Jack the Bodiless

I take it you're not from a farming background?

Without modern agricultural machinery, farming crops involves a LOT more effort than animal herding. Cain put in more effort than Abel, but appaently there was't enough bloodshed involved to satisfy God. Let's not foget this is the same God who demands human sacrifices elsewhere in the Bible.

kctan

I don't think so. The god here looks more like a leader or king & the offering of meat is of course considered alot more better than that of vegetables especially in that ancient time.

As to human sacrificies, they are just rites of appeasement to unknowns. The leader/king most likely became the god later on & the appeasement is inherited by him by default of him becoming one with the unknowns.

JMHO.

Ron Garrett

Which goes back to my point that sacrifice feeds the priest/king, not God.

Grumpy

Nice to see truthseekar admit that the text itself cannot support the contention that Cain's motives were what led to God's unequal treatment of the sacrifices. Such an idea comes only from the reader's imagination. Now, if only I could find the Bible verse which says "lean not unto your own understanding"... one of the NT epistles? Proverbs?

Too bad truthseekar missed the main point of why God would require a sacrifice of any kind. Mind you, the Genesis 4 account is the first sacrifice / offering mentioned in the Bible. As no such duties have been imposed on humanity at this point, we should assume that both Abel and Cain made their offerings totally voluntarily.

Reluctant or not, Cain made an offering. God was under no obligation to accept either. When God shows favoritism, he then attaches other conditions for proper sacrifices. I could understand Cain getting ticked off at this nonsense -- though killing his own brother was a definite no-no.

God must have recognized his own complicity in the homicide, which is why the usual capital punishment is waived in favor of banishment.

Grumpy

Wow. Everyone else got sick of this thread at exactly the same time I did.

fromdownunder

Grumpy, what a subtle way to *bump* a thread.

I will add to this, as there a couple of points regarding Cain and Abel which have not been raised here (although they have been in the past).

Since people were vegans at the time, Cain obviously thought that offering food to God was the right thing to do. As we all now know, this was a very bad career move. But since god had not previously suggested what, if any offerings, to make, an offering of food would have made an awful lot of sense.

Now, as for Abel, he raised sheep. Firstly, why? (and get your mind out of the gutter, I'm not from New Zealand) - perhaps for wool - but certainly not for food. So how did he get it into his head that he must kill an animal and BBQ it for God.

Surely, being a vegan and knowing no better, the idea of killing and cooking a sheep for meat would have been completely foreign to him.

How did he get it into his skull that God wanted a sacrifice consisting of lamb chops?

But naturally, God accepted the non-food sacrifice and rejected the food sacrifice. If I had been Cain, and had not been taught SacrificetoGod 101, prior to taking the exam, I would have been p*ssed as well.

Norm

Seeker of the Truth

Hi Everyone,

I never imagine so much can be said about Abel and Cain since I started this thread !

Thanks for all the discussions. I have followed and learnt from everyone of them.

I would be away for vacation in 4 hours time; about time to give my brain a rest ....

I would like to this opportunity to share with you something I read today.

Religion is like the fashion: one man wears his doublet slashed, another laced, another plain, but every man has a doublet; so every man has a 'religion'. We differ about the trimmings. - John Selden

A wise architect observed that you could break the laws of architectural art provided you had mastered them first. That would apply to religion as well as to art. Ignorance of the past does not guarantee freedom from its imperfections. - Reinhold Niebuhr

I personally don't know much about these guys but what they said seem to make common senses.

Again, thank you all for your contributions !

Seeker of the Truth

brighid

truthseekar -

I quote you : grumpy,
the text specifys the offering as it was from there labour and therefore makes it a good gift ( tell me I`m spekulating again) and it states the way in which thay sacrifice ( one with the first fruit fat, and the other with not much effort at all) and this is an expresion of there attributes and attitudes ( dreaming again). Thats what I get from the story.
Like any other book reads , don`t you guy`s read , don`t you picture what your reading even if it were history not fanticy , or I now , Your athiests so it doesn`t matter what I say You won`t see reason because you guys are yust like the fundys, denie every thing and clam everything . the debunkers, that would be a more accourate name for those expressing athiisim, in your persicution of christians you athiests have become exactly like the fundamental christian , stupid!"

