Learning Genesis

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The theory goes that Cain built a city, so how do you build a city without many people. After he killed Able, he was afraid others would kill him. Who would these others be? God had to put a mark on Cain so his dad and mom and future brothers would want to kill him? There would have to be others for these things to make sense.

Genesis 4:
13 And Cain said to the Lord, “My punishment is greater than I can bear! 14 Surely You have driven me out this day from the face of the ground; I shall be hidden from Your face; I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond on the earth, and it will happen that anyone who finds me will kill me.”

15 And the Lord said to him, “Therefore, whoever kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.” And the Lord set a mark on Cain, lest anyone finding him should kill him.
16 Then Cain went out from the presence of the Lord and dwelt in the land of Nod on the east of Eden. 17 And Cain knew his wife, and she conceived and bore Enoch. And he built a city, and called the name of the city after the name of his son—Enoch.

/ Now it would be possible God made more people after kicking them out of Eden. Listing them in the Bible would not be needed since they A. had no souls -or- B. were insignificant because their descendents would all be killed in Noah's Flood.
Putting a mark on Cain would make sense if Able had descendents or other brothers at the time. But it seems clear that only Adam and Eve were alive when Cain killed Able.
 
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After the birth of Seth, Adam lived another 800 years, and he had other sons and daughters. (Genesis 5:4 NLT)

Not to spoil things, but the answer is in Genesis.
 
25 And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and named him Seth, “For God has appointed another seed for me instead of Abel, whom Cain killed.”

Seems clear that there were only Cain and Able as brothers until Able was killed, then Seth was born. As to daughters, we don't know. There is no mention of Able having offspring.
 
3 And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord. 4 Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the Lord respected Abel and his offering, 5 but He did not respect Cain and his offering. And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell.

As far as God not accepting Cain's sacrifice, he only brought "an offering". Able brought the first born. Also, remember: Genesis 3:
17 Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’:
Cursed is the ground for your sake;
In toil you shall eat of it
All the days of your life.

So offering something grown from the cursed ground may also been a problem. Mostly though, it was what was in Cain's heart when he was giving his offering. He didn't really sacrifice anything of value, which makes what he did offer, not a "sacrifice". It would be like your in need and I only give you the change in my pocket. Not much of a sacrifice and not much help for you.
 
Though it is not specifically mentioned because of the focus being placed on the Cain and Abel scenario, the boys (though the first two born to them) are grown here (speculatively could be 20 or 30...who knows?) and as you can see Cain as already married (so Cain, Abel, and younger offspring may also have had children but in the teaching they are at this time insignificant)....Adam and Eve were blessed to be fruitful and multiply...it is reasonable that would have had children every year of two (more twins? some triplets? some singles)... and then beginning as teens, these offspring all may have mated..and so on...the numerical possibilities are staggering...

Here is another thing that probably is not realized...I'll bet in most minds Adam and Eve is seen as euro/caucasian! Where for the eventuality of all possible variation they would have to have been a variety from which all possible anthropomorphic characteristics and all levels of melanin could have been reinforced...think about it...

I have, and it puzzles me. Adam and Eve had characteristics in them that gave way to Caucasians, Negros, Indians, Chinese etc..?

God only made Adam and Eve and they had lots of children. I'm still unsure about the timeline as it's very vague but Cain must have married his sister as far as I can tell from these comments. Were there no genetic disorders with all of these brothers and sisters inter-marrying?
 
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I have, and it puzzles me. Adam and Eve had characteristics in them that gave way to Caucasians, Negros, Indians, Chinese etc..?

God only made Adam and Eve and they had lots of children. I'm still unsure about the timeline as it's very vague but Cain must have married his sister as far as I can tell from these comments. Were there no genetic disorders with all of these brothers and sisters inter-marrying?
Purer DNA, no issues... like our copied, fragmented, damaged copy of a copy of a copy of a copy… DNA today. Indeed they had all the colors of all races today. If you look as the skin pigmentation, it's just the amount of melanin we all have that gives us the "color" we are. There's no difference. After the Tower of Babel when God confused the tongues of men into today's various language, certain traits became common among those of the same tongue. So, today we have all the wonderful verity, erroneously called "race", of humans on the planet.
 
I have, and it puzzles me. Adam and Eve had characteristics in them that gave way to Caucasians, Negros, Indians, Chinese etc..?

God only made Adam and Eve and they had lots of children. I'm still unsure about the timeline as it's very vague but Cain must have married his sister as far as I can tell from these comments. Were there no genetic disorders with all of these brothers and sisters inter-marrying?
Vagueness does not equate with fiction Tubby Tubby.
Given that there were just one male and one female who were given a mandate to populate the world, they would need to be able to procreate (incestuously) without giving rise to a race of imbeciles. But as time wore on, the risk of imbecility increase with each successive instance of inbreeding. That is why at a relatively early stage the Lord God forbade incest. He knew what the latitude that was created within the human race was. and He knew that there was ample scope for procreation without incest.
The limit was not reached however until after the flood, as there was still some scope for incest, but less so than earlier. That is likely why there were three couples of child baring age taken onto the Ark.
 
Tubby...not that she is our Eve (but could be) but have you ever heard of Mitochondrial Eve?

For future reference...just for fun if interested see Nature, 1987, “Mitochondrial DNA and Human Evolution“, Cann, Stonekong, and Wilson; also in Nature, 2000, “Mitochondrial genome variation and the origin of Modern Humans“, Ingman, Kaessmann, Paaba, and Gyllensten

Paul
 
At least you are getting to see how people understand it and some of the reasons why....and that is good regardless of whether or not you come to the place where you are a believer. My only hope for any Atheist is to at least get them to become what I consider more honest...an agnostic...who does not deny the possibility, even though they have no reason based on their experience or knowledge.
 
