goodness, and for the multitude of Thy mercies do away mine offences. O
God, great is the abundance of Thy sweetness. Blessed are all they that
hope in Thee. After the darkness Thou bringest in the light; and pain is
converted into joy. Thou repayest a thousand for a hundred, and for a
thousand thou givest ten thousand. For the least things, Thou rewardest
with the greatest things; and for temporal joys, Thou givest those that
are eternal. Blessed are they that keep Thy statutes, and bend their
necks to Thy yoke. They shall dwell in Thy tabernacle and rest upon Thy
holy hill. They shall be denizens of Thy courts with Thee, whose roofs
shine above gold and precious stones. Blessed are they who believe in
the triune God, and will to know His ways. We all sing, Glory to the
Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, and we magnify our God.
As in the beginning the angels sang, so shall we now and ever, and in
ages of ages. Amen.”[95]
Manasseh Ben-Israel has preserved a prophecy of Adam, that the world is
to last seven thousand years. He says this secret was handed down from
Adam to Enoch, and from Enoch to Noah, and from Noah to Shem.[96]
At Hebron is a cave, “which,” says an old traveller, “Christians and
Turks point out as having been the place where Adam and Eve bewailed
their sins for a hundred years. This spot is towards the west, in a
valley, about a hundred paces from the Damascene field; it is a dark
grotto, not very long or broad, very low, in a hard rock, and not
apparently artificial, but natural. This valley is called _La valle de
Lagrime_, the Vale of Tears, as they shed such copious tears over their
transgressions.”[97]
Abu Mohammed Mustapha Ben-Alschit Hasen, in his Universal History, says
that Adam’s garment of fig-leaves, in which he went out of Eden, was
left by him, when he fell, on Adam’s Peak in Ceylon. There it dried to
dust, and the dust was scattered by the wind over the island, and from
this sprang the odoriferous plants which grow there.[98]
Adam is said to have not gone altogether empty-handed out of Paradise.
Hottinger, in his Oriental History, quoting Jewish authorities, says:
“Adam having gone into the land of Babel, took with him many wonderful
things, amongst others a tree with flowers, leaves and branches of gold,
also a stone tree, also the leaves of a tree so strong that they were
inconsumable in fire, and so large as to be able to shelter under them
ten thousand men of the stature of Adam; and he carried about with him
two of these leaves, of which one would shelter two men, or clothe
them.”[99] Of these trees we read in the Gemara that the Rabbi Canaan
asked of the Rabbi Simon, son of Assa, who had gone to see them, whether
this was true. He was told in reply that it was so, and that at the time
of the Captivity the Jews had seated themselves under these trees, and
in their shadow had found consolation.
But Palestine seems also to have possessed some of the trees of Adam’s
planting, for Jacob Vitriacus in his Jewish History says: “There are in
that land wonderful trees, which for their pre-excellence are called
Apples of Paradise, bearing oblong fruit, very sweet and unctuous,
having a most delicious savour, bearing in one cluster more than a
hundred compressed berries. The leaves of this tree are a cubit long and
half a cubit wide. There are three other trees producing beautiful
apples or citrons, in which the bite of a man’s teeth is naturally
manifest, wherefore they are called Adam’s Apples.”[100] Hottinger says
that at Tripoli grows a tree called Almaus, or Adam’s apple, with a
green head, and leaves like outspread fingers, no branches, but only
leaves, and with a fruit like a bean-pod, of delicious flavour, and an
odour of roses. Buntingius, in his Itinerary, describes an Adam’s apple
which he tasted at Alexandria, and he said the taste was like pears, and
the clusters of prodigious size, with twenty in each cluster, like
