Cain & Abel

Cain

First-born of Adam and Eve, named “Cain” (“Ḳayin”) because “gotten” (root, “ḳanah”) “with the help of Yhwh.” He became a tiller of the ground, and made an offering of its fruits which Yhwhdid not accept, though He had accepted that of Abel. Cain was angered, whereupon Yhwhassured him that divine acceptance depended upon conduct. Cain slew Abel, and was cursed by Yhwhso that the soil should yield no return to his labor, and he should be driven out to wander over the earth. At Cain’s appeal Yhwh”made to him a sign, lest any one finding him should smite him.” Cain went forth to the land of Nod Wandering), east of Eden; his wife bore him a son Enoch, after whom he named a city which he had built. From him were descended Lamech, who is recorded as having married two wives; Jabal, who instituted nomad life; Jubal, who invented music; and Tubal-Cain, the inventor of metal weapons—i.e., the authors of material and social progress.

In Rabbinical Literature:

Cain, the murderer of his brother Abel, presented to the views of the Rabbis two different types. One was that of a sinner who yielded to his passions who was greedy, “offering to God only worthless portions; the remnants of his meal or flaxseed”; whom either God’s favorable acceptance of Abel’s sacrifice or Abel’s handsomer wife and twin sister filled with jealousy; who, because he claimed the pasture-land or the wife of Abel as his birthright, quarreled with his brother. He was nevertheless sincere in his repentance when he said, “Too great is my sin [A. V., “punishment”] to bear” (Gen. iv. 13). and so the mark the Lord set upon him was a token of forgiveness. Like a man who had slain another without premeditation, he was sent into exile to atone for his sin (Sanh. 37b); and his crime was finally atoned for when he met death through the falling upon him of his house (Book of Jubilees, iv. 31), or at the hands of his great-grandson Lamech, who took him for a wild beast in the distance and shot him (Tan., Bereshit, ed. Vienna, p. 6b, and Yalḳ. i. 38).

Cain was also viewed as a type of utter perverseness, an offspring of Satan (Pirḳe R. El. xxi.), “a son of wrath” (Apoc. Mosis, 3), a lawless rebel who said, “There is neither a divine judgment nor a judge” (Midr. Leḳaḥ Ṭob and Targ. Yer. to Gen. iv. 8), whose words of repentance were insincere (Sanh. 101b; Tan.), whose fleeing from God was a denial of His omnipresence (Gen. R. xxii.), and whose punishment was of an extraordinary character: for every hundred years of the seven hundred years he was to live was to inflict another punishment upon him; and all his generations must be exterminated (Test. Patr., Benjamin, 7, according to Gen. iv. 24; Enoch, xxii, 7). For him and his race shall ever be “the desire of the spirit of sin” (Gen. R. xx., after Gen. iv. 7). He is the first of those who have no share in the world to come (Ab. R. N. xli., ed. Schechter, p. 133).

Generations of Cain

The seven generations of Cain, as the brood of Satan, are accordingly represented as types of rebels(Gen. R. xxiii.). While the pious men all descended from Seth, there sprang from Cain all the wicked ones who rebelled against God and whose perverseness and corruption brought on the flood: they committed all abominations and incestuous crimes in public without shame. The daughters of Cain were those “fair daughters of men” who by their lasciviousness caused the fall of the “sons of God” (Gen. vi. 1-4; Pirḳe R. El. xxii.; compare Sibyllines, i. 75). The Ethiopian Book of Adam and Eve and the Syriac Cave of Treasures—both Christianized Melchisedician works based upon a genuine Jewish original—relate the story of the fall of the descendants of Seth as “the sons of God” who had lived in purity as saints on the mountain near Eden, following the precept and example of Seth and Enoch, their leaders, but were attracted by the gay and sensuous mode of life in which the children of Cain indulged; the latter spending their days at the foot of the mountain, in wild orgies, accompanied by the music of instruments invented by Jubal, and by women, in gorgeous attire, seducing the men to commit the most abominable practises. In the days of Jared (“descent”) the Sethites (“the sons of God”) went down the hill to join the Cainites, heedless of the warnings of Jared; and none of those who walked in the path of sin could come back. This was repeated in the days of Enoch, Methuselah, and Noah: all the admonitions of these saintly leaders did not prevent the fall of the sons of Seth, for whom the daughters of Cain lusted (see The Book of Adam and Eve, transl. by S. C. Malan, 1882, pp. 115-147; Dillmann, “Das Christliche Adambuch,” 1853, pp. 82-101; Bezold, “Die Schatzhöhle,” i. 10-23). Josephus (“Ant.” i. 2, § 2; i. 3, § 1) also speaks of the excessive wickedness of the posterity of Cain, which grew in vehemence with every generation; while the posterity of Seth remained virtuous during seven generations, after which the fall of the angels ensued and they were enticed by their gigantic offspring. To Philo, likewise, Cain is the type of avarice, of “folly and impiety” (“De Cherubim,” xx.), and of self-love (“De Sacrificiis Abelis et Caini”; “Quod Deterius Potiori Insidiari Soleat,” 10). “He built a city” (Gen. iv. 17) means that “he built a doctrinal system of law-lessness, insolence, and immoderate indulgence in pleasure” (“De Posteritate,” 15); and the Epicurean philosophers are of the school of Cain, “claiming to have Cain as teacher and guide, who recommended the worship of the sensual powers in preference to the powers above, and who practised his doctrine by destroying Abel, the expounder of the opposite doctrine” (ib. 11).

