Cain and the Capitalist Cult

    The curdled sky unplaceable through the smoke of burning cities
    day and night disfigured, bulldozed earth in a heap of spoil
    Cain stands screaming in the field of blood,
    “Am I my brother’s keeper?” 
    Patron saint of the Capitalist Cult.

Steinbeck and the Most Important Word in the World

Have I mentioned that I love Steinbeck?  Of course I have; John Steinbeck is the best. Take for example, this discussion of Cain and the most important word in the world, from his novel East of Eden:

                “Do you remember when you read us the sixteen verses of the fourth chapter of Genesis and we argued about them?”
                “I do indeed.  And that’s a long time ago.”
                “Ten years nearly,” said Lee.  “Well, the story bid deeply into me and I went into it word for word.  The more I thought about the story, the more profound it became to me.  Then I compared the translations that we have-and they were fairly close.  There was only one place that bothered me.  The King James version says this-it is when Jehovah has asked Cain why he is angry.  Jehovah says, ‘If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.’ It was the ‘thou shalt’ that struck me, because it was a promise that Cain would conquer sin.”
                Samuel nodded.  “And his children didn’t do it entirely,” he said.
                Lee sipped his coffee.  “Then I got a copy of the American Standard Bible.  It was very new then.  And it was different in this passage.  It says, ‘Do thou rule over him.’ Now this is very different This is not a promise, it is an order.  … The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin, and you can call sin ignorance.  The King James translation makes it a promise in ‘Thou shalt,’ meaning that men will surely triumph over sin.  But the Hebrew word, the word timshel-‘Thou mayest’-that gives a choice.  It might be the most important word in the world.  That says the way is open.  That throws it right back on a man.  For if ‘Thou mayest’-it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.’ Don’t you see?”
                “Yes, I see.  I do see.  But you do not believe this is divine law.  Why do you feel its importance?”
                “Ah!” said Lee. “I’ve wanted to tell you this for a long time.  I even anticipated your questions and I am well prepared. Any writing which has influenced the thinking and the lives of innumerable people is important.  Now, there are millions in their sects and churches who feel the order, ‘Do thou,’ and throw their weight into obedience.  And there are millions more who feel predestination in ‘Thou shalt.’  Nothing they may do can interfere with what will be.  But ‘Thou mayest’!  Why that makes a man great, that gives him stature with the gods, for in his weakness and his filth and his murder of brother he has still the great choice.  He can choose his course and fight it through and win.”  Lee’s voice was a chant of triumph.  

Where Did Cain Get His Wife- Some Literalist Problems

A strict adherence to an overly literal interpretation of the Bible often causes more interpretive problems than it solves.  Take for example the age old question, “Where did Cain get his wife?” (Genesis 4:7) The Young-Earth-Ken Ham-Creationist types insist that Cain married his sister (or possibly a niece.) 

“We’re not told when Cain married or many of the details of other marriages and children, but we can say for certain that Cain’s wife was either his sister or a close relative.” Ken Ham

This may answer the question, but it creates more problems than it solves; now we have to deal with a couple of biological and moral conundrums.

This overly literal reading of the Genesis story is problematic biologically because incestuous marriages often produce children with genetic defects.  But of course, our literalists have an answer for this.  They claim that “There were no genetic imperfections at the beginning of the human race…Genetic defects resulted from the Fall and only occurred gradually over long periods of time (Geisler, Howe, 38).”[i]

How can they know this? Were they there?  There’s nothing in the literal text to say that genetic imperfections appeared only very gradually after the Fall.  They’re just making stuff up as they go along.

But the more problematic area is moral.  If we allow that Cain married his “sister or a close relative” (and what would you like to bet that the literalists will NOT allow that this close relative could have been his mother?)  then we have the moral problem of incest.  This is a no-no in God’s law (and is taboo in most cultures around the world).  Again the literalists have an answer – though not a very good one.

They claim that “there was no command in Cain’s day not to marry a close relative.  This command (Lev. 18) came thousands of years later in Moses’ day (c. 1500 B.C.) (Geisler, Howe, 38).”

But (and this is a big but) there was no command against murder in Cain’s day either.  How can he have been held guilty for that but not incest? 

An overly literalist interpretation creates more problems than it solves. For every question they answer with their twisted reading, another three problems are created.

---

[i] Geisler, Norman & Howe, Tomas When Critics Ask: A Popular Handbook on Bible Difficulties, Victor Books, Wheaton, IL 1992.