magnificent bunches of grapes. But the most remarkable fact about them
was that, if one of the fruit were cut with a knife, the figure of a
crucifix was found to be contained in it.[101] And this tree was
supposed to have been the forbidden tree, and the fruit to have thus
brought hope as it also brought death to the eater. Nider, “In
Formicario,” also relates that this fruit, thus marked with the form of
the Crucified, grows in Granada.[102]
“At Beyrut, of which S. Nicodemus was the first bishop,” writes the
Friar, Ignatius von Rheinfelden, “I saw a wonderful fruit which is
called by the Arabs, Mauza, and by the Christians Adam’s fig. This fruit
grows upon a trunk in clusters of fifty or more, and hangs down towards
the ground on account of its weight. The fruit is in shape something
like a cucumber, and is a span long, yellow, and tasting something like
figs. The Christians of those parts say it is the fruit of which Adam
and Eve ate in Paradise, and they argue thus: first, there are no apples
in those parts; secondly, S. Jerome translated the word in the Bible,
Mauza; thirdly, if the fruit be cut, within it is seen the figure of a
crucifix, and they conclude thereby that the first parents were showed
by this figure how their sin would be atoned; fourthly, the leaves being
three ells long and half an ell wide, were admirably adapted to make
skirts of, when Adam and Eve were conscious of their nakedness. And Holy
Scripture says nothing of apples, but says merely—fruit. But whether
this was the fruit or not, I leave to others to decide.”[103]
Adam is said by the Easterns to have received from Raphael a magic ring,
which became his symbol, and which he handed down to his descendants
selected to know and read mysteries. This was no other than the ‘crux
ansata,’ or handled cross, so common on Egyptian monuments as the
hieroglyph of Life out of death. The circle symbolized the apple, and
thus the Carthusian emblem, which bears the motto “Stat crux dum
volvitur orbis,” is in reality the mystic symbol of Adam. “Which,” says
the Arabic philosopher, Ibn-ephi, “Mizraim received from Ham, and Ham
from Noah, and Noah from Enoch, and Enoch from Seth, and Seth from Adam,
and Adam from the angel Raphael. Ham wrought with it great marvels, and
Hermes received it from him and placed it amongst the hieroglyphics. But
this character signifies the progress and motion of the Spirit of the
world, and it was a magic seal, kept secret among their mysteries, and a
ring constraining demons.”[104]
Footnote 81:
Weil, p. 28.
Footnote 82:
Basnage, Histoire des Juifs. La Haye, iii. p. 391.
Footnote 83:
Tract. Avod., f. 1, col. 3; also Tract. Pesachim, f. 118, col. 1.
Footnote 84:
Eisenmenger, i. pp. 376, 377.
Footnote 85:
Eisenmenger, i. pp. 377-80.
Footnote 86:
Talmud, Avoda Sara, fol. 8 a, and in Levy, Parabeln, p. 300.
Footnote 87:
It is a popular superstition among the lower orders in England that a
woman who dies in childbirth, even if she be unmarried, cannot be
lost.
Footnote 88:
Weil, pp. 29-38.
Footnote 89:
Dillman, Das Adambuch des Morgenlandes; Göttingen, 1853. This book is
not to be confounded with the Testament of Adam.
Footnote 90:
Tabari, i., capp. xxviii. xxix.
Footnote 91:
In More Nevochim, quoted by Fabricius, i. p. 5.
Footnote 92:
Gen. v. 1.
Footnote 93:
Fabricius, i. p. 11.
Footnote 94:
Adv. Hæresi, c. 5.
Footnote 95:
Eusebius Nierembergius, De Origine S. Scripturæ. Lugd., 1641, p. 46.
Footnote 96:
Fabricius, i. p. 33.
Footnote 97:
Ferdinand de Troilo, Orientale Itinerario. Dresd., 1676, p. 323.
Footnote 98:
Selden, De Synedriis, ii. p. 452.
Footnote 99:
Hottinger, Historia Orientalis, lib. i. c. 8.
Footnote 100:
Jacobus Vitriacus, Hist. Hierosol., c. lxxxv.
Footnote 101:
As King Charles’s oak may be seen in the fern-root.
Footnote 102:
Fabricius, i. p. 84.
Footnote 103:
Neue Ierosolymitanische Pilgerfahrt. Würtzburg, 1667, p. 47.