A doctrine of the Cainites appears, then, to have been in existence as early as Philo’s time; but nothing is known of the same. In the second century of the common era a Gnostic sect by the name of “Cainites” is frequently mentioned as forming a branch of the antinomistic heresies which, adopting some of the views of Paulinian Christianity, advocated and practised indulgence in carnal pleasure. While some of the Jewish Gnostics divided men into three classes—represented (1) by Cain, the physical or earthly man; (2) by Abel, the psychical man (the middle class); and (3) by Seth, the spiritual or saintly man (see Irenæus, “Adversus Hæreses,” i. 7, 5; compare Philo, “De Gigantibus,” 13)—the antinomistic pagan Gnostics declared Cain and other rebels or sinners to be their prototypes of evil and licentiousness. Cain, Esau, Korah, the Sodomites, and even Judas Iscariot, were made by these Gnostics expounders of the “wisdom” of the serpent in rebellion against God (Gen. iii. 5), the primeval serpent, “Naḥash ha-Ḳadmoni” (Gen R. xxii. 12). How many of these pernicious doctrines were already formed in pre-Christian times and how many were developed during the first and second Christian centuries is difficult to ascertain (see Jude 11, “the way of Cain”; Irenæus, l.c. i. 31, 1; 26, 31; 27, 3; Hippolytus, “Adversus Omnes Hæreses,” v. 11, 15, 21; Clemens of Alexandria, “The Cainists,” Stromata vii. 17; Eusebius, “Hist. Eccl.” iii. 29; Epiphanius, “Hæres.” xxv., xxvi., xxxviii. 2). Blau with good reason refers to such Cainite doctrines the Haggadah of blasphemy, referred to in Sanh. 99b, as taught by Manasseh ben Hezekiah, the typical perverter of the Law in the direction of licentiousness.

Bibliography:

• A. Hönig, Die Ophiten, Berlin, 1889;
• M. Friedländer, Der Vorchristliche Jüdische Gnosticismus, 1898, pp. 19 et seq.;
• idem, Der Antichrist, 1901, pp. 101 et seq.;
• Hilgenfeld, Die Ketzergeschichte des Urchristenthums, 1884, pp. 324 et seq.;
• Ginzberg, Die Haggada bei den Kirchenvätern, pp. 59-70.

Sources and Original Form. Critical View:

The narratives in Gen. iv. are assigned to two different strata of the Jahvistic document; e.g., Ball, “S. B. O. T.,” the story of the murder of Abel (1-16a, 25, 26 ² to J), the later stratum; and the story of Cain, the city-builder, and of his descendants (16b-24 ¹ to J), the earlier stratum. The independence of the two sections is shown, among other things, by the fact that the man who, in verse 12, is to be “a fugitive and a wanderer,” in verse 17 builds a city. Verses 16b-24, to which probably 1a should be added, are from the same document as the story of the creation in Eden; and 1b-16, 25, 26, from that containing J¹‘s account of the flood. The apparent cross-reference, “wanderer,” “nad” (12), with “wandering,” “Nod” (16b), is due to a redactor; and verse 24 refers to a version of the story of Cain which is different from that given in 1b-16 (compare below).

