So did Cain & Abel multiply with each other or did they just have sex with their mother?
because, ya know, either way makes sense to to me.

-ISHI TIB

Do you really think Cain and Abel were more than fictional characters in ancient Hebrew mythology?

I am for the moment assuming that "Cain and Abel were more than fictional characters in ancient Hebrew mythology".
By the way, Cain did kill Abel - so they can't have multiplied with each other.
The theory goes that the children of Adam and Eve intermarried. (ie Cain married one of his sisters)

Lance

That's an interesting point for our "literalists". No female beside Mary is mentioned early in Genesis.

So what happened guys?

Well Eve is mentioned a couple of times.

Here is an excerpt from The Book of Jubilees

JUB 04:08 And in the sixth week he begat 'Azura, his
daughter.

JUB 04:09 Cain took his sister, 'Awan, as a wife, and
she bore for him Enoch at the end of the fourth jubilee.
And in the first year of the first week of the fifth
jubilee, buildings were constructed in the land. And Cain
built a city and he named it after his son, Enoch.

JUB 04:10 And Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she bore him
nine more children.

JUB 04:11 And in the fifth week of the fifth jubilee,
Seth took 'Azura, his sister, as a wife. And in the fourth
year of that week, she bore him Enos.

----------------------------------------------------------
If you read Jubilees, or, Genesis you will have
a genealogy handed down in an orderly fashion with the bore's
and/or begats until Noah comes along. In this fashion;

Gen 05:32
Gen 05:32 And Noah was five hundred years old: and Noah begat
Shem, Ham, and Japheth.


This jump of 500 years seems to establish a new era.

We have another phase of genealogy until Abraham. In the
Abraham story it appears that he slays his brother Haran,
and, reading between the lines (Josephus, Jubilees, and
Genesis) it appears that Haran and Sarai were coupled and
she had a son named Lot by Haran. It is curious that the
wives are taken (involuntarily) and that the children are
bore. In Jubilees even the daughters are bore. Myself, I
go by the 12 year rule and these "bore" children are
released from the care of their mother into the schools
of the priest. "Bore" does not say that the father is
the natural father and we know the orthodox Jews have a
rule that you cannot be a Jew unless your mother is a
Jew. What I am implying is that when Cain slew Abel this
Abel had already taken a wife and Cain reclaimed her and
raised a step-son.

Abram went to Egypt (Qumran) and the pharaoh (Haran) took
Sarai. Later Abram is going to overthrow this Egypt and
take his wife back. The story of Haran taking Sarai in the
first place is the "Rape of Dinah" story. Moses slaying
an Egyptian (Haran) and burying him in the sand is another
repetition of the same story.

When we get to the story of king David he takes the wife
(Bath-sheba) of another (can't recall his name) and has
him slain. I feel that a close scrutiny of the underlying
text involving Solomon will reveal that he was not really
David's son.

The stories in the Old Testament are inter-related and
the histories begin before 1000 b.c.e. and this "Methuselah
lived 965 years (+12)" was their method of going back
in time in a vain attempt to become the original inhabitants
of the world.


----------------------------------------------------------


gotta go

thanks, offa

Offa,

I am curious to know where you found the mystery book. How many more are there? And where are the ones about Jesus' childhood? Thanks.

hubj.

Offa, very interesting and enlightening. Tell me more. Thanks

Offa, I'm interested in Jesus's childhood (until age 14)too. I believe that history will eventually reveal Jesus as the birth son of Augustus Caesar. What do you think. I believe that Jesus was taken to Egypt by his mother Cleopatra. Augustus Julias Caesar Octavian changed Cleo's name to Mary when he married her. One of several things happened; Either history is mixed up, and it was Augustus that married Cleo. Or Julias Caesar the elder married Cleo, making Gaius and Jesus one and the same.

The Infancy Gospel of Mark, which is usually dated no earlier than 125 A.D., describes Jesus' early childhood from about 5 years to 12 years old; I have never heard of anyone who thinks it's a legitimate history, although it is quite amusing. Young Jesus struck someone dead who annoyed him, and then after his parents told him that wasn't a nice thing to do he brought the guy back to life again. Quite a temper there!

There is a lot of extrabiblical pseudepigrapha written around the second century BCE that claim to be written by OT figures such as Enoch or Abraham, or deal with Old Testament subjects. If you're interested a Google search for "biblical pseudepigrapha" will have some useful results.