Cain the Evil Ground Tiller
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In Genesis 4:2, the storyteller emphasizes a contrast between Adam and Eve's sons: Cain and Abel. The verse describes Abel as a "keeper of sheep," and Cain as a "tiller of the ground." The divergence of Cain and his descendents from the righteousness of the Lord begs the question: Does Cain's agrarian profession condemn himself and his descendants down an unrighteous path; and is that profession both cause and symptom of Sin in all Man?
In Eden, Adam and Eve live as foragers, eating "of every tree in the garden" which God planted for them, except the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (2:16-17). This life in Eden is an innocent one, before Adam disobeys God's decree and eats the forbidden fruit. As punishment, God curses the ground and condemns Adam: "in sorrow shalt thou eat of it for all the days of thy life; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field" (3:17-18). God's wrath for eating the fruit is not the death he had threatened, but a life of working by the "sweat of thy face" to cultivate grain (3:19).
We are conditioned to see the agricultural revolution, around ten millennia ago, as the turning point toward human modernity and civilization; and yet in Genesis, this lifestyle, tilling the "ground from whence [Man] was taken" is presented as God's curse, not his blessing (3:23). Returning to Cain and Abel, it is likely that the authors meant for them to be seen as emblematic figures, much as Adam is: Adam being the Hebrew word for "man." The improbability of two literal individual brothers pursuing completely antithetical lifestyles, herding and crop-growing lends credence to these observations...