The later section, 1b-16, is commonly explained thus (compare Holzinger’s “Genesis”): Cain is the eponym of the Kenites (see 2), and the verses are a form of an independent tradition which explained the nomadic life of the Kenites as due to a curse laid upon them for some ancient murder. To the settled Israelites the nomadic life, seemed mean and wretched. Verses 25, 26 connect this story with the complete J.

The earlier section, 17-24, is J¹‘s genealogy of the descent of the human race from Adam, and his account of the development of civilization. The Song of Lamech (23, 24) is an ancient fragment inserted by J¹, referring to a form of the story of Cain which placed his conduct in a favorable light.

Text of Gen. iv. 1: A. V., “[a man] from the Lord,” so Targ. O., implies a reading ‘; the actual text might possibly be rendered as R. V., “with the help of the Lord”; so Septuagint, Vulgate, or even”from Yhwh.” Marti, apud Holzinger, proposes ‘ot for ‘et, “a man bearing theYhwh-sign” (compare verse 15, and below).

Origin of Name

The etymology of iv. 1 is a linguistic impossibility. The name was originally that of the Kenite tribe (see 2). The word  (“ḳayin”) is read in the Masoretic text of II Sam. xxi. 16, and translated “lance”; the corresponding words in Arabic and Syriac mean “smith.” The tribe may have derived its name from the fame of its smiths. The “Cainan” of Gen. v. 14 (“Ḳenan”) is another form of this name (compare “Kenan”; R. V. “Kenan”). No explanation ofYhwh’s disapproval is given in the Masoretic text. The LXX. of verse 7 implies some ceremonial irregularity. Suggestions that the sin consisted in the bloodlessness of the offering, or in its worthlessness, or that it was given in a wrong spirit, are alike conjectures. The story is probably imperfect at this point.

The “Sign” of Cain

The “sign” of Cain is sometimes understood as a sign given to Cain to reassure him, but probably some mark on his person is intended, which should indicate that he was under divine protection. It perhaps refers to a tribal mark of the Kenites connected with their worship of Yhwh(Stade,”Z.A.T.W.”; Guthe, “Herzog,” 1901, s.v.).

The Apocrypha (Wisdom x. 3, 4) refers to Cain as the cause of the Flood. In the New Testament Cain is mentioned as an evil example (Heb. xi. 4; I John iii. 12; Jude 11).

2. Tribe; mentioned in Num. xxiv. 22, and Judges iv. 11, for the tribe of the Kenites (see Kenites).

3. City (“Ha-Ḳayin”); mentioned in Josh. xv. 57, in southern Judah, often identified with Yagin, southeast of Hebron.

Bibliography:

• Delitzsch, Neuer Commentar über die Genesis, 1887;
• Wellhausen, Die Composition des Hexateuch;
• Budde, Die Biblische Urgesch. 1883;
• Stade, Das Kainzeichen, in Z. A. T. W. 1894, pp. 250 et seq.; 1895, pp. 157 et seq.;
• reprinted in Akademische Reden und Abhandlungen, 1899, pp. 229-273;
• Holzinger, Genesis, in Kurzer Handkommentar zum Alten Testament, 1898;
• Gunkel, Handkommentar zur Gen. 1901.

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Abel

The younger brother of Cain and the second son of Adam and Eve. He was the first shepherd, while Cain was a tiller of the soil. The writer of Gen. iv. tells us that when the brothers came as a matter of course to present their offerings to God, the sacrifice of Abel—the first-lings of his flock—was preferred to that of Cain, who gave of the fruits of the earth. The acceptance of Abel’s offering aroused the jealousy of Cain, who, in spite of the warnings of God, wreaked his vengeance upon the favorite by murdering him.

