Genesis · chapter 4 of 50
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Genesis 4 tells how Cain and Abel bring offerings to God, who accepts Abel's but not Cain's. Moved by anger, Cain kills his brother and God sentences him to be a wanderer, yet protects him with a mark. The chapter follows Cain's line down to Lamech and ends with the birth of Seth and with people beginning to call on the name of the Lord.
After the fall of Genesis 3, this chapter shows how sin grows in the first family: from the parents' disobedience we move to murder between brothers. It is the first example of what God warned, that sin is crouching at the door, and also of how God keeps caring for those who fail and preserving a faithful line.
Adam knows his wife Eve, who gives birth to Cain and then to Abel. Cain works the ground and Abel keeps sheep. One day each brings an offering to the Lord: Cain from the fruit of the ground, Abel from the firstborn of his flock and their fat portions. The Lord looks with favor on Abel and his offering, but not on Cain and his, and Cain becomes furious and his face falls.
God speaks to Cain: if he does what is right he will be accepted, but if not, sin is crouching at the door like a beast that desires to have him, and he must rule over it. Cain invites Abel out to the field and kills him there. When the Lord asks where his brother is, Cain answers that he does not know and asks whether he is his brother's keeper. God tells him that Abel's blood cries out from the ground and sentences him to wander, with the soil no longer yielding for him.
Cain fears being killed, and the Lord puts a mark on him so that no one will kill him. Cain goes east of Eden, has a son, Enoch, and builds a city. Among his descendants is Lamech, who takes two wives, Adah and Zillah, and sings a song of vengeance. Adah bears Jabal, who lives in tents with livestock, and Jubal, ancestor of musicians; Zillah bears Tubal-cain, who forges bronze and iron. Adam and Eve have another son, Seth, in place of Abel, and Seth has a son, Enosh; then people begin to call on the name of the Lord.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
God warns Cain that if he does what is right he will be accepted; if not, sin is crouching at the door, desiring him, and he must rule over it. God does not leave Cain without warning: he shows him that sin can be resisted.
Cain answers the Lord's question with a lie and a defensive question: he does not know where his brother is and asks whether he is his keeper. The question in fact has an answer: we are responsible for one another.
Abel's blood cries out to God from the ground. God hears the cry of the victim and takes human life seriously, so that no crime stays hidden before him.
A son, Enosh, is born to Seth, and from then on people begin to call on the name of the Lord. After the growth of evil, the chapter ends with a sign of faith that continues through the line of Seth.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: Cain worked the ground and Abel kept sheep. — Genesis 4:2
Answer: He brought firstborn animals of his flock and their fat portions, and the Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering. — Genesis 4:4
Answer: That sin was crouching at the door, desiring him, and that he must rule over it. — Genesis 4:7
Answer: He said he did not know and asked whether he was his brother's keeper. — Genesis 4:9
Answer: He put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him. — Genesis 4:15
Answer: People began to call on the name of the Lord. — Genesis 4:26
Genesis 4 teaches us to recognize the first symptoms of sin: comparison, resentment and a fallen face. God approached Cain before he acted and gave him the chance to choose. In a small group you can ask what we do with envy or anger when they visit us, and whom we tell before they grow.
It also reminds us that we are responsible for one another. Cain's question is still alive in the church: caring for a brother, listening to the wounded and not hiding behind excuses. God still hears the cry of those who suffer injustice, and he calls us to hear it too.
Genesis 4 ends with two lines: Cain's, which grows in cities, crafts and violence, and Seth's, where the name of the Lord is invoked. Genesis 5 follows that second thread with the list of generations that leads from Adam to Noah.
The text gives no explicit reason. Hebrews 11:4 says Abel offered by faith. Many interpreters think the difference lay in the heart and attitude of each, more than in the kind of offering, and Cain's reaction, becoming furious instead of correcting himself, points in that direction.
The text does not explain. Genesis 5:4 says Adam had other sons and daughters, so Cain could have married a sister or a niece, in a time when humanity was very new and the prohibitions God would later give to Israel did not yet exist.
The Bible does not describe the mark. It says only that the Lord put it on Cain so that no one would kill him. It was not a punishment but a protection, showing that even in his judgment God is merciful.