Year: 1871

From the Christian Union.


DECEMBER 18th, 1860.


''Rey. Henry Ward Beecher-Dear Sir
Please to inform me who Gains wife was, and
oblige A READER


There is no record of Gains courtship
OF wedding. However interesting to the
parties themselves, it is of no interest to
US, except upon the supposition that the
account in Genesis of the creation of
Adam was designed to exclude the sup
position that any people had been created.
If Adam and Eve were the sole rrogeni-
tors of the race. then Cain and Abel, it is
inferred, must have married their own
ssters-a connection which is shocking to
the sensibilities of the whole race, at a
subsequent stage of development.


But many of the Fathers of the Church
denied ihli Adam and Eve. and their
children, were the only people on the
globe. They affirmed that the text in
Genesis very plainly implies that there
were other inhabitants besides Adams
family. They allege that verse II, of
chapter 4 of Genesis, plainly implies that
the earth was already widely populated
For, when God declared that Cain should
be driven out from his family, and made
q vagabond in the earth, Cain deprecated
the sentence and replied that ''everyone
that tindeth me shall slay me-" 1t was
plainly not his family connections that he
feared, for he desired not to be driven
forth from them. 1t was the people that
he should meet when 4 wanderer in the
| earth. Who, then, We're the people
whom Cain feared to meet when he
should have gone forth into the earth?


1t is also reasoned by scholars that the
most natural method of soothing his fears
would have been to tell him. 'There are
no other people on earth except your
fathers children" Instead of that the
Lord is represented as falling in with
Gains impression respecting the popula-
ton of the world, and that He set d mark
upon Cain, lest any finding him should
kill him. (Gen. iv. l5) Still further, it
is said that Cain, separating himself from
his kindred, went to the land of Nod, east
of Sodom, "and he builded a city, and
called the name of the city after the name
of his son Enoch" The Fathers very
pertinently asked, Where did the people
come from that lived in this city That
would be an extraordinary state of things
which should have enabled Cain to fill up
city, however small, with his own chill
dren And it is inferred, therefore, that
there We're other people in the land be-
sides the immediate posterity OF Adam
If Adam was the only progenitor, Cain
| must have married his sister. If there
were other lines Of people, other Adams
as it We're, then Cain might have married
into another stock.


We do not express any judgment in the
matter. We give our correspondent the
opinions that have been held in the early
days of the Church, but with the statement
that almost all modern Christian writers
have rejected them.


But as the origin of races has in our
day assumed an important scientific de-
velopment, and, Us very able scientists
hold to u variety of original stocks, it is
interesting to know that those views have
been held before, and upon supposed
Biblical grounds.


But are there no more questions about
Cain? Does nobody wish to know his
Wife's name? Does no one wish to know
what the mark was which the Lord atlix-
ed to Cain? Does no one wish to know
how Cain died. Questions must be
scarce to leave such points untouched. If
Cain is to be raised, he surely ought to be
thoroughly dealt with.


The Mosaic account of the creation, so
far from excluding the supposition that
any people had been created before Adam,
seems to favor the theory that the world
was peopled before Adam and his rib be-
gan that work The account of the Ia
bors of the sixth day, in the first chapter
Of Genesis, states that God created man,
male and female, with the injunction to
multiply and replenish the earth. Whether
they did so or not, we find. after the con-
clusion of the seventh, the sanctlied day,
the statement that s'there was not Il man
to till the ground" The probability is
that there were men, but they were afllict-
with laziness-and that it was into this
unthrifty family that Cain married. 1t is
expressly stated that he found his wife in
the land of Nod, which was Of course the
home of q sleepy headed race. 1t is not
until toward the close of the second chap
ter that we find the account of the creation
of Adam and Eve, who were speedily
driven out of Eden. and told to work for
a living 1t would seem that the Lord
created two classes,-a race of idlcrs and
a race of toilers-and that to the latter
class belong all the descendants of Adam
EDITOR JOURNAL.