In Hellenistic and Rabbinical Literature:

Abel was regarded as the first innocent victim of the power of evil, represented by Cain; the first martyrsaint, with the title the Just. In Enoch, xxii. 7 the soul of Abel is the chief of the martyr-souls in Sheol, crying to God for vengeance until the seed of Cain shall be destroyed from the earth. In the vision of the bulls and lambs (Enoch, lxxxv. 3-6) Abel, whose death is deeply mourned by Eve, is the red bull pursued by Cain, the black bull. In the Testament of Abraham (recension A, chap. xiii., and recension B, chap. xi.) Abel is described as the judge of the souls:

“an awful man sitting upon the throne to judge all creatures, and examining the righteous and the sinners. He being the first to die as martyr, God brought him hither [to the place of judgment in the nether world] to give judgment, while Enoch, the heavenly scribe, stands at his side writing down the sin and the righteousness of each. For God said: I shall not judge you, but each man shall be judged by man. Being descendants of the first man, they shall be judged by his son until the great and glorious appearance of the Lord, when they will be judged by the twelve tribes [judges] of Israel [compare Matt. xix. 28], and then the last judgment by the Lord Himself shall be perfect and unchangeable.”

Josephus (“Ant.” i. 2, § 1) calls Abel “a lover of righteousness, excellent in virtue, and a believer in God’s omnipresence; Cain altogether wicked, greedy, and wholly intent upon ‘getting’ [].”

According to the Ethiopic Book of Adam and Eve (ii. 1-15) and the Syrian Cave of Treasures, both works of half-Jewish, half-pagan (Egyptian) character (see Gelzer, “Julius Africanus,” ii. 272 et seq.), the body of Abel the Just, after many days of mourning, was placed in the Cave of Treasures. Before this cave, Adam and Eve and their descendants offered their prayers; and “by the blood of Abel the Just” Seth and his descendants adjured their children not to mingle with the seed of the unrighteous.

It is, therefore, an awful curse hurled against the Pharisees when Jesus is represented as saying: “Upon you may all the righteous blood shed upon the earth come, from the blood of the righteous Abel [compare Epistle to the Hebrews, xi. 4, and I John, iii. 12] unto the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom ye slew between the sanctuary and the altar” (Matt. xxiii. 35). From Josephus (“B. J.” iv. 5, § 4) it appears that this murder took place thirty-four years after the death of Jesus.

Abel, according to Midrash, protested against Cain’s denial of a divine judgment and of a future retribution, and declared for the existence of a divine judgment and a judge, a future world with reward for the righteous and punishment for the wicked. “With the first produce of the field the Lord blessed all the saints from Abel until now,” says Issachar (Test. Patriarchs, p. 5). According to Pirḳe de-R. Eliezer (chap. xxi.), Abel’s dog watched by his corpse to keep off the beasts of prey; and while Adam and Eve were sitting there, weeping and mourning, a raven came and buried a bird in the sand. Thereupon Adam said, “Let us do the same”; and he dug up the earth and buried his son.

Regarding the mourning over Abel, compare the Book of Jubilees, iv. 7, with the strange interpretation of Abel as “Mourning” (as if the name were written ). Compare Philo, “De Migratione Abrahami,” xiii., and Josephus, “Ant.” i. 2, § 1.

God’s favorable attitude toward Abel’s sacrifice (Gen. iv. 4) is shown in the fact that it was consumed by fire from heaven. This is a haggadic idea known to Theodotion, accepted by the Christians, and found in the works of many Church Fathers, such as Cyril of Alexandria, Jerome, Ephraem Syrus, and Aphraates. In midrashic literature, however, it is found only in later works (Midrash Zuṭṭa, p. 35, ed. Buber, Berlin, 1899).

Woman was at the bottom of the strife between the first brothers. Each of the sons of Adam had a twin-sister whom he was to marry. As Abel’s twin-sister was the more beautiful, Cain wished to have her for his wife, and sought to get rid of Abel (Pirḳe R. Eliezer, xxi.; Gen. R. xxii. 7, according to Ginzberg’s emendation; Epiphanius, “De Hæresi,” xl. 5, “Schatzhöhle,” ed. Bezold, p. 34; compare, too, “The Book of the Bee,” ed. Budge, pp. 26, 27).

Abel, stronger than Cain, overcame him in a struggle between them, but mercifully spared his life. Cain, however, took Abel unawares and, overpowering him, killed him with a stone (Gen. R. xxii. 18)—some say with a cane, or even that he choked him with his fingers (compare Ginzberg, cited below, pp. 229, 230, 298, 299).

