Cain

In stories common to the Abrahamic religions,

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Cain or Káyin (????? / ????? "spear" Standard Hebrew Qáyin, Tiberian Hebrew Qáyin / Q?yin; Arabic ????? Q?y?n in the Arabic Bible; ????? Q?b?l in Islam) is the eldest son of Adam and Eve, and the first man born in creation according to Genesis.

Related Topics:
Standard Hebrew - Tiberian Hebrew - Arabic - Bible - Islam - Adam and Eve - Genesis

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The Hebrew word for Cain, qayin, originally meant a lance or spear. The word also may be related to a mid-1st millenium BCE South Arabic word qyn, meaning a metal smith. (See Richard S. Hess, Studies in the Personal Names of Genesis 1-11, ISBN 3-7887-1478-6. pp. 24-25.) The word has become associated with the word qanah, meaning "to obtain," or "to provoke to jealousy" because of a word-play in Gen. 4:1 between qayin and qanithi, a derivative of qanah ("And Adam had sex with his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Qayin, and said, 'I have obtained a man from YHWH.'"). Nevertheless, there is no etymological relationship between these two words. (See Allen C. Myers, et., The Eerdmans Bible Dictionary, 1987, p. 181). Qayin was also the name of an ancient tribe friendly to Israel, also referred to as the Kenites, from whom some scholars attribute the stories about Cain.

Related Topics:
1st millenium BCE - Israel - Kenites

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According to the Bible, Cain was a tiller of the land while his younger brother Abel was a shepherd. God's rejection of Cain's sacrifice (minchah in Hebrew) of fruit and grain in preference to Abel's offering from his flocks drove Cain to murder his brother in a jealous rage. When God later questioned Cain as to his brother's whereabouts, Cain answered, "Am I my brother's keeper?"

Related Topics:
Bible - Tiller - Abel - Shepherd - God - Sacrifice - Murder - Brother

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God decreed that Cain was cursed so that he could no longer till the ground, and that instead he must be a fugitive wanderer. Cain protested that he would be killed by those he encountered, in reply to which God gave Cain a special mark and decreed that any who killed him would suffer vengeance "sevenfold." Cain then settled in the Land of Nod, east of Eden. See Cain and Abel for a fuller story and some exploration of the mythological significance.

Related Topics:
Cursed - Land of Nod - Eden - Cain and Abel

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According to the Book of Jubilees 4:9, Cain married his sister Awan, and the couple had their first son Enoch approximately 196 years after the creation of Adam. He then established the first city, naming it after his son Enoch. According to the Book of Jubilees 4:31, Cain died when his house collapsed on him, in the same year that Methuselah died.

Related Topics:
Book of Jubilees - Awan - Enoch - Methuselah

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The nature of Cain's mark is unspecified in the Bible. In popular mythology, however, the mark has been thought to be a mark on the forehead, or possibly red hair. Formerly, a widespread belief was that the mark of Cain was black skin. This idea was used as an argument in favor of slavery; however, that view has generally fallen out of favor as racist.

Related Topics:
Red hair - Slavery - Racist

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Cain is also thought to have fathered the Biblical races of giants and monsters—the so-called children of Cain. This tradition has no basis in the Bible itself, which portrays Cain's descendants as ordinary human beings and states that the giants were born of the union of the "sons of God" (generally interpreted as fallen angels) with the daughters of men.

Related Topics:
Giants - Fallen angel

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