The Great Commandment, And Another Like It

Intro

When we last left the story of Genesis, the first humans had been exiled from the Garden. Now we find them on the outskirts of paradise. Things looked grim for the humans in Genesis three, yet god did not leave them without hope. The hope that the work of the serpent could be overcome, and that though their rebellion had brought death, God intended to give them life. Now, at the beginning of chapter 4, that promise of life looks to become a reality, as Eve gives birth to two sons.

The Birth of Cain and Abel

The New Revised Standard Version Cain Murders Abel

Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have produced a man with the help of the LORD.”

The New Revised Standard Version Cain Murders Abel

Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have produced a man with the help of the LORD.”

The New Revised Standard Version Cain Murders Abel

Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have produced a man with the help of the LORD.”

“Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have produced a man with the help of the LORD.” Next she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a tiller of the ground.”

Eve has

Genesis, like much of scripture, really loves word play. Eve names here son qayin because the LORD helped her qanah , i.e. “produce” or “create” a man. What’s interesting is that this word qanah can also mean “to buy” and is often associate with buying land. The idea might be that Eve is hoping Cain will be their ticket back into the Garden, as a fulfillment of the promise in . Cain is a “tiller of the ground” like his father, Adam, after all. Abel’s name, on the other hand, comes from the Hebrew hebel. It’s the word used over and over again in Ecclesiastes, and it literally means “breath” or “vanity”. This is likely a pun on the shortness of Abel’s life, but also an ironic commentary on the culture in which Cain and Abel lived. Within the Biblical world and the ANE in general, it was always the firstborn, the oldest son who was favored. He was the one through which life and prosperity would come to the family. The younger brother, not so much! So Cain is put forth as a symbol of life and vitality, while Abel is dismissed as “vapor, nothingness”. Ironically, by the time of the New Testament, and even by the end of the story, their roles will be completely reversed. Abel will come to a symbol of faith, and Cain a symbol of evil.

Two Brothers

The only other information

The Keeper of My Brother

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (1989). (). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (1989). (). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

The story doesn’t waste much time telling us any more about Cain and Abel’s childhood, or who they were. We just get this one story, a story that has perplexed readers of scripture for thousands of years.

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (1989). (). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

Cain, the tiller of the ground, and Abel, the keeper of the sheep, bring an offering to God. We don’t know where they bring the offering. Perhaps their parents, Adam and Eve, had set up some kind of altar outside of Eden. Maybe the two brothers made the offering at the gates of the garden of Eden, between the two Cherubim guarding it, in a scene not dissimilar from the tabernacle that their descendents the Israelites would have been all too familiar with. We don’t really know why they made an offering. The Hebrew word used suggests it was an offering of thanksgiving, perhaps thanking God for providing a good harvest that year, but we don’t know for sure.

What we do know, however is this: the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, 5 but for Cain and his offering he had no regard.

This one line has perplexed readers perhaps since it was written. Why does God favor one brother over the other? Why does God “regard Abel” but not Cain? The passage might offer us one hint. Cain brought “an offering of fruit from the ground”, but Abel brought “the firstlings of his flock”. It might be that Cain didn’t put a whole lot of thought into his offering. These weren’t first fruits of the harvest, this wasn’t the best Cain had to offer. Yet Abel had offered the “firstlings of his flock” and the heleb, or the “best, most choice parts”, your translation may say “fat portions”.

And so Cain became grievously upset. He was angry, he felt shamed perhaps. Maybe Cain knew why his gift was rejected. Maybe he didn’t. But it hurt. Abel, the younger brother, had been honored, and he had not. And so, here we have, I think, the real reason that God rejected Cain and not Abel. God doesn’t really need nice sheep or pretty fruit. It’s not that God was being petty by demanding the best. No, the issue was not the offering, but the offerer.

This, as it turns out, is precisely

I can’t help but be reminded of Toy Story here. Woody is the favorite toy, he’s the one Andy is supposed to play with. But here comes Buzz Lightyear, and suddenly Andy is obsessed with space and astronauts, not cowboys and the West. Andy feels hurt. He feels betrayed. And he does something that, for a toy, is so very human: he blames his hurt and anger on someone else. This must be Buzz’s fault!

Cain is the favorite child. He’s the firstborn, he’s the hope of his mother and father. So why is Abel, who’s name literally means “nothing”, getting all of this attention?

I remember feeling similarly as a kid. I was the oldest, and I was the one my dad would take hunting, I was the one that my dad played sports with. But, one day, my dad decided my sister was old enough to start hunting and playing baseball too. So when my dad would teach her to shoot a gun, I’d always have to show him how I could hit the target too. And when he would teach her to swing a bat, I’d yell “No, look at me! I can do that too!” I was furious that she got so much more attention than I did. I never stopped to think that maybe it’s because her offering was more sincere. She wanted to learn to play baseball, and to shoot a gun. She wanted to spend time with her dad and have fun. I mostly just wanted to be the only child, to be special again.

I think this is a very relatable human emotion, even for those of us who don’t have siblings. When someone at work gets recognized, it’s hard for us to be happy for them. Instead, we ask, “Why isn’t that me? I deserved that.” This jealousy, this anger toward a brother, is the emotion we see in Cain. And God sees it. So he gives Cain this warning:

“Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is lurking at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it.”

“Why are you angry, Cain?” God seems here to suggest that there’s no good reason for Cain to feel this way. This is a problem he has brought upon himself. This is a Cain problem. Who is there to be angry at, then?

Then God shows Cain he has a choice before him. My English translation isn’t actually quite right, the Hebrew is, “If you do well, you will be lifted up”. In v. 5 we see that “Cain was very angry, and his face fell”. The implication is that if Cain chooses to do good, his 'face’ will be lifted up again. He’ll be happy, his sorrow and anger will cease. This is, perhaps, more significant than we realize. Walter Brueggeman puts it this way:

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (1989). (). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

“The first alternative, ‘to do well’, is instructive. It suggests that a post man can do well. He is not ‘fallen’. He is not the victim of any original sin. He can choose and act for the good. Such an affirmation by the narrator suggests that chapter 3 must not be permitted to control chapter 4. Cain in this story is free and capable of faithful living.”

If the first part of v. 7 is an instruction that gives permission for Cain to do good, then the second part is a warning of the perils Cain faces if he fails to choose the good. Sin is not just "breaking the rules”. It is a hungry animal, crouching, waiting to pounce on Cain and overpower him. Another way to translate this verse may be that “Sin is a demon lurking at your door.” Sin, then, is an aggressive force that poses a real danger to Cain’s life. There is hope though. It’s desire is for Cain, but he can rule it. He can choose to do well. God has left this decision entirely up to Cain.

Sadly, Cain does not rule sin. Sin has its way with him, and in the following verses we see Cain rise up to kill his brother Abel.

And so God, as in the Garden, comes looking for the man Cain. “Where is your brother Abel?” God asks. “I do not know, am I my brother’s keeper?” Cain doesn’t want to accept the responsibility placed on him in v. 7. He doesn’t want to accept his responsibility in the choice.

But God knows. “…your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground!” The judgement this time is somewhat different. When Adam sinned, the ground was cursed because of him. Now, however, it is not the ground that is cursed, but Cain is cursed “from the ground.” Cain was a tiller of the ground. The ground had provided for Cain, but Cain returned that provision with blood. This passage makes it seem as if the ground has a mind of its own. As if the very creation itself acts out against sin. Cain’s act has tainted the very ground itself, and now it won’t provide for Cain anymore. This is why Cain will be a “fugitive and wanderer of the Earth”. He will have to scavenge and scrounge for food, because the creation will not provide it for him anymore.

So Cain cries out. My version states, “Cain said to the LORD, “My punishment is greater than I can bear!” Like his parents before him, Cain fears that God is relentless. He fears that God will be sure to see him dead for what he’s done.