The place where Abel was killed remained desolate forever, never producing vegetation (Midrash Canticles, ed. Shechter; “Jew. Quart. Rev.,” 1894-95, vii. 160. Jerome, “Commentary on Ezekiel,” xxvii.18, supported by Jewish tradition, held it to be Damascus (Heb. : blood;  drink). According to another version, the earth refused to take up Abel’s blood (Apocalypsis Mosis, xl.).

Since man had no knowledge of burial, Abel’s corpse remained unburied for some time. At God’s command, two turtle-doves flew down; one died; the other dug a hollow place and moved the dead one into it. Thereupon Adam and Eve did likewise to Abel’s body (Tan., Bereshit, § 10; Pirḳe R. Eliezer, xxi., see also Gen. R. l.c.; compare “Denkschrift d. Wiener Akademie,” xx. 52, and Ginzberg, l.c. 295).

Bibliography:

• Ginzberg, in Monatsschrift, 1899, 226-230, 294-298.

In Mohammedan Legend:

The story of Cain and Abel is thus told in the Koran (sura v. 30 et seq.): “Recite to them the story of the two sons of Adam: Truly, when they offered an offering and it was accepted from one of them, and was not accepted from the other, that one [Cain] said, ‘I will surely kill thee.’ He [Abel] said, ‘God only accepts from those who fear. If thou dost stretch forth to me thine hand to kill me, I will not stretch forth mine hand to kill thee; verily, I fear God, the Lord of the worlds; verily, I wish that thou mayest draw upon thee my sin and thy sin, and be of the fellows of the fire; for that is the reward of the unjust.’ But his soul allowed him to slay his brother, and he slew him, and in the morning he was of those who perish. And God sent a crow to scratch in the earth and show him how he might hide his brother’s shame; he said, ‘Alas for me! Am I too helpless to become like this crow and hide my brother’s shame?’ And in the morning he was of those that did repent ” (compare Pirḳe R. El. xxi).

No further mention is made of Abel; and the absence of his name here causes the commentator Baidawi and the historian Tabari to say that the two mentioned here were not sons of Adam, but “children of Adam” or merely descendants. The Arabic historians (Ya’ḳubi, Tabari, Ibn al-Athir, etc.) call Abel “Habil”; and, following Jewish tradition, they say that to each one of the brothers a sister or sisters were born. Adam wished that each should marry the sister of the other; but Cain’s sister was the handsomer of the two and had been born in paradise; while Abel and his sister had been begotten outside of the garden. Adam suggested that the question should be settled by each one bringing an offering. Abel brought of the best of his flock, but Cain of the worst of the products of the ground. Fire fell from heaven, and consumed only the offering of Abel. The sister of Abel is called Kelimia; that of Cain, Lubda (compare Lebuda and Kelimat in the Syriac “Schatzhöhle,” ed. Bezold, trans., p. 8; and in the “Book of the Bee,” ed. Budge, trans., p. 25; in the Ethiopic Midrash the names are Aklemia and Lubuwa; see Malan, “Book of Adam and Eve,” pp. 93, 104). According to an another tradition, Adam’s height shrank considerably through grief at the death of Abel.

Bibliography:

• Weil, Biblische Legenden der Musulmänner, p. 30;
• Grünbaum, Neue Beiträge zur Semitischen Sagenkunde, pp. 67 et seq.

Critical View:

The Biblical account of Abel comes from one writer (J) only, and is so brief and fragmentary that much is left to speculation when we try to get the original form of the story. The name itself can not be satisfactorily explained, as it is only clear that the narrative comes from a very old tradition. The Assyrian word for son is hablu, and the derivation from a Babylonian source seems to be quite probable (Stade’s “Zeitschrift,” 1884, p. 250). The story is intended to set forth: First, the superiority of the pastoral over the agricultural occupation. This prejudice naturally inhered in the nomadic life. The fact confirms the antiquity of the original story. Secondly, it emphasizes the peculiar value of the choicest animal sacrifices as developed later in the ritual system. Thirdly, it shows how deep-seated was the jealousy and rivalry between people of different occupations, who in ancient times formed separate communities and were continually at war. Fourthly, there also lurks in the story a consciousness that certain people are more pleasing to God than others, and that the difference is, in part at least, connected with modes of worship and sacrifice. Neither Abel nor Cain is referred to in later Old Testament books. The New Testament has several references.

From–

The 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia

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