Tubby...not that she is our Eve (but could be) but have you ever heard of Mitochondrial Eve?

For future reference...just for fun if interested see Nature, 1987, “Mitochondrial DNA and Human Evolution“, Cann, Stonekong, and Wilson; also in Nature, 2000, “Mitochondrial genome variation and the origin of Modern Humans“, Ingman, Kaessmann, Paaba, and Gyllensten

Paul
Of course but this research sets its origin tens of thousands of years ago. It hardly fits with your timeline.
 
Gen 4:19 Then Lamech took for himself two wives: the name of one was Adah, and the name of the second was Zillah. 20 And Adah bore Jabal. He was the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock. 21 His brother’s name was Jubal. He was the father of all those who play the harp and flute. 22 And as for Zillah, she also bore Tubal-Cain, an instructor of every craftsman in bronze and iron. And the sister of Tubal-Cain was Naamah.

23 Then Lamech said to his wives:

“Adah and Zillah, hear my voice;
Wives of Lamech, listen to my speech!
For I have killed a man for wounding me,
Even a young man for hurting me.
24 If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold,
Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.”

Lamech is clearly self-important by referring to himself in third person to his wives.

So Lamech is saying that his murderous activity is 11 times worse than the murder committed by his great-great-great grandfather?

What is his reasoning?
 
Gen 4:19 Then Lamech took for himself two wives: the name of one was Adah, and the name of the second was Zillah. 20 And Adah bore Jabal. He was the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock. 21 His brother’s name was Jubal. He was the father of all those who play the harp and flute. 22 And as for Zillah, she also bore Tubal-Cain, an instructor of every craftsman in bronze and iron. And the sister of Tubal-Cain was Naamah.

23 Then Lamech said to his wives:

“Adah and Zillah, hear my voice;
Wives of Lamech, listen to my speech!
For I have killed a man for wounding me,
Even a young man for hurting me.
24 If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold,
Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.”

Lamech is clearly self-important by referring to himself in third person to his wives.

So Lamech is saying that his murderous activity is 11 times worse than the murder committed by his great-great-great grandfather?

What is his reasoning?
Good analysis, good question.
 
Of course but this research sets its origin tens of thousands of years ago. It hardly fits with your timeline.

My timeline? BY now you should have realized I am not a strict literalist, and when I came to Christ I wrestled a bit with this unpopular position but I remain open to OEC...so my timeline and the standard accepted Genesis timeline are quite different. I do not limit it to a literal interpretation. I know this puts me outside the norm we will encounter here but I have no problem seeing "yom" (translated as day) as an undefined length of time...Moses himself uses it in many ways...

Take for example when we looked at Genesis 2:5 on...most take this as the 6th day being expounded on...but is it?

Where does day 6 end then and day 7 begin...did all those events including the making of Adam, Eve, additional animals, the tree encounter, the curse of the serpent and ground and the expulsion all take place in one literal 24 hour period?

Then again, literally following a day 7 could it have been a day 8? And day one, before their was a Sun for the earth to rotate in relation to....could have been "a day unto the Lord" and if so some could consider it 1,000 years but 1,000 is the highest number the Hebrew mind could conceive...they only thought in 1,000s and 1,000s of 1,000s but never millions or billions...God is the owner of the cattle of 1,000 hills...really? Not all the hills? NOt all the cattle? Yes ALL (way more than a literal 1,000)...

The timeline is but cannot be dogmatically determined....the point is that even science indicates all living humans alive on the earth all came from one original female host and she was totally human....
 
Gen 4:25 And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and named him Seth, “For God has appointed another seed for me instead of Abel, whom Cain killed.” 26 And as for Seth, to him also a son was born; and he named him Enosh.[c] Then men began to call on the name of the Lord.

I think Big Moose mentioned this earlier but I hadn't read this far in Genesis yet. This does make the city building by Cain seem quite odd to me as in this sequence of events there only existed one son of Adam when Cain built Enoch.

The only possible explanation would be that they had several other children between Able/Cain and Seth but why wouldn't they be mentioned in the bible?
 
They simply are not important to the lesson God is purveying...

The book of Genesis has a form...We see first a thesis like statement and and then it is expounded upon but then God goes back and picks out a person or event and then develops that until we come to the next vector which moves to the next offshoot and so on...

Ex. Genesis 1:1 (the Thesis)...carries until 2:4, but then concentrates on mankind until 3 (introduced the serpent and fall scenario)...Adam and Eve continue and then we have a part of the lives of Cain and Abel...and the affect of this, until Seth, then the discrepancy between these two specific lines (though there may have been more) until Enoch, Methuselah which leads to Noah, then from among his offspring we focus on Shem and among his generations Abraham and so on...the point is there are so many others and so much more going on that is not included...but that is because they are not in His purpose for giving us this information (which is going somewhere in human history...to the Christ events)...
 
Gen 4:25 And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and named him Seth, “For God has appointed another seed for me instead of Abel, whom Cain killed.” 26 And as for Seth, to him also a son was born; and he named him Enosh.[c] Then men began to call on the name of the Lord.

I think Big Moose mentioned this earlier but I hadn't read this far in Genesis yet. This does make the city building by Cain seem quite odd to me as in this sequence of events there only existed one son of Adam when Cain built Enoch.

The only possible explanation would be that they had several other children between Able/Cain and Seth but why wouldn't they be mentioned in the bible?
The scripture say so:

Genesis 5:4 (KJV)
And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:
 
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