostle Paul writes in Colossians 1:15-16:
[Christ] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation: for by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or dominions, or rulers, or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him.
Because God is sovereign, that would mean that if extraterrestrials existed, He would have made them. Nothing created was made by anyone other than God. Further, because all things were made through Christ and for Christ, the immediate question I would have is: What Christ-centered purpose would extraterrestrials serve? According to God, everything He made points to Jesus. So, how would Martians or little green men direct us to the Messiah? Christ is the God-Man, not the God-extraterrestrial. God became a Man so that He could redeem us. Christ did not die for non-humans. This would suggest that if extraterrestrials did exist, they would be an unredeemable race of non-human life forms. This again raises the question: What is their Christocentric purpose? Additionally, the Bible establishes that humans are the only created material beings into which God breathed His Spirit (Genesis 2:7). As a result, only we are made in God’s image (Genesis 1:26), and only we have the communicated attribute of intelligence and reason.
Furthermore, the secular idea of extraterrestrials tends to manifest in two general forms: either they are hostile to us and want to destroy us and our planet, or they are benevolent and want to gift us, whether it be with knowledge, technology or a “higher consciousness.” Well, the idea of beings that want to destroy humankind makes them opposed to God, for Christ came to seek and to save those who are lost (Luke 19:10). When it comes to a tale of benevolent extraterrestrials, what is painfully absent from said narratives is God. That is, if they are a superior class of beings that gift us with something we need to save ourselves, then we don’t need God; we just need to make contact with the aliens.
In my mind, it would appear, then, that when we test the secular idea of extraterrestrials against the Word of God, we end up with two conclusions. Either we don’t take the idea seriously, in the same way we don’t take the tooth fairy seriously, or we discern that deliverance coming from alien life forms is more diabolical than a superficial fairy tale: it’s just another version of Christ-less salvation.
The final comment I will make pertains to angels. The Bible makes clear that righteous angels perform their duties in accordance with God’s will. For example, they worship God (Isaiah 6:2), rejoice in the salvation of humans (Luke 15:10), protect the elect (Psalm 91:11), interact with us in our world (Hebrews 13:2), and are faithful messengers who relay God’s Word to humans (Daniel 8:16, 9:21-23; Matthew 1:20; Luke 1:11-12, 26-38). That’s what righteous angels do. But what about the fallen angels: Satan and demons? They act against God and His people and specialize in deception. In fact, the devil disguises himself as an angel of light (II Corinthians 11:14-15). Meaning, he pretends to be a messenger who preaches truth and illumination, but his ultimate motive is to murder you.
So, how does this relate to aliens? Well, in the Garden of Eden, what did Satan do? He appeared to Adam and Eve in the form of something natural: a serpent. Meaning, he presented himself like a being familiar to our first parents. His ultimate goal was to destroy Adam and Eve, but how did he do it? He lied and then offered them an alternative to God. In fact, he told Eve that if she ate from the fruit of the tree, she would be like God (Genesis 3:5). In other words, this supernatural alien—who undoubtedly is more intelligent, has more power and is far more capable than humans—offered Adam and Eve an opportunity for illumination (opening of the eyes), self-deification (being like God) and greater knowledge (knowing good and evil). The only thing Adam and Eve had to do was first ignore God’s Word and then trust the serpent instead. What’s especially telling is the fact that—according to the prevailing secular narrative—in modernity, technology is the means by which we can ascend and be like the Most High. Certainly, as the story goes, an extraterrestrial would not persuade us to eat fruit. What they would persuade us to do is bow down before technology in order to (for example) know all things (AI), become like God (delaying or escaping death) or open our eyes to scientific redemption. I will end my analysis here and allow you to draw your own conclusions. If I proceed any further, I will invariably end up speculating and straying away from the text.
This post was shorter than most, but I believe it is often wise to say less when walking in murky territory. My primary intent in this post was not actually to develop a comprehensive biblical theology of aliens but rather to demonstrate the sufficiency of Scripture in providing guidelines and answers to everything in life (II Peter 1:3); this includes the reality of aliens and the possibility of extraterrestrials. God’s truth is supreme, and when we analyze reality through that paradigm, what becomes readily obvious is as follows: a non-material spiritual world is very real and is active in our reality, but the purpose of that the truth is to direct us toward Christ, no one else. Everything else is either deception or a creative distraction.
Dr. C. H. E. Sadaphal