the beginning of repentance: "then men began to call upon the name of the LORD"

genesis 4:25-26:
"and adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name seth: for god, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of abel, whom cain slew. and to seth, to him also there was born a son; and he called his name enos: then began men to call upon the name of the LORD."

the story of salvation begins anew with seth, in a line which luke's gospel will continue to "jesus himself." (3:23-38) the linage in its fullness begins with chapter five, but it has this little introduction, ending "then began men to call upon the name of the LORD."

this verse introduces a theme which will be of tamtamount importance through the rest of scripture. in exodus, when the name of the lord, forgotten in captivity, is revealed to moses, it is because, "the LORD said, . . . the cry of the children of israel is come unto me." (3:7-9) even in the dark days of the judges, when "every man did that which was right in his own eyes," (judges 21:25) ". . . when the children of israel cried unto the LORD, the LORD raised up a deliverer to the children of israel, who delivered them . . . " (3:9)

even so, seth, the son of adam, began to call upon the name of the LORD, and the great song of salvation began to rise in a mighty chorus for all those who have ears to hear.

the first geneology: the line of cain

genesis 4:16-24:

"and cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of nod, on the east of eden. and cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bare enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city, after the name of his son, enoch. and unto enoch was born irad: and irad begat mehujael: and mehujael begat methusael: and methusael begat lamech. and lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was adah, and the name of the other aillah. and adah bare jabal: he was the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle. and his brothers name was jubal: he was the father of all such as handle the harp and organ. and zillah, she also bare tubalcain, an instructer of every artificer in brass and iron: and the sister of tubalcain was naamah. and lamech said unto his wives, adah and zillah, hear my voice; ye wives of lamech, hearken unto my speech: for i have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt. if cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly lamech seventy and sevenfold."

genesis. "in the beginning." we read these titles of the first book of moses and in our simple, reductive way want to make this the book of the beginning of some one thing. now, ultimately and most importantly, it is the story of the beginning of two things: the beginning of creation, and the beginning of the holy one's redemption of creation in christ jesus, an event so important that matthew in his gospel will call it the regenesis (19:28). but that is a story with many threads of narrative, and they all start in genesis.

the first geneology will be that of cain, "who went out from the presence of the lord." it is interestingly enough from the line of cain that most of the things in which we most pride ourselves as "civilized" people originate: cities, tent-dwellers with cattle, harp and organ, artifice in brass and iron, and, in lamech's declaration to his wives, the idea that we can, in our own wisdom, act without consequences.

except for lamech's conceit, these things are not all wrong in themselves. but they are fruitless done "out from the presence of the lord." as david will recognize in psalm 127, david, who wanted to built a great city with a house for the holy one: "except the lord build the house, their labor is but lost that build it." indeed the ultimate or at least penultimate vision in the revelation to john is "the holy city, new jerusalem, coming down out of heaven . . . ."(21:2) the messiah will tent among us, and we will be his cattle, says john in his gospel. (1:14; 10:11) david, the clearest image of the messiah in the old testament, will tell how to redeem harp and organ and instruments of brass and iron, culminating the psalter with "praise ye the lord. . . . praise him with stringed instruments and organs. praise him with the loud cumbals; praise him upon the high sounding cymbals." (150:1, 4-5), an image paul will pick up in first corinthians, saying that without charity, we are sounding brass, or tinkling cymbal, nothing. (13:1-2)

and nothing is what becomes of the line of cain, "out of the presence of the lord." perhaps they are mentioned in the enigmatic passage about "giants in the earth" that leads to the story of noah. either way, the holy one will continue his story of redemption through the line of seth.

a note on cain's wife

cain's wife as a befuddlement to freshman bible students is a result of the odd way we have come to read genesis. few of us read genesis 1:25, "and god made the beast after his kind," and imagine, say, all the beasts descending from one great ur-bear. but when we read about man, we think of only two people, or maybe in the second story in the second chapter, one person.

we want to make adam a proper noun, when a better understanding might be earthlings, the human ones, made from the humous.

the transgression of the man and the woman was not so importantly a singular historical event, but the description, as much as we might wish otherwise, of how all of us earthlings, unhumble human ones, act when we are beguiled by the subleties of the serpent, the shiny one, unless we are living in the presence of the holy one.

by "coincidence" i am writing this essay on february 16th, the commemoration of st. juliana. ". . . the devil is said to have appeared to the saint as an angel of light. his aim was to persuade her that what she had renounced in the world [,marriage to a roman prefect,]was in fact good." (james bentley, a calendar of saints (new york: facts on file publications, 1986.))