man, born of woman.3: a crescendo of mercy

"and the Lord said unto cain, where is abel thy brother? and he said, i know not: am i my brothers keeper?
and he said, what hast thou done? the voice of thy brothers blood crieth unto me from the ground.
and now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brothers blood from thy hand;
when thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth.
and cain said unto the lord, my punishment is greater than I can bear.
behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall slay me.
and the lord said unto him, therefore whosoever slayeth cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the lord set a mark upon cain, lest any finding him should kill him." (genesis 4:7-15)

is there a more poignant question in any scripture than cain's: "am i my brother's keeper?" i would suggest that in the recognition of the proper answer to that question is all that is necessary for politics and ethics. nor is there a more bitter irony in any scripture than abel's blood which cries unto the holy one from the very ground which cain had tilled.

building is slow, destruction is swift, and sorrow does not restore. cain the farmer becomes a vagabond on the earth. no cain cries out, "my punishment is more than i can bear. . . . everyone that findeth me shall kill me." justice seldom seems so attractive when it is happening to ourselves as it does when it is happening to those with whom we are vexed. but cain does not meet the punishment he thinks he deserves. "the lord set a mark upon cain, lest any finding him should kill him." even over the cacophony plays the theme of the holy one's faithful mercy.

(the image above is a capital in the cathedral of st. lazare in autun, depicting a legend that cain was accidentally killed by the young tubalcain who mistook him for an animal.)

man, born of woman.2: the invention of murder

"and the Lord said unto cain, why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen?
if thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.
and cain talked with abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that cain rose up against abel his brother, and slew him." (genesis 4:6-8)

one of my favourite oscar wilde aphorisms, the theme of his amazing de profundis, is that all sin results from a lack of imagination. perhaps eve had not been able to imagine that any creature so glittery as the serpent would not speak gold.

cain, who had been his mother's favourite, now can imagine no other way to regain the holy one's respect than to kill his brother. he cannot imagine that he could, as the holy one tells him, rule over [sin]. rather than hearing the good news, "if thou doest well, shall thou not be accepted," he seems to think that if he is the only son, he will be the favourite son. so, he talks with his brother, takes him out to "the field," and murders him. in these few notes is already written the story of jesus' crucifixion, when, after the accusers talk to him, they take him outside the city to murder him.

into the joyous song of creation comes the dark cacophonic theme of murder, as well as the motif of adversity between the first- and second-born.

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.

an excursus on eating

so much happens in these first chapters of genesis that it's easy to let some of the "most important themes slip by unheard. so, i want to take a moment to think about the role of eating in genesis.

the second commandment is about food:

"and god said, behold, i have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.
and to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, i have given every green herb for meat: and it was so." (genesis 1:29-30)

(the first commandment, to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth" (genesis 1:28), is perhaps fulfilled, but in an unsatisfactory manner.)

so the man and the woman (it is not really accurate to call them adam and eve, since adam means both of them, male and female, and the name eve does not occur until after the fatal bite) sin by eating the forbidden fruit.

again and again eating, being fed, banqueting, or feasting will occur in the scriptural story. indeed the ultimate act of salvation will be celebrated in a holy meal.

songs between the acts: the begats

i try to be a minimalist, so i've never bought a copy, but my little branch of the one holy catholic and apostolic church publishes my pedigree. it lists my consecrating bishop richard's chief consecrator, and his chief consecrator adrian's chief consecrator, and so on all the way back to peter in antioch. peter was martyred in rome, and he may have been the bishop of rome, but he almost certainly was the bishop of antioch, and his chair is there to prove it. when each year in mid-january even the roman church celebrates the feast of peter's chair, it his chair in antioch that is remembered.

this is one of the meanings of apostolic succession: the physical reception of the power of the holy spirit to perform the office of a bishop by the laying-on-of-hands of previously consecrated bishops. there is another part, the nature of which can be a bit mor controversial: the passing on, the tradition, of the faith and teaching of the apostles. one of the specific parts of the teaching i received was the liturgy of sts. addai (thaddeus in the new testament) and mari (addai's barnabas, as it were). this liturgy, this work of the people of god, was widely spread in the first days of the church's going into all the world, being taken into persia, burma, and india. as we recite these ancient prayers still today, we gather "to remember that which we have received through tradition from [the father], rejoicing, glorifying, exalting, commemorating, and celebrating this great mystery of the passion, death, and resurrection of our lord jesus christ."

i take this somewhat backwards entry to discussing the "begats" because to many who call themselves christian they are perhaps even less interesting than the details of my apostolic succession. in the big church, however, apostolic succession is what assures church unity, and in a similar way it is the begats that assure the unity of the story of scripture. the new testament begins with the begats leading to jesus (and apostolic succession may be thought of as the spiritual begats after jesus). like themes in much great music, the begats start simply, and grow. so we find simply in the fourth chapter of genesis, "and adam knew eve his wife: and she conceived, and bare cain . . . ." (4:1) what follows is easy to understand as part of the same story that began innocently in the garden.

as the story grows longer, and more complicated, the acts are often separated by longer periods of time with fewer details. the begats that start matthew's gospel will lead all the way from abraham. luke's gospel takes them back to adam. but whever the song of the begats is sung, it reminds us that the acts it connects are part of the same great operatic story, assuring its unity. "and celebrating this great mystery of the passion, death, and resurrection of our lord jesus christ."

mis en scene: genesis 1:27-28

this passage says far more than one might wish.

