Aside from being a source of many movie titles, the reading I looked at this morning, Genesis 4:1-6, also tells the story of the first sibling rivalry and the first murder. Thankfully for the human race, these two things don't always go together.
It's not impossible that Cain and Abel may represent the conflicts between wandering herdsmen and the first farmers, who settled in the fertile crescent in the fourth millennium BCE. It would be unsurprising if the new growers of crops took exception to herds wandering over their land, or if traditional herdsmen didn't object to farmers planting and ploughing their flock's pastures. Of course this doesn't mean the story isn't true, because the story is about Cain and Abel's relationship with God, and therefore about our relationship with God, whether it is a story of two actual brothers or a metaphor for two groups of people.
When Adam and Eve eat the fruit of the tree, and are confronted by God, they have no idea what's coming next. They feel guilt and shame for the first time, and try to pass the buck. The man blames the woman, the woman blames the serpent, but they tell God what actually happened, though they try to spin it to their own advantage. When Cain interacts with God, there's been a move on in mankind's thought. Cain knows that his parents were punished for wrongdoing, and he expects a certain kind of response from God. He second-guesses what God is going to do.
Each of the brothers brings an offering to God, who "looks with favour" on Abel's meat, but isn't so pleased with Cain's fruit and veg. The Biblical account doesn't tell us why, though if this is a moral story told by generations of wandering herdsmen, that may account for it! The important thing is Cain's reaction. He's angry, and he sulks. He assumes that God doesn't love him as much as He loves Abel, he assumes that God is going to keep on finding fault with him. But God says, "No. If you do what's right, then everything is going to be fine." At this point, God is reassuring Cain. "Just don't fall into sin," He says, "and everything will be OK."
But Cain doesn't listen to God's reassurance and advice. He assumes that God loves Abel more, so the best way to stop that happening is to make sure Abel isn't around. He takes his brother out into the fields and kills him. And he assumes that God doesn't know. When he's questioned by God, he doesn't do what his parents did and try to spin the truth, he avoids answering the question altogether. "Why should I know where Abel is?" he asks. Anyone who's ever confronted a child with evidence of wrongdoing and received a shrug in return can picture exactly what Cain is doing. But of course God knows, and He tells Cain that He knows.
And then Cain does it again. He assumes what God will do. "Oh right," he says, "that's it. I'm a dead man." Cain tells God what He is going to do - cast him from His presence, and then he'll be killed. But God can't be predicted and second-guessed like that. "Oh no Cain," says God, "you're not going to be killed." And God puts a mark on him, so that he won't be murdered by anyone. And Cain goes off, east of Eden, marries and has a family. Of course, it's not impossible that it's a worse punishment to live your whole life with the guilt of murdering your brother, than to be quickly killed in retribution, which is why the mark of Cain is sometimes called the "curse of Cain". Cain is condemned to life imprisonment in his own personal jail of guilt and regret.
What about us? Do we make assumptions about what God will do, about how He feels, about what we deserve? Do we decide that because things aren't going so well, that means God no longer loves us? Do we believe that we've somehow got away with wrongdoing, that nobody noticed, that it doesn't really count? Or do we decide what our punishment should be, and fail to hear what God says about the punishment for sin? Do we second-guess God, try to remake Him in our image, make Him less loving or more vengeful or more absent? Or do we come before Him with the kind of offering He wants, and believe in His goodness and mercy?
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