man, born of woman 1: the invention of religion

"and adam knew eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare cain, and said, i have gotten a man from the lord. and she again bare his brother abel. and abel was a keeper of sheep, but cain was a tiller of the ground. and in process of time it came to pass, that cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the lord. and abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. and the lord had respect unto abel and to his offering: but unto cain and to his offering he had not respect. and cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell." (genesis 4:1-5)

our history begins. the woman, now named eve, "the mother of all," mothers: ". . . she conceived, and bare cain, and said, i have gotten a man from the lord. and she again bare his brother abel, and able was a keeper of sheep, but cain was a tiller of the ground."

the first first born, the first two brothers, the first favourite son. now it is the woman who names, and cain's name is a proud statement of achievement while abel's means at best merely "brother" and perhaps merely "futile."

the futile second brother seems to ignore the curse on the ground, not eating of it but becoming a shepherd, precurser to david and the messiah.

hard-working, brow-sweating cain, however, tills the ground and invents religion: "cain brought of the fruit of the ground and offering unto the lord."

much of the strength of these stories is their spare emptiness. one of the few things helpful that i learned in seminary is that the why question is seldom helpful. this story does not present us with whys.

so we speculate, perhaps, why cain made this offering. he is not told to. leon cass, in one of the most insightful readings of genesis i have found, the beginning of wisdom, suggests that cain must have thought the holy one like himself, and hungry. (noah, released from the ark, also ". . . builded an altar unto the lord . . . and offered burnt offerings on the altar" (gen. 8:30), and in what can be seen as the ultimate ironic fulfillment of this passage as prophecy, jesus, released from the tomb, will prepare for the disciples "a fire of coals . . . , and fish laid thereon, and bread." (john 21:9))

"and abel, he also brought the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. and the lord had respect unto abel and to his offering: but unto cain and his offering he had not respect. and cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell."

i am tempted toward theodicy here, to quote later scriptures about the holy one's knowing the hearts of men (a theme which also crops in john's gospel (2:24-25)), but the text does not say anything about what the holy one knows about the brothers' hearts or why he respects one's sacrifice and not the others'. rather, i will suggest this story shows how limited man's knowledge is. we are, as eve said, "beguiled" by "shiny things" (the hebrew name for serpents), and nothing seems so shiny to us as our own good ideas about religion.