Old Testament Quandary: Cain and a Population Explosion

The Old Testament – the Christian version of the Hebrew Scriptures – can be a little tough to read and interpret at times. Contradictions seem to appear; stories are sometimes duplicated; the ancient customs can seem impenetrable. Recently, I received these really good questions about the story of Cain in Genesis 4:

 In Genesis, Cain is banished after murdering Abel. He enters the land of Nod, marries and begins a family and his lineage. If Adam, Eve, Cain and Abel are the only four humans at this point, who are these people in Nod? Where did they come from? Do they precede Adam and  Eve? Do they know God? Do they know about Adam and Eve? Do Adam and Eve know about them?

Like I said, the Old Testament can present us with some challenges!

Genesis is part of the Pentateuch, and along with Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy make up the five books of the Hebrew Scripture known as the Torah. For the most part, when we look at a book today we think of it as something written all at once. Even if it is an anthology or collection, it is put together with an eye toward a unified whole. The Torah, however, is less like a novel and more like a scrapbook. It is more like chicken soup and less like a chicken dinner. It is more like a quilt, made up of diverse pieces, than it is a blanket woven into a singular cloth.

Think of it this way: Thousands of years ago, before there was paper or pen, and definitely before printing presses and copy machines, people clung to wisdom and knowledge through stories that were passed on from generation to generation. Now, you might be thinking, well how can you trust memory like that? Remember that you and I are conditioned to rely on writing and recording information we want to keep. Today we “know” things by collecting facts and records. Ancient people had only memory and they way they possessed and passed on knowledge was through stories. Getting the stories right was the job of the head of the family or the priest.

The stories in the Torah are not meant to provide an historical account of events. (Forgetting this is why people get distracted and stuck on questions about “creationism” and evolution). Ancient stories passed on wisdom and answers to really important questions. Why do we die? Why do people hate snakes? Where did the world come from? Why are people mean to each other? Most important: What about God? The creation story is about “who” and not “how.”

As the Hebrew people became the nation of Israel, the differing traditions and stories of the people came together and were shared. By the time the Torah was written down, the various stories were collected and brought together like patches for a quilt. The genius of those who did this over time, was truly a work of the Spirit. Like a quilt, the people who brought together the stories kept them all and chose to accept the contradictions and diversity of thought.

When you come across a place in the Torah that presents a question like we have with the Cain story, you are probably encountering a seam where stories have been joined together. If the Bible had been put together by Random House, this would be a really terrible job of editing. However, when holy stories, passed on from generation to generation are being stitched together, reverence for the Spirit of God in the story leads to keeping bumps instead of smoothing everything away. You can see this evident in other places.

• Genesis 1 is the creation story from one source. Genesis 2 tells the story from another perspective.
• In Genesis 6:19, Noah is instructed to take “two of every kind” of creature into the ark. In Genesis 7:2, the instruction is to take seven pairs. Two tradition meet and a seam is formed.

I think the “seam” you have discovered in your question is how the “quilter” worked to join the stories about the fall and murder into the stories about how the generations that led to Noah came to be. I don’t think there is a concern here to join Adam and Eve to the people in Nod, other than through Cain’s wandering. In just a few verses, we will see that a relationship with God has mostly disappeared from humanity.

That is the “short” (though not very) answer to this question. Hope it helps.

 

© 2017 Timothy V. Olson. All rights reserved.