Footnote 104:
Stephanus Le Moyne, Notæ ad Varia Sacra, p. 863.
VI.
CAIN AND ABEL.
After that the child given to Satan died, says Tabari, Adam had another
son, and he called him Seth, and Seth was prophet in the room of his
father, after the death of Adam.
Adam had many more children; every time that Eve bore, she bare twins,
whereof one was male, the other female, and the twins were given to one
another as husband and wife.
Now Adam sought to give to Abel the twin sister of Cain, when she was
old enough to be married, but Cain (Kabil, in Arabic) was
dissatisfied.[105] Adam said to the brothers, Cain and Abel, “Go, my
sons, and sacrifice to the Lord; and he whose sacrifice is accepted,
shall have the young girl. Take each of you offerings in your hand and
go, sacrifice to the Lord, and He shall decide.”
Abel was a shepherd, and he took the fattest of the sheep, and bore it
to the place of sacrifice; but Cain, who was a tiller of the soil, took
a sheaf of corn, the poorest he could find, and placed it on the altar.
Then fire descended from heaven and consumed the offering of Abel, so
that not even the cinders remained; but the sheaf of Cain was left
untouched.
Adam gave the maiden to Abel, and Cain was sore vexed.
One day, Abel was asleep on a mountain. Cain took a stone and crushed
his head. Then he threw the corpse on his back, and carried it about,
not knowing what to do with it; but he saw two crows fighting, and one
killed the other; then the crow that survived dug a hole in the earth
with his beak, and buried the dead bird. Cain said, “I have not the
sense of this bird. I too will lay my brother in the ground.” And he did
so.
When Adam learned the death of his son, he set out in search of Cain,
but could not find him; then he recited the following lines:—
“Every city is alike, each mortal man is vile,
The face of earth has desert grown, the sky has ceased to smile,
Every flower has lost its hue, and every gem is dim.
Alas! my son, my son is dead; the brown earth swallows him!
We one have had in midst of us whom death has not yet found,
No peace for him, no rest for him, treading the blood-drenched
ground.”[106]
This is how the story is told in the Midrash:[107] Cain and Abel could
not agree, for, what one had, the other wanted; then Abel devised a
scheme that they should make a division of property, and thus remove the
possibility of contention. The proposition pleased Cain. So Cain took
the earth, and all that is stationary, and Abel took all that is
moveable.
But the envy which lay in the heart of Cain gave him no rest. One day he
said to his brother, “Remove thy foot, thou standest on my property; the
plain is mine.”
Then Abel ran upon the hills, but Cain cried, “Away, the hills are
mine!” Then he climbed the mountains, but still Cain followed him,
calling, “Away! the stony mountains are mine.”
In the Book of Jasher the cause of quarrel is differently stated. One
day the flock of Abel ran over the ground Cain had been ploughing; Cain
rushed furiously upon him and bade him leave the spot. “Not,” said Abel,
“till you have paid me for the skins of my sheep and wool of their
fleeces used for your clothing.” Then Cain took the coulter from his
plough, and with it slew his brother.[108]
The Targum of Jerusalem says, the subject of contention was that Cain
denied a Judgment to come and Eternal Life; and Abel argued for
both.[109] The Rabbi Menachem, however, asserts that the point on which
they strove was whether a word was written _zizit_ or _zizis_ in the
Parascha.[110]
“And when they were in the field together, the brothers quarrelled,
saying, ‘Let us divide the world.’ One said, ‘The earth you stand on is
my soil.’ The other said, ‘You are standing on my earth.’ One said, ‘The
Holy Temple shall stand on my lot;’ the other said, ‘It shall stand on
my lot.’ So they quarrelled. Now there were born with Abel two
daughters, his sisters. Then said Cain, ‘I will take the one I choose, I
am the eldest;’ Abel said, ‘They were born with me, and I will have them
both to wife.’ And when they fought, Abel flung Cain down and was above
him; and he lay on Cain. Then Cain said to Abel, ‘Are we not both sons
of one father; why wilt thou kill me?’ And Abel had compassion, and let
Cain get up. And so Cain fell on him and killed him. From this we learn
not to render good to the evil, for, because Abel showed mercy to Cain,
Cain took advantage of it to slay Abel.”[111]
S. Methodius the Younger refers to this tradition. He says: “Be it known
that Adam and Eve when they left Paradise were virgins. But the third
year after the expulsion from Eden, they had Cain, their first-born, and
his sister Calmana; and after this, next year, they had Abel and his
sister Deborah. But in the three hundredth year of Adam’s life, Cain
slew his brother, and Adam and Eve wailed over him a hundred
years.”[112]
Eutychius, Patriarch of Alexandria, says, “When Adam and Eve rebelled
against God, He expelled them from Paradise at the ninth hour on Friday
to a certain mountain in India, and He bade them produce children to
increase and multiply upon the earth. Adam and Eve therefore became
parents, first of a boy named Cain, and of a girl named Azrun, who were
twins; then of another boy named Abel, and of a twin sister named Owain,
or in Greek Laphura.