You speculate that the passage intimates that the labor makes this a good gift and you state that one with the “first fruit and the other with not much effort at all.” Could you please point to the Genesis passage and quote where it makes reference to the lack of effort and labor being the “specific” reason for this god’s discordance with Cain? It also states that Abel ALSO brought the first fruits - this would require Cain did as well.

If you are “assuming” that tilling the Earth is somehow easier then herding sheep – I would say you lack a basic understanding of both. Try gardening – a small garden, or talk with a farmer who has many acres to plant, fertilize, feed and harvest. It is an extremely laborious process and takes great effort and great skill to grow healthy fruits of their fields. I would say that it is unfair to compare the fruits of the field to the fruits of the herd – it’s like comparing apples to sheep. No equitable comparison can be made.

I would also say that Cain had a right to be upset and even indignant. Nothing states that he did not work any more or less industriously in his fields than Abel did with his flock. These passages give no reason WHY this god did not find favor with Cain – just that Abels offering was respectable and Cain’s was not. The passage you quote that proceeds the offerings and God favoring Abel only discusses why Cain was upset. He basically says – if I work hard don’t I deserve favor? I am wroth because I believe I worked as hard as Abel (possibly more so) and you have spurned me for no good reason. I agree with Cain. I think he took it a bit far by killing Abel when his problem was really with this god.

I am also afraid that you are simply spouting anti-atheist propaganda and are incorrect in your belief that we persecute Christians or even have any desire to persecute you. We DISLIKE Christian group-think for very good reasons. Also, Challenging the authority of the Bible, questioning the motives of the alleged Creator, researching the “facts” against evidence at hand and drawing the conclusion that this is all a bunch of hog wash – is NOT persecution. Atheists in the United States don’t jail Christians for espousing Christian dogma. We don’t come into your churches and harass you. We don’t deny you jobs, health care, equal rights or basic human dignity because we don’t adhere to your flavor of belief. We simply DON’T agree with you and we desire a logical, accurate and rational explanation of the things you claim come from a perfect deity incapable of anything other than good. We ask that you properly define yourself and when you do so improperly we call you on it. This deary, is not persecution – it is actually something noble – seeking the truth!

Persecution is much more sinister – such as demanding that a person convert to the flavor of the Church before such things as a job, health care or other social services are given. Persecution is when members of one religion harass, slander, harm and kill members of divergent religious groups (or no religious background, or are among the most hated sinners – like homosexuals and back sliders) for no other reason than they don’t believe exactly the same way or they call god by a different name. Now, which atheist groups in America are guilty of such persecution? Atheists don't claim that they have been given authority by some invisible man in the sky who allegedly spoke to some ancient and uneducated sheep herders in the middle east. We don't claim that we are better than you because God told us so.

Atheists don’t insist that you believe as we do. We simply don’t want your hog wash shoved down our throats in the form of mandatory and public school prayer, laws against blasphemy, mandatory Sunday closings to observe the “Christian” Sabbath, posting of your Ten Commandments in our public and government buildings and yadda, yadda, yadda. We don’t want to take away your rights and we support the freedoms of all people (even if we find them completely irrational and utterly stupid by the standards of rational thought, critical thinking and any form of logic). We simply want equal freedom. Remember – you came to the SECULAR web on an INFIDEL forum. We have not come to your house – you came to ours. Now, it would be much more respectable and Christian-like to behave like a well-mannered guest and simply follow the explicit and outlined rules of this forum. And don’t ever expect that we are going to treat you with kid-gloves when you come here and espouse the same-old, same-old that has been picked apart a thousand times before.

I suggest that you bone up on the information provided here and actually read some atheist writings, perhaps Robert Ingersoll to begin with. Peruse the vast resources of this library and become familiar with the arguments and educate yourself about the constructs of logical arguments and fallacies and you won’t feel so beat up. We are simply offering you an opportunity to sharpen your intellect and expand your educational horizons. Unless of course you fear that “science and logic are the enemies of faith.”

Brighid

Grand Nubian

Truth seeker is beginning to get weak. Go get some strentgh from god buddy.

Why don't you kill some kids in gods name then he will reward you for it?

You actually said other won't use reason! HA!