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A capricious God and illicit sex?: Genesis 4-6:4.

A capricious God and illicit sex?: Genesis 4-6:4. Dr Katherine Southwood. Problem. Why was Cain’s offering rejected? מנחה ‘gift / offering’ LXX δωρον meaning ‘gift’ and θυσι α meaning ‘sacrifice’ . Philo:

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A capricious God and illicit sex?: Genesis 4-6:4.

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  1. A capricious God and illicit sex?: Genesis 4-6:4. Dr Katherine Southwood

  2. Problem • Why was Cain’s offering rejected? • מנחה ‘gift / offering’ • LXX δωρον meaning ‘gift’ and θυσιαmeaning ‘sacrifice’ . • Philo: What is the difference between a gift and a sacrifice? He who slaughters a sacrifice, after dividing it, pours the blood on the altar and takes the flesh home. But he who offers something as a gift offers the whole of it, it seems, to him who receives it. And the lover of self is a divider, as was Cain while the lover of God is a giver as was Abel.

  3. Why the rejection? • Timing? ימיםמקץויהי(‘in the course of time’). • Manner of the offering? Gen 4:7 ‘If you do well will you not be accepted (or forgiven)? And if you do not do well sin is crouching(?) at the door.’ (Hebrew, translation is difficult here) ‘If you brought it correctly, but did not correctly divide it have you not sinned?’ (Greek) • Was Cain’s offering sinful?

  4. Post expulsion • Increase in violence • Increase in disobedience (compare Cain and Eve) • Abel’s blood cries out from the ground: murder. • The mark of Cain • The land of Nod.

  5. Genesis 6:1-4 When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. Then the LORD said, “My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days will be a hundred and twenty years.” The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.

  6. Who are the ‘sons of God’ האלהיםבני • Giants? Septuagint. • Angels? 1 Enoch 6-11. • Warriors? Numbers 13:33 • Descendants of Seth? • Descendants of Cain?

  7. Who are the ‘sons of God’ האלהיםבני • Ps 2:7: ‘He said to me, “You are my Son; today I have become your Father.’ • Job 38:7: while the morning stars sang together and all the angels (האלהיםבני) shouted for joy?

  8. They were good looking טוב • ‘bracelets, decorations, … jewellery, the beautifying of the eyelids, all kinds of precious stones…’ (1 Enoch 8:1). • Morally good? • טוב has a wide semantic range. Compare ‘good’ and ‘evil’ in Nehemiah 2.

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