“Now, when the children were grown up, Adam said to Eve, ‘Let Cain marry
Owain, who was born with Abel, and let Abel have Azrun, who was born
with Cain.’ But Cain said to his mother, ‘I will marry my own twin
sister, and Abel shall marry his.’ For Azrun was prettier than Owain.
But when Adam heard this, he said, ‘It is contrary to the precept that
thou shouldst marry thy twin sister.’
“Now Cain was a tiller of the ground, but Abel was a pastor of sheep.
Adam said to them, ‘Take of the fruits of the earth, and of the young of
the sheep, and ascend the top of this holy mountain, and offer there the
best and choicest to God.’ Abel offered of the best and fattest of the
first-born of the flock. Now as they were ascending the summit of the
mountain, Satan put it into the head of Cain to kill his brother, so as
to get Azrun. For that reason his oblation was not accepted by God.
Therefore he was the more inflamed with rage against Abel, and as they
were going down the mount, he rushed upon him and beat him about the
head with a stone and killed him. Adam and Eve bewailed Abel a hundred
years with the greatest grief.... And God cast out Cain whilst he was
still unmarried into the land of Nod. But Cain carried off with him his
sister Azrun.”[113]
The Rabbi Zadok said, “This was the reason why Cain slew Abel. His twin
sister and wife was not at all good-looking. Then he said, ‘I will kill
my brother Abel, and carry off his wife.’”[114]
Gregory Abulfaraj gives this account of the strife: “According to the
opinion of Mar Theodosius, thirty years after he was expelled from
Paradise, Adam knew his wife Eve, and she bore twins, Cain and his
sister Climia; and after thirty more years she bore Abel and his twin
sister Lebuda. Then, seventy years after when Adam wanted to marry one
of the brothers with the twin sister of the other, Cain refused, asking
to have his own twin sister.”[115]
The Pseudo-Athanasius says, “Up to this time no man had died so that
Cain should know how to kill. The devil instructed him in this in a
dream.”[116]
Leonhard Marius on Genesis iv. says, “As to what instrument Cain used,
Scripture is silent. Chrysostom calls it a sword; Prudentius, a spade;
Irenæus, an axe; Isidore says simply, steel; but artists generally paint
a club, and Abulensis thinks he was killed with stones.” Reuchlin
thinks, as iron was not discovered till the times of Tubal-cain, the
weapon must have been made of wood, and he points out how much more this
completes the type of Christ.[117]
Cain and Abel had been born and had lived with Adam in the land of
Adamah; but after Cain slew his brother, he was cast out into the land
Erez, and wherever he went, swords sounded and flashed as though
thirsting to smite him. And he fled that land and came to Acra, where he
had children, and his descendants who live there to this day have two
heads.[118]
Before Cain slew his brother, says the Targum of Jerusalem, the earth
brought forth fruits as the fruits of Eden; but from the day that blood
was spilt upon it, thistles and thorns sprang up; for the face of earth
grew sad, its joy was gone, the stain was on its brow.
