Cain and Abel were twins.Īccording to the Biblical text, Abel was a shepherd. The Hebrew word for "again" is asaph, meaning to add something, in this case the birthing of Abel was added to the birthing of Cain. Notice that there is only one conception, but two births. Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain And again, she bore his brother Abel.
But notice how it is worded in Genesis 4:1-2. Note that there are two conceptions and two births. In the normal Hebraic accounting of multiple births the conception then birth of each child is mentioned such as we can see in Genesis 29:32-33 where it states that Leah conceived and bore a son, and then she conceived again and bore a son. It is a well-known fact that Jacob and Esau were twins, but what is not commonly known is that Cain and Abel were also twins. This may seem odd to us, because we have always assumed that Abel was the good guy and Cain the bad, but this is an oversimplification of the facts, as according to their names, a reflection of their character, Cain is what we would call "a man of character," but Abel is "vain." Cain is a possessor, one who has substance while Abel is empty of substance.
In Hebrew thought, ones name is reflective of one's character and the Hebraic meanings of the names of "Cain and Abel" are windows into their characters. The Hebrew word for "name" is shem and literally means breath or character. The word הבל ( havel) means to be empty, often translated as vain or vanity in the sense of being empty of substance. The word קין ( qayin, from the root QN) means to acquire or possess something which is why Eve ( chavah in Hebrew) said "I have gotten/acquired ( qanah, also from the root QN) a man" (Gen 4:1). In Hebrew, Cain is קין ( qayin) and Abel is הבל ( havel). The names Cain and Abel come from the Greek Septuagint, a 2,000 year old Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, where their names are written as "Kain" and "Abel." These names are the Greek transliterations of the Hebrew. However, if we carefully study the text, we find that there is much, much more, to this story. Because of Cain's sin, he is branded with a mark and sent away. Out of jealousy, Cain take's his brother out into the field and kills him. Two brothers bring their sacrifices to God Abel's sacrifice is accepted, but Cain's sacrifice is not. We have all heard the story of Cain and Abel. And the explicit message was that you were to be ‘out there’ connecting the dots.The Untold Story of Cain and Abel By Jeff A. “When the Protestant Reformation hit the Netherlands, as opposed to the pre-reformation mentality that the entire life of the parish was centered at the altar, in the mass, after the Reformation hit the Netherlands, during the week they would shutter the doors. But politics is downstream from culture…. “Probably the last place that can be rescued right now is politics, but that’s the thing that we run to first. And you can hear fantastic theological doctrines, all preached without a whiff of heresy, and yet at the end of the day, 95 percent of it seems to have very little bearing on the life of someone at work.” You can go months, and months, and months on end to many churches that I have been to and you can hear wonderful expositional preaching. “The level of engagement on the faith and work question in most churches is so weak. What practical steps can local churches take to develop culture makers? Who do we have on our team that is creating culture? “Do we have people on our team like that on our team right now? … Who do we have on our team that is ? Who can we point to?” And if we want to talk with the people that fill those kinds of stadiums, I think it would be helpful for us to think about our role as shepherds in this culture.” These are not people that are complete idiots. “So when I know people with elite art degrees went the week before last to Madison Square Garden with thirty thousand other people to be inspired by the new Yeezy fashion line and Kanye’s new album The Life of Pablo, these are not dumb bunnies. And we think that’s going to get people running into the arms of the church. We just regard it all as ridiculous and absurd. “Things that people deeply, deeply care about in things like popular culture, our Christian thinkers and theologians… seem to have this imperious, disdainful, sarcastic, critical attitudes toward…. What’s wrong with our attitudes toward culture?
Gregory Alan Thornbury, President of King’s College in New York, NY, recently gave a lecture at Southeastern Seminary about Cain, Abel, Kanye West and cultural engagement.