Genesis 4--The End Result of Dystopia

Lamech said to his wives,
"Adah and Zillah,
Listen to my voice,
You wives of Lamech,
Give heed to my speech,
For I have killed a man for wounding me;
And a boy for striking me;
If Cain is avenged sevenfold,
Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold."

Yippee.

I crushed a soda can on my forehead once--does that make me a man, or the crushing of said soda can holy?

Let me give you a postmodern version of this assinine fallacy: "The United States has vanquished the nation of Panama for threatening a dozen of its citizens. If our ancestors were avenged for the deaths of hundreds in great wars, we will be even more greatly avenged for the deaths of one or two Americans in small wars."

I hate to break this to those of you out there who are unconditionally "rah-rahing" the military and political actions of this country on the basis of its so-called Judeo-Christian heritage, but I seriously doubt that the Founding Fathers (many of whom were Freemasons and/or Deists) were in tune with the cross of Christ when they wrote the Constitution. After all, this same Constitution classified African Americans in terms of fractions (3/5 of a person) and (initially) limited the hallowed franchise of voting to anyone with a substantially large portion of landed property. The Bill of Rights (which so many of us remember and cherish) did not originally appear in the Constitution but was a compromise to ensure that the 13 colonies would actually support it (hence the reason that the Bill of Rights is a set of 10 amendments (not articles) at the end of the Constitution).

I won't grouse about the inability of women to vote (personally, I think the American woman's voting record during the past 70 years leaves much to be desired) or about the ill-treatment of the first peoples who lived in the continental United States (who were not, contrary to PC education, pacifistic nomads who elected to walk meekly into oblivion), but I think that any honest treatment of American history should account for the fact that, in New Testament terms, this nation did not begin with the kind of "Christian" roots that conservative religious public figures depict in their lofty, wistful encomiums of "the good old days." Christ was right when he said to Peter that those who live by the sword die by the sword, but unfortunately, those few short words seem to have disappeared from many of our nation's churches, Christian schools, and ministries. Instead, it is "America, God's nation," and damn to hell anyone else who gets in our way.

Let me ask you something: Do you honestly think that the example Jesus set for us in the Gospels bears an iota of resemblance to this nonsensical hoopla? I'm not judging those of you who care about our country's well-being (as do I), but I am (emphatically) pointing out that the cross of Christ Jesus destroys for anyone who takes on the name of Christ Jesus the luxury of living up to any standard that is lower than the one set by Christ Jesus himself. Did you see Christ hitting people in the Gospels? Avenging himself on anyone? Even defending himself when he was accused? (I'm sure someone will be willing to take some verses out of context to prove me wrong, but be warned: if you do, realize that my knowledge of the Bible is as good as yours.)

There may not be a line of Cain (see Genesis 6-8 for an explanation of that), but there is a legacy of Cain. We are no less violent and wicked today than Cain's descendants were, and as the following chapters will show, we are no less potential objects of God's wrath today than our spiritual "ancestors" 6000 years ago.

Let us never forget that--and let us ever be mindful that Christ's mercy (which is God's mercy) should never be mistaken as a sign of weakness.

A Few Notes on the Desacralization of Christ in the American Church

de·sa·cral·ize(d-skr-lz, -skr-)
tr.v. de·sa·cral·ized, de·sa·cral·iz·ing, de·sa·cral·iz·es
To divest of sacred or religious significance.

For the past few days, my wife and I have been listening to episodes of Adventures in Odyssey, a radio show for children centered on a small town (called Odyssey) and an ice cream shop owner who also serves as the town's resident Christian evangelist. I first heard this show on the radio a couple of years ago and liked it, so I was excited to discover that my wife and her family have been collecting episodes for years (they have over 20 albums of audiocassettes). Not only has the character development in these episodes been strong (one of my measuring sticks for quality in an entertainment product), but my wife and I have been very pleased with the way that Bible topics are handled by the producers of the show.

Which is why we found ourselves wondering what in the world those same producers were thinking as we listened to a 2 part recreation of the birth of Christ that denuded the story of any of the major miraculous events associated with the coming of our Savior into the world and reduced it to . . . a birth as ordinary, terrifying, and uncomfortable for the mother as any childbirth could be. All of the points of interest in the Nativity--the Annunciation (the angel bringing the news to Mary that she would conceive a child), Joseph's decision to keep Mary as his wife after hearing from an angel that her conception was truly immaculate (i.e. that it took place without sexual intercourse), the appearance of the chorus of angels to the shepherds tending their flocks outside Bethlehem--were either recounted secondhand or simply omitted from the story. Even the star, that great wonder that guided the three Magi to the Christ child, was lost in the parade of inane innkeepers, predatory Roman soldiers, and mad Zealots. Ultimately, the birth of Jesus was treated simply as yet another Third World birth--in a cave, accompanied by terrified screams from the mother.