Abel’s offering had been of the fattest of his sheep, the Targum adds,
but Cain offered flax.[119]
Abel’s offering, say certain Rabbis, was not perfect; for he offered the
chief part to God, but the remainder he dedicated to the Devil, and Cain
offered the chief part to Satan, and only the remainder to God.[120]
The Rabbi Johanan said, Cain exclaimed when accused by God of the
murder, “My iniquity is greater than I can bear,” and this is supposed
to mean, “My iniquity is too great to be atoned for, except by my
brother rising from the earth and slaying me.” What did the Holy One
then? He took one letter of the twenty-two which are in the Law, and He
wrote it on the arm of Cain, as it is written, “He put a mark upon
him.”[121]
After Abel was slain, the dog which had kept his sheep guarded his body,
says the Midrash. Adam and Eve sat beside it and wept, and knew not what
to do. Then said a raven whose friend was dead, “I will teach Adam a
lesson,” and he dug a hole in the soil and laid his friend there and
covered him up. And when Adam saw this, he said to Eve, “We will do the
same with Abel.” God rewarded the raven for this by promising that none
should ever injure his young, that he should always have meat in
abundance, and that his prayer for rain should be immediately
answered.[122]
But the Rabbi Johanan taught that Cain buried his brother to hide what
he had done from the eye of God, not knowing that God can see even the
most secret things.[123]
According to some Rabbis, all good souls are derived from Abel and all
bad souls from Cain. Cain’s soul was derived from Satan, his body alone
was from Eve; for the Evil Spirit Sammael, according to some, Satan,
according to others, deceived Eve, and thus Cain was the son of the Evil
One.[124] All the children of Cain also became demons of darkness and
nightmares, and therefore it is, say the Cabbalists, that there is no
mention in Genesis of the death of any of Cain’s offspring.[125]
When Cain had slain his brother, we are told in Scripture that he fled.
Certain Rabbis give the reason:—He feared lest Satan should kill him:
now Satan has no power over any one whose face he does not see, thus he
had none over Lot’s wife till she turned her face towards Sodom, and he
could see it; and Cain fled, to keep his face from being seen by the
Evil One, and thus give him an opportunity of taking his life.[126]
With regard to the mark put upon Cain, there is great diverging of
opinion. Some say that his tongue turned white; others, that he was
given a peculiar dress; others, that his face became black; but the most
prevalent opinion is that he became covered with hair, and a horn grew
in the midst of his forehead.
The Little Genesis says, Cain was born when Adam was aged seventy, and
Abel when he was seventy-seven.
The book of the penitence of Adam gives us some curious details. When
Cain had killed his brother, he was filled with terror, for he saw the
earth quivering. He cast the body into a hole and covered it with dust,
but the earth threw the body out. Then he dug another hole and heaped
earth on his brother’s corpse, but again the earth rejected it.
When God appeared before him, Cain trembled in all his limbs, and God
said to him, “Thou tremblest and art in fear; this shall be thy sign.”
And from that moment he quaked with a perpetual ague.
The Rabbis give another mark as having been placed on Cain. They say
that a horn grew out of the midst of his forehead. He was killed by a
son of Lamech, who, being shortsighted, mistook him for a wild beast;
but in the Little Genesis it is said that he was killed by the fall of
his house, in the year 930, the same day that Adam died. According to
the same authority, Adam and Eve bewailed Abel twenty-eight years.
The Talmud relates the following beautiful incident.
God had cursed Cain, and he was doomed to a bitter punishment; but
moved, at last, by Cain’s contrition, He placed on his brow the symbol
of pardon.
Adam met Cain, and looked with wonder on the seal or token, and asked,—
“How hast thou turned away the wrath of the Almighty?”
“By confession of sin and repentance,” answered the fratricide.