Biblical Limericks: God Doesn’t Like Vegetarians

Cain brought an off’ring agrarian
while Abel came with fresh carrion.
God chose Abe’s, of the two,
so I think that it’s true:
God’s biased ‘gainst vegetarians.


Genesis 4: 3 - 4

(and neither did Paul...)

More Anomalies A – Z: Lamech

Oh, I wasn’t blind; I knew it was him
when I drew back the bow string.
I nocked the arrow and said his name:
                Cain.
I clapped my hands to watch him fall,
spouting crimson blood into the air
and clutching at the shaft I’d loosed.

Hear me Adah, I am Lamech!
6^th from Cain among the sons of men.
Hear me, Zillah, I am 7^th down from Adam;
listen to me.  Hear what I say.

I take what I want
and deserve what I get.
Wound me if you are weak;
I’ll kill in return because I am strong.

If grandfather Cain is avenged sevenfold
then I will be avenged seventy and seven again.

More Anomalies A – Z: Cain

"There liveth none under the sunne, that knows what to make of the man in the moone."  John Lyly - Endymion (1591)

The Watchers were there when Cain took up the stone he used to crush Abel’s skull, watching, though they had not yet begun to interfere in human affairs.    They merely observed as the first to be born stood over the bleeding body of the first to die until Abel breathed his last.

They said nothing when the mark was carved upon his head as a warning, an omen.

They watched him turn his rake and hoe into namesake spears.  They watched the settled farmer become the uprooted wanderer of the eretz nod.  A fugitive groaning and shaking, lost upon the earth.

And the Watchers saw him at the end, murdered by that boastful warrior Lamech, whose story is set down in full in the Book of the Wars of the Lord.  They saw his corpse bristling with raven feathered arrows, and dumped beneath a thorn bush. 

That is when the Watchers first involved themselves in the affairs of humans.  The gathered up his body along with a bundle of the thorns that covered him and carried him away to the moon. And there he remains, buried alone among the moon’s gloomy spots.

For more anomalies click here.


 

Ghost Brothers of Darkland County - A Musical of Haunting and Hope

My wonderful wife surprised me last night with tickets to see Ghost Brothers of Darkland County – the musical written by Stephen King, John Mellancamp, and T-Bone Burnett.  Wow – oh- wow, do I love her!  Ghost Brothers combines all of my favorite things – Americana music, gothic horror, theater, and theological explorations. 

The music of the show is a variety of bluegrass, country, rock, gospel, and zydeco songs.  And though my wife (who has an aversion to music that veers towards ‘country / western’) was ‘nervous’ about the accordion, harmonica, and banjo listed in the program, she said that it was much better than she anticipated.  I loved it.  Seriously great tunes!  Especially the songs, That’s Me (sung by a devilish character known as The Shape), Home Again, and What Kind of Man am I?  The gospel number Tear This Cabin Down is powerful – and, along with Home Again – probably suitable for use in church on Sunday.

The play itself bears a striking resemblance to another of my favorite plays – J. B. -a play in verse by the poet,Archibald MacLeish.  J.B. is set in an abandoned circus tent, with has-been actors taking on the roles of God and Satan to tell the story of Job.  Instead of a circus tent however, Ghost Brothers is told through an old-time radio drama (complete with a sound effects crew standing by to create sound of breaking bones, doors slamming, tree frogs and etc…)

Photo from Ghost Brothers of Darkland County home page

An additional similarity to MacLeish’s play is found in the ‘supernatural’ characters representing good and evil, light and dark, God and Satan – They are The Zydeco Cowboy (light) and The Shape (dark).  In the production we saw they were played as a sort of dueling Hank Williams (Zydeco Cowboy) and Tom Waits (The Shape) – a point I liked very much.

Ghost Brothers of Darkland County is a story of brothers – resonating, most obviously, with the story of Cain and Able, but also with stories like John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, and Thorton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth, with nods towards southern authors like William Faulkner and Flannery O’Conner.   But it’s also the story of a father and his sons, and a story about the past, and how the past is passed. It is gone. It cannot be changed. It’s a story about lies and truth that comes too late.  It’s a story about redemption (or the lack thereof) and, despite its ghost story trappings and murderous narrative, a story about hope and moving forward.

This is an odd duck in the world of musical theater – there are no big dance numbers, there’s no orchestra (just a four piece band, right on the stage).  It’s violent.  It’s rough, but also tender and haunting (and not just because of the ghosts…) 

Another point of interest for this geek– the father, Joe McCandless – was played by Bruce Greenwood (recognized by science fiction fans as Captain Christopher Pike in the two most recent Star Trek movies.)