This is not a critique of Adventures in Odyssey--as I said, my wife and I love the show--but it is an example of something I find very disturbing in the way that postmodern Christianity presents Christ. With no awe, no wonder, and perhaps not even a sincere acceptance of Jesus' claims about himself, churches present Christ as a "buddy," an "ordinary guy" who, in his common-ness, is supposedly "relevant" to a culture of "ordinary guys" (and, presumably, "ordinary girls") who stumble, pee, and worry about their relationships. The lessons that we learn in many Protestant Sunday School classes, if my wide experience with Protestant churches serves, is not about the awesome qualities of God-made-flesh-dwelling-among-us but about the relevance of a particular parable or quotation from Jesus (usually taken out of context) to a "real world" situation in our own lives in which we, in essence, should be nicer than we are to others.

I'm a fan of being nice to people (in fact, my wife says--and she's right--that I'm too nice to people), but that, ultimately, is neither the message nor the heart of the New Testament. The Christ of the Gospels was more than a schoolmarm who wanted everyone in his neighborhood to be nice to each other. (Otherwise, why would generations of his followers have died--willingly--on crosses, in coliseums, and in torture chambers of every size and description?)

The crux of the New Testament, and indeed of the entire Bible, is this: Is Jesus the rightful owner of your body, mind, and soul?

A nice guy, a good teacher, even a morally inspiring public figure, may be worth my attention and may even inspire my respect, but unless he or she was responsible for creating me, I cannot consider that person to be the rightful owner of my very being. There has to be more, something that proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that this person is indeed the rightful owner of my body, mind, and soul--not merely the artful presentation of ideas, not merely even signs and wonders, but a quality, a something that echoes throughout every cell inside me and says, with a voice of thunder, "This is he who knit me together in my mother's womb!"

When I began to read the Gospels, to really read the Gospels, I knew in my heart that when I was listening to the words of Christ, I was listening to the words of my Creator. It is not something I can explain--it just was. This man who walked on the Earth 2000 years ago and taught and healed and blessed as many poor, indigent, and lost souls as he could get his hands on owned me.

I wish that so many more people, indeed so many more churches, would rediscover this amazing quality of wonder and joy that I have in my life now whenever I hear even the name "Jesus." To some of you, that may seem childlike or even naive, and if so, perhaps you would do well to read the following:

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?"

He called a little child and had him stand among them, and he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven."

Matthew 18:1-4

It is this childlike sense of awe and wonder, this innocent submissiveness, that postmodern American churches, by and large, have failed to foster. When, after all, was the last time that you heard an inspiring message on the raising of Lazarus from the dead? Or the healing of a woman who had suffered hemorrhages for 12 years? Or the raising of the synagogue leader's little girl from the dead? I am dismayed at the possibility that, until the production of The Passion of the Christ (a movie produced, incidentally, by a Roman Catholic), many lifelong Protestants in the United States could not bring themselves to grasp the horror and wonder of the Cross. (Indeed, I fear that a large portion of American Christians walked into theaters and reacted with evaluative judgments regarding the "accuracy" of the film . . . much as the Judean crowds, soldiers, and Pharisees reacted to the real thing with evaluative judgments of Christ Himself.)

Again, this is not a commentary--favorable or otherwise--on a Christian entertainment product (personally, I found The Jesus Film to be far more compelling, spiritually and cinematically), but it is a commentary on the rather un-childlike way with which we approach Christ, his Bible, and his Church. A 4 year-old receives the wonder of the birth of Christ into the world--the chorus of angels, the fulfillment of prophecy, the star and the wise men--with all the wide-eyed gladness it is due . . . but the 40, 50, and 60 year-olds who are busily telling the story seem to have lost that wide-eyed gladness in themselves.

Is it because we are caught up in the cynicism of a workaday world in which people "compete" with each other for goods and services? Are we stupid enough to believe that our salaries, our mortgages, and our material wants are worth revolving our lives around? Do we honestly think that the wonder-filled joy of a child is somehow "beneath" us?

How sad.

The Line of Cain (continued)

Lamech married two women, one named Adah and the other Zillah. Adah gave birth to Jabal--he was the father of those who live in tents and raise livestock. His brother's name was Jubal--he was the father of all who play the harp and flute. Zillah also had a son, Tubal-Cain, who forged all kinds of tools out of bronze and iron. Tubal-Cain's sister was Naamah.