“Woe is me!” cried Adam, smiting his brow; “is the virtue of repentance
so great, and I knew it not! And by repentance I might have altered my
lot!”[127]
Tabari says that Cain was the first worshipper of fire. Eblis (Satan)
appeared to him and told him that the reason of the acceptance of Abel’s
sacrifice was, that he had invoked the fire that fell on it and consumed
it; Cain had not done this, and therefore fire had not come down on his
oblation. Cain believed this, and adored fire, and taught his children
to do the same.[128]
Cain, says Josephus, having wandered over the earth with his wife,
settled in the land of Nod. But his punishment, so far from proving of
advantage to him, proved only a stimulus to his violence and passion;
and he increased his wealth by rapine, and he encouraged his children
and friends to live by robbery and in luxury. He also corrupted the
primitive simplicity in which men lived, by the introduction amongst
them of weights and measures, by placing boundaries, and walling
cities.[129]
John Malala says the same: “Cain was a tiller of the ground till he
committed the crime of slaying his brother; after that, he lived by
violence, his hand being against every man, and he invented and taught
men the use of weights, measures, and boundaries.”[130]
The passage in Genesis “_Whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be
taken on him seven-fold_,”[131] has been variously interpreted. Cosmas
Indopleustes renders it thus, “Whosoever slayeth Cain will discharge
seven vengeances;” that is, he will deliver him from those calamities to
which he is subject when living.[132]
But Malala renders it otherwise; he says it is to be thus understood:
“Every murderer shall die for his sin, but thou who didst commit the
first homicide, and art therefore the originator of this crime, shalt be
punished seven-fold; that is, thou shalt undergo seven punishments.” For
Cain had committed seven crimes. First, he was guilty of envy; then, of
treachery; thirdly, of murder; fourthly, of killing his brother;
fifthly, this was the first murder ever committed; sixthly, he grieved
his parents; and seventhly, Cain lied to God. Thus the sin of Cain was
seven-fold; therefore seven-fold was his punishment. First, the earth
was accursed on his account; secondly, he was sentenced to labour;
thirdly, the earth was forbidden from yielding to him her strength;
fourthly, he was to become timid and conscience-stricken; fifthly, he
was to be a vagabond on the earth; sixthly, he was to be cast out from
God’s presence; seventhly, a mark was to be placed upon him.
The Mussulmans say that the penitence of Cain, whom they call Kabil, was
not sincere. He was filled with remorse, but it was mingled with envy
and hatred, because he was regarded with disfavour by the rest of the
sons of Adam.
Near Damascus is shown a place at the foot of a mountain where Cain slew
Abel.[133]
The legends of the death of Cain will be found under the title of
Lamech.
“Half a mile from the gates of Hebron,” says the Capuchin Friar,
Ignatius von Rheinfelden, in his Pilgrimage to Jerusalem, “begins the
valley of Mamre, in which Abraham saw the three angels; the _Campus
Damascenus_ lies toward the west; there, Adam was created; and the spot
is pointed out where Cain killed his brother Abel. The earth there is
red, and may be moulded like wax.”[134] Salmeron says the same, “Adam
was made of the earth or dust of the _Campus Damascenus_.” And St.
Jerome on Ezekiel, chap. xvii., says: “Damascus is the place where Abel
was slain by his brother Cain; for which cause the spot is called
Damascus, that is, Blood-drinking.” This Damascus near Hebron is not to
be confused with the city Damascus.
Footnote 105:
Abulfeda, p. 15. In the Apocryphal book, The Combat of Adam (Dillman,
Das Christliche Adambuch des Morgenlandes; Göttingen, 1853), the same
reason for hostility is given. In that account, Satan appears to Cain,
and prompts him to every act of wickedness.
Footnote 106:
Tabari, i. c. xxx.
Footnote 107:
Jalkut, fol. 11 a.
Footnote 108:
Yaschar, p. 1089.
Footnote 109:
Targums, ed. Etheridge, London, 1862, i. p. 172.
Footnote 110: