Cain and Abel (Genesis 4-5)

[Gen. 4:]

Cain is the older brother, a farmer. Abel tends sheep. Cain offers God some fruit for sacrifice; Abel serves up lamb. God likes the lamb better (throughout the Bible, we'll be hearing a lot about how God loooves him some animal fat).

Cain, feeling snubbed, perhaps overreacts a bit by deciding to murder Abel. Wow. Where'd that come from? Well, no Fulbright Scholar he, Cain goes on to lie to God about the killing. Considering that in human history there have now lived only three people aside from the murder victim, you know God has to be working from a pretty short list of suspects. Indeed, he susses out Cain's guilt right away, because, "the voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground."

And so Cain is banished to the land of Nod, and given a special mark (left undescribed) which will serve to identify him as a pariah/untouchable to anyone he encounters. This business with the mark might seem unnecessary, as the only two other people on earth are Cain's parents. However. Cain gets the mark, and he heads on to Nod.

...And he has a son there with his wife? Where did she come from? Well, we've all heard about this before: it's one of the most famous bits of nonsense in the Bible, so I won't dwell on it too long.

[I suppose it's possible that there could be extra people on earth if we took Genesis 2 at face value and held that there were two separate creations of humans - one where lots of people got made (Gen. 1:26-29), then a second creation in the garden of Eden (Gen. 2:7). But really that just causes more problems. For one thing, not all of humanity would be subject to Adam and Eve's fall from grace anymore (not that the Bible really discusses original sin as such. That was St. Augustine's bag, and it largely came into fashion in the 300s CE).]

At any rate, Cain and this wife of his create a lineage of colorful folks, like "Jubal... the father of all those who play the lyre and pipe." Really? Nobody plays the lyre and pipe except descendants of Jubal? That seems a little hard to swallow in light of the fact that in a minute here, God is going to exterminate every human being on earth save eight: and none of those eight is Jubal or a descendant of Jubal. So nobody plays the lyre or the pipe after the flood? Or raises cattle and lives in tents (the descendants of Cain's grandson Jabal)? Or forges bronze and iron instruments (the descendants of Cain's grandson Tubal-cain)?

It would seem that I'm picking nits here, and I am. But the general idea that early human culture and economic activity are developing among the Noddites, would seem to be undermined by the fact of their imminent extinction.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Adam and Eve have another son, named Seth.

[Gen. 5:]

This is a chapter of the famous "X begat Y begat Z" variety. I think this basically covers it:

(The numbers indicate how many years each person lived.)

(Oh, pardon the messiness of this handwritten family tree. I drew it up, like, 12 years ago, and it seemed amusing to put it to some use after all that time.)