I delayed writing this post because of something I will discuss at length below, but first, I think it is important for us to remember that according to the Genesis account, the line of Cain ended with the Flood.

This is of vital significance to our understanding the above passage, as it renders null and void a literal reading of "father" (i.e. the ancestor of a line of people). Jabal was not, in any sense, considered in the ancient Israeli mind to be the ancestor of a race of people with the "innate" knowledge of living in tents and raising livestock. Jubal, likewise, was not, in any sense, considered to be the ancestor of a race of people with an exclusive talent for playing the harp and flute.

A healthier reading of this passage from Genesis 4 should take into account the possibility that Jabal and Jubal were the first to do the things that they did, as Tubal-Cain was (perhaps) the first to forge tools out of bronze and iron (though the passage does not explicitly state this), but they passed on the skills they learned to others, perhaps even others outside their clan. It should be inferred here, as I have hinted in previous posts, that the descendants of Cain represent a departure from the kind of nomadic, agrarian lifestyle that Cain's father and brother Abel had pursued. Left without recourse to the fruit of the ground, Cain and his descendants would have had to invent ways to eke out a living for themselves--primarily by selling skills they had honed from non-agrarian pursuits.

We today have a term for this exchange of special services for food or other goods: capitalism. Yes, I know some of you balk at the idea that capitalism has anything to do with the line of Cain, but I would like to point out 2 things: (1) that capitalism has never, even from its outset, depended on the production of fruits and vegetables for its commerce and (2) that one of the hallmarks of capitalism is the creation of so-called "industrial centers" . . . otherwise known as cities. Capitalism prides itself on inventiveness--"new" goods, "new" services, "new" and "improved" technologies--to the extent that farming itself is becoming more and more unusual in our culture (or, at least, farming as it was done for centuries upon centuries before the mid-1800s). The family-owned pasture or homestead has given way to the corporately owned franchise, which sells processed foods of dubious nutritional value to a public that, in general, knows little about the raising and harvest of agricultural goods.

It is this sort of impersonal relationship, the cold exchange of dubious services for personal gain, that is represented in the above passage from Genesis 4. Cain was a murderer--and he passed on the callousness toward human life he had nurtured within his own soul to an entire line of descendants. Thus, even though the direct line of Cain's descendants ended with the destruction of the human race by floodwater, he still has "children" even to this day.

Lamech married two women, one named Adah and the other Zillah.

Here we come to the crux of what I have been wrestling with in regard to this text.

My wife and I have talked off and on about the merits of monogamy and polygamy ever since we first met, and each of us has done our share of reading on the topic (much of it either inconclusive or, to our minds, untrustworthy). It is no secret that polygamy constitutes a large number of the marriages within the Hebrew Bible--Abraham, Jacob, Esau, Judah, Joseph, Moses, King David, and so on--and while Christians often quote the following passage from Genesis 2 to support monogamy (as well as several other scriptures), there are plenty of other verses from the Old Testament that describe God as "blessing" someone with many wives:

For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

This passage is mentioned by Jesus in the New Testament (see the Gospel of Matthew), which prompts many Christian Bible students--amateur or professional--to say that monogamy is God's ideal (or perfect) will for the human race. In fact, St. Paul seems to confirm this view when he says in his first letter to Timothy that elders and deacons should be husbands of only one wife.

However . . .

One thing my wife and I have learned over the years is that whenever we read a biblical exegesis (or reading/study of a particular Bible passage or topic), we need to consider the attitude of the author as well as what the author says. Paul was writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit when he wrote those words to Timothy, and Jesus was speaking the word of truth when he quoted Genesis 2:24 to the Pharisees who were trying to trick him into saying something repulsive about marriage and divorce . . . but what about the Christian writers 20 centuries later who quote those verses in their publications and on the internet?

I agree with the position that monogamy is God's ideal for marriage--after all, the Bible does explicitly say that God created one man and one woman--but I am troubled at the extent to which this position is argued in Christian circles out of fear. Christianity is, in general, losing its once total hold over the culture of the United States, and I think that, for many people, the prospect of a nation (and indeed a world) in which Christianity is no longer a dominant religion represents a serious challenge to their faith. But Christianity's growth through the first thousand years of its existence had less to do with popularity than with truth, and therefore, our arguments, whatever they may be, must have their basis in truth and conviction, not fear and self-interest.

I love my wife (she is the only woman I have ever loved, at least in that sense), and I know, deep within my soul, that the moment we began to interact sexually was the moment that God began to look upon us as "married." Maybe he always looked upon us that way--it is my view, at least, that from the moment of our birth we were designed to be together--but whatever the case, our union was not consummated until we began to interact sexually. Both of us understood, at least unconsciously, that a sexual union was the end of "singleness" and the beginning of "marriage," in God's sight if in no one else's, which explains for us, in part, why we never gave ourselves in that way to anyone else.