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (1989). (). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

“Not so!” declares God. And the LORD put a mark on Cain, so that no one who came upon him would kill him.

I like what Walter Brueggeman has to say on this mark:

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (1989). (). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

“On the one hand, it announces the guilt of Cain. On the other, it marks Cain as safe in God’s protection. In such a simple way, the narrative articulates the two-sidedness of human life, in jeopardy for disobediance and yet kept safe. The acknowledgement of guilt and the reality of grace come together in this presentation.”

And so Cain, like his parents, is exiled. He moves even farther from Paradise. If things looked Grim in , they look even more so in Chapter 4. All hope is not lost, however. God provides for Cain’s life just as he had provided for Adam and Eve. Cain has a long line of descendents who go on to do great things. Cain’s genealogy attributes metalworking, animal husbandry, as well as the development of art and culture all to Cain’s descendants. Unfortunately, it appears Cain’s family never truly broke free of the rule of the beast that is sin.

Cain’s legacy end’s with a man named Lamech, who is the man recorded in the Bible to practice polygamy. The curse of woman being ruled by man is played out in even more depraved ways as mankind moves farther from Eden. Worse still, Lamech duplicates the failing of Cain. He brags to his two wives about the man he has killed, and seems to twist God’s grace for Cain into a demand for sanctioning every violent act. “If Cain was avenged seven fold, then Lamech seventy times seven!”

This is how Cain’s story ends, and Eve’s hopes of her offspring crushing the snake are not met through Cain. Hope is still provided, however, as God gifts her with another Son, Seth. The rest of the story of Genesis will follow the family of this last son, and while Cain’s descendants are said to be responsible for human culture and technology, it is through Seth that people “begin to invoke the name of the LORD”. All hope may not yet be lost.

Conclusion

The story of Cain and Abel has so much in common with that of Adam and Eve. They almost run parallel to one another. Cain, Like Adam, is a tiller of the Ground. Cain, like his parents, is given a choice. Sin slithers in and tempts Cain much like it did his parents, and like his parents, Cain succumbed to the temptation. Like his parents, Cain was exiled from the Garden. And, surprisingly, just like Adam and Eve, Cain had an encounter with a God ready to pour out grace and mercy even on those who have committed the gravest of sins.

At the heart of this passage, I think, is a very significant challenge to the understanding of God and sin within American Christianity.

Firstly, the story here and its parallel in Genesis three challenge our ideas about an Angry God. When I was first taught Christianity, I was told that the “good news” of Jesus was that he had saved us from the wrath of God. That God was unimaginably angry at humanity for sin, and he was honor bound to kill us all for what we’ve done. This is precisely the idea of God that the serpent plants in the heads of Adam and Eve. It is the very same idea of God that Cain has when he protests, “My punishment is too great to bear!” Yet, in both instances, we don’t see this angry, vengeful, violent God. We see one who knows what is “good” for us, and who deeply desires that we choose life. We see a god willing to forgive even the gravest sin of Cain. We see a God who is more concerned with mercy and grace than with vengeance and wrath.

Secondly, this story challenges our ideas of sin. We like to think of sin as “breaking the rules”. Sin is bad, we think, because we’ll get punished for it if we get caught by God. Sin is bad because God said so. But that’s not what we see here. Sin is bad because it is an evil force that wants to dominate and destroy our lives. Sin is bad because it causes irreparable harm to both us and the creation.

And sin is about more than “breaking the rules”. It’s about the state of our relationship to both Brother and God. Sin does not exist within a vacuum, but within our relationships to others. To be right with God, I must be right with my brother. To choose life for myself is necessarily to choose life for my brother.

“You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder’; and ‘whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire.  So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.”

Sometimes I think we read this story and walk away thinking that the main point is “Don’t kill people”. Do we really need the Bible to tell us that? I sure hope not.

No, I think this story is more interested in the life of the murderer. A life haunted by its skewed relationship to God, a relationship which has been skewed because of a violated brother.

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (1989). (). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.