"so god created man in his own image,
in the image of god created he him;
male and female created he them.
and god blessed them,
and god said unto them,
be fruitful, and multiply,
and replenish the earth and subdue it.
and have dominion over the fish of the sea,
and over the fowls of the air,
and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."

this is one of the most commented-upon passages in all scripture. these few sentences, which to some readers have seemed to describe a more-or-less self-evident situation, can also be very controversial. for many non- or anti- or even professing-christian environmentalists, they seem to be the reason for western, nominally "christian" civilization's trashing of creation. then there are christian apologists who defend the bible and argue that modern westeners have it all wrong. in fact there is even a green bible (new york: harpercollins, 2008), with all the words in green which support an environmentally aware reading of the texts.

i would point out merely two examples to suggest that the text is not responsible for our greedy subduing without replenishment. first there is the demise of the anasazi, a native american culture which should act better if our idea of the noble savage is correct, but who apparently acted just as greedily as we do and over-consumed themselves right out of existence without the benefit of this story. then there was the necessity for nineteenth-century capitalists to free themselves from any restraints of scripture, a desire that expressed itself as darwinism, which was well-described by nietzsche, and which led to the modern wonders of the war to end all wars, and then endless war.

(please note that what was most helpful to the expanding capitalism of the nineteenth century was not a theory of evolution. indeed, gregory of nyssa, commenting on genesis in the creation of man, had assumed an evolutionary working out of creation in the fourth century. but gregory's understanding was of creation, with a creator. nineteenth-century darwinism removed the creator from the mix. no longer were all men created in the image of god. if, say, the zulu had to be destroyed for the species to make progress, it could be written off as the survival of the fittest.)

in this passage of genesis is expressed the biblical understanding of humanity's place in the universe, a place the psalmist would find quite remarkable:

"what is man, that thou art mindful of him?
and the son of man, that thou visitest him?
thou madest him lower than the angels,
to crown him with glory and worship.
thou makest him to have dominion of the works of thy hands;
and thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet:
all sheep and oxen; yea, and the beasts of the field;
the fowls of the air, and the fishes of the sea;
and whatsoever walketh through the paths of the seas." (psalm 8:4-8)

it is a place we find difficult to accept, either yielding to the temptation to "be as gods" (genesis 3:5), or denying our responsibility: "am i my brother's keeper?" (genesis 4:9) these extremes of human behaviour are not limited to the early stories of genesis. still today we overreach ourselves, gleefully unleashing nuclear power, a force over which truly we are powerless. and we look around at global warming, demonstrably the result of human activity, and say, these are just natural cycles; no need for us to act responsibly.

"and god said unto them,
be fruitful, and multiply,
and replenish the earth and subdue it.
and have dominion over the fish of the sea,
and over the fowls of the air,
and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."

it is possible to look at the bible as the story of how poorly we have carried out these first commandments, with jesus the ultimate example of how it should be done.

an interlude: the music and the song

when i was born, my father bought me two gifts: a set of the american educator encyclopedia, and a speedo swim suit; whether he was encouraging a penchant for knowledge and near-nakedness, or minimalism, i'm not sure, but i still find the excess baggage of baggy swimwear silly, and i remember the end-papers of the encyclopedia vividly.

the endpapers showed the relative size of objects in the universe, described in powers of ten, with a hydrogen molecule as the smallest, the galaxy as the largest, and man right in the middle. i don't know how accurate this was, but it does reflect a good theological understanding of man's place in the universe in the biblical tradition.

indeed it is not only in the biblical tradition, but widely, that a human being is seen as a microcosm. the imago dei of genesis chapter one is also an image of the cosmos. between all the parts of creation there is a harmonic relationship. the pythagoreans understood this, and found it the basis of how we understand the universe; students at st. john's college in annapolis and santa fe start their education with pythagoras until this day.

if, however, the very nature of creation is musical, it does not therefore follow that there is only one song. so if i take the writings of the christian scriptures very seriously, and find in them a great song of the holy one's revelation to us, i am not claiming that this is the only way we can know god. indeed, it is the harmony between the revelation of creation (see my blog cycles of praise), the revelation of scripture, and ultimate the revelation in god the son, jesus christ, which verifies the truth of the song heard in scripture.

not all knowledge was contained within the volumes of the encyclopedia my father gave me at my birth. not everything we can know of god is contained in the book we believe our heavenly father gave us, either. but such gifts can be very good starts.