Covenant Structure in Genesis 4 – Part 3

Cain’s despising of atoning blood in the Sanctuary of God led to murder of the image of God. As in later biblical history, the shedding of innocent blood led to the barrenness of the land.

In part 2, we analyzed the Garden cycle of Genesis 4: the two sons of Adam offering their respective “near bringings” at the Sanctuary of God. We now observe the immediate results of Cain’s primeval Baalism in the Land.

Land: Kingdom Revoked

Creation / Initiation / Sabbath

• Through a clever use of literary structure, the chain of authority apparent in this stanza brilliantly reflects the nature of Cain’s sin. The Lord’s authority is primary (Sabbath), and Cain’s headship as firstborn is secondary (Passover). Abel’s sacrificial ministry (and now Abel himself) is offered in the place of Cain, who brought the Firstfruits of the Land. Cain, speaking as a “serpent-king”—a beast (Pentecost), becomes a false prophet (Trumpets) and a “wolf-priest” (Atonement) who represents—shelters—no one but himself, a prefigurement of the Gentile kings. (Booths). All of this imagery is crucial for our understanding of the rest of the Bible, especially as it culminates in the book of Revelation.
• The word “keeper” is not the same word used of Abel’s keeping of sheep, but that used in Genesis 2:14 to describe Adam’s role in keeping, watching over, preserving,  the Garden of Eden. Adam’s sin was a failure of priestly guardianship. As the ‘obed ’adamah (servant of the ground), Cain’s sin was a failure of kingly guardianship.

Division / Delegation / Passover

• As the Division stanza, the theme here is the cutting of the sacrifice. Within the stanza, rather than the blood speaking as a witness of peace between God and man, this blood called for vengeance. It testified against the false brother in the same way that the blood of all those human sacrifices—splashed against the altar—would culminate in the “speaking” altar of the Temple in the first century.

When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne. They cried out with a loud voice, “O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?” Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been. (Revelation 6:9-11)

And I heard the angel in charge of the waters say, “Just are you, O Holy One, who is and who was, for you brought these judgments. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. It is what they deserve!” And I heard the altar saying, “Yes, Lord God the Almighty, true and just are your judgments!” (Revelation 16:5-7)

• The blood of Christ speaks better things than the blood of Abel