Not many couples, married or not, take sexuality this seriously, but we do, and I wish that everyone else in our culture did as well. Think about it: If you were to understand yourself as "married" to someone you had given yourself to 10 or 15 years ago, even for only one night, I think you would also understand the extent to which you may have had to cut off the natural yearnings of your body and/or soul for that person in order to remain faithful to your current spouse. That is the power of sexuality--it unites us spiritually with another person as fully as it does emotionally and physically, and I am not convinced that in God's eyes we ever stop being "married" to that other person.

I am not saying that if you lost your virginity to someone you did not eventually marry, you are damned to a life of constant yearnings and temptations to infidelity--as I said, if you are in Christ, I believe the Holy Spirit is more than capable of rendering you a loyal, and monogamous, spouse--but I am saying that in God's eyes, the giving of our bodies and souls to others, in whatever guise, is deadly serious business. If you give your body away to someone, under any circumstances, you had better be certain that it is an act of love and holiness, because if it isn't, you may still find yourself bound to that person--for better or worse.

Genesis 4--The Line of Cain

So Cain went out from the LORD's presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden.

Yes.

And I realize that much Christian editorializing has gone into this verse, to the effect that Cain's descendants founded the civilization that later became known as Babylon--but this ignores one fundamental point, of great significance to our comprehension of the story as it was recited and understood by the ancient Israelis 3000 years ago: The descendants--or line--of Cain ended with the destruction of the human race by flood.

(For further information on this event, see Genesis 6-8, which we will discuss at greater length in a few posts.)

Noah, who we will cover later, was descended from another ancestor--Seth--and therefore did not pass on either the line of Cain or the so-called "mark" of Cain . . . which begs the question: Why even mention this family line at all, since it is not the one traced throughout the book of Genesis?

Simple: Cain's family line exemplifies everything that the Israelis were taught not to be.

Cain lay with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Cain was then building a city, and he named it after his son Enoch. To Enoch was born Irad, and Irad was the father of Mehujael, and Mehujael was the father of Methushael, and Methushael was the father of Lamech.

Two things to note here, and then an aside:

1. Cain built a city--a rather strange thing to do for someone who had spent his entire life tilling and cultivating the soil. However, remember that the previous verses of chapter 4, Cain had been banished from the soil; in essence, his livelihood was destroyed because of his cold-blooded murder of Abel, his brother. In order to eat, and in order to make a life for himself, Cain was reduced to other crafts and trades.

Throughout human history, the endeavor to build cities, and more fundamentally, ways of living outside of farming, has brought about a great many advances, but it has also, I fear, done a great deal of damage to the human soul. It seems we are at our best when we are tied in some way to the soil, a fact recognized (and celebrated) in many of our greatest works of art, music, and literature. When we walk away from the soil, when we "say goodbye" to close-knit communities in which men and women have tilled the ground for generations, we lose a sense of respect for the wonders of the creation that we were always designed to steward (see previous blog entries on Genesis 1 and 2).

The argument that human beings should be able to abandon the feeding and care of livestock and the growing and harvesting of plants for "higher pursuits" is, at its heart, fatuous. What higher pursuit could there be than to dedicate one's physical, mental, and spiritual energy toward making things grow? And what greater metaphor could we have for the necessity of cultivating holistic spiritual, mental, and physical vitality in our families, our communities, and ourselves than in the simple miracle of a seed germinating into beautiful, productive life?

An inability to comprehend the importance of agriculture will, inevitably, lead to a civilization's decline, and a culture that abandons all pretense of agriculture will, in the process, I fear, abandon all pretense of real warmth and understanding in its households and communities.

2. Cain's family line was short. We do not hear of anyone after Lamech, and probably for good reason. In Genesis 6-8, the Israelites preserved an account, recited from memory over dozens of generations, of a great flood which destroyed every member of the human race--except for one family. This family, the family of Noah, was not descended from the line of Cain but from the line of Seth, another one of Adam and Eve's sons.

Which brings up another important question, and one I want to address here:

Where did Cain find a wife?

The answer, I think, should be obvious--if only we could, for a moment, look past our own rather benighted concepts of marriage to a culture in which the union of husband and wife was the union of two families. The ancient Israelis, like almost every other human civilization on Earth before 1900, had a keen understanding of marriage's implications, that it was the union of two souls as well as two bodies and minds. Therefore, to them, it was deadly serious business, with potentially devastating consequences for both bride and groom if lightly undertaken.

Ancient Israeli families, like the families of many other pre-Industrial cultures, were very careful about making sure their children had spouses who loved them and who brought out their best qualities . . . and this is the reason why marriages were, for the most part, arranged in ancient Israeli society. What better way to assure that your son or daughter will find a mate you can trust with their welfare than to look for suitable spouses in your local community, neighborhood, or family?

Yes, family--fathers and mothers often arranged marriages between 2nd or 3rd cousins, and sometimes even between people who were related more closely, with an interest in maintaining family traditions or simply in protecting the physical, mental, and spiritual welfare of their children, and so it would not have been as difficult for them to imagine where Cain's wife might have come from during the recitation of this chapter than it seems to be for us.

I doubt that Cain married his sister, as some Christian writers have argued, but almost certainly, he married a niece--and while this offends every sensibility of the postindustrial, postmodern mind, I would like to remind you that while we may find the marital practices of the ancients repugnant, we cannot escape the conclusion, given the state of our own culture today, that their marital practices were, on the whole, better than our own.

Consider, if you will, the standard scenario that our culture considers "normal" today: Young men and women, upon entering puberty, are expected, without guidance from their parents or elders, to be wise in the application of their sexual desires. Predictably, they do what anyone in their situation would do--they make decisions based on their own fantasies rather than on a clear estimation of their personalities and needs.

Therefore, the story we often recognize as "acceptable" in our culture goes something like this: These young men and women begin to date absolute strangers, often without bothering to tell their parents what is happening and how they feel about it. Dating leads to a "relationship"--which can involve sex, but more often involves the loss of emotional virginity--and these "relationships," which have not been grounded on the basis of mutual needs, beliefs, and interests, end in what we euphemistically term a "breakup."

Unfortunately, in too many cases, the cycle simply repeats itself, until the son or daughter in question finds someone he or she "might marry," who is then subjected to the obligatory family "interview" (which is often simply a rubber stamp for whatever the child actually wanted). If the "interview" (usually no more than 2 hours) is successful, then engagement and marriage ensue shortly thereafter.

This scenario is extremely dangerous for the people involved in these relationships because often, they are not afforded an adequate review of their romance by those who know and care for them the most. The reason we have a 60% divorce rate within the United States is that we do not invest enough time and energy in training our children to approach every potential relationship with the opposite sex as if it were a decision of grave importance. Instead, we allow our children, in the absence of our own accumulated wisdom, to soak up fantasies about love and marriage that ultimately lead them, if they (and we) are not careful, to a union with someone that neither we nor they can trust.

Think about it: If you have a son or daughter, who you spent 20 years of your life training, feeding, and fixing band-aids for, wouldn't you want to make sure that son or daughter marries someone you know will give them the same love, care, and dedication that you did?

Genesis 4--The Curse of Cain

Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is Abel your brother?"

And he said, "I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper?"

He said, "What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to Me from the ground. Now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you cultivate the ground, it will no longer yield its strength to you. You will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth."

Cain said to the LORD, "My punishment is too great to bear! Behold, You have driven me this day from the face of the ground, and from Your face I will be hidden, and I will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me."

So the LORD said to him, "Therefore whoever kills Cain, vengeance will be taken on him sevenfold "

And the LORD appointed a sign for Cain, so that no one finding him would slay him.

2 things to note from the dialogue here:

1. The same rebellion in Adam and Eve's response to God's questioning of their actions manifests itself in Cain's initial response to God--except that Cain's response is more openly hostile, while his parents' responses simply amounted to fearful (and rather ill-conceived) attempts to distract God's attention from themselves. Therefore, God's response to Cain--depriving him of home, soil, and livelihood--is far more harsh than his response to Adam and Eve.

Apparently, in Israeli culture, there were degrees of rebellion. We will explore what these degrees may have been at greater depth later, but for now, it is important for us to observe that to God, the attitude of the heart is more important than the words of the mouth.

2. This is the second example we find in the Torah of human beings attempting--and failing--to hide their sins from an all-powerful, and all-seeing God, and it will not be the last. The ancient culture that produced the Torah understood the importance of educating its children to fear and respect God--and how better to do so than by reciting, in as many variations as possible, the methods and creativity applied by various individuals to the project of deceiving God? As we have seen, however, even God's questions (such as "Where are you?" in Genesis 3 and "Where is your brother?" in this chapter) are leading questions--God's way of allowing the perpetrators of sin a chance to come clean.

Unfortunately, the postmodern era in which we live seems as likely to heed the warnings of the Torah in this regard as the ancient Israelis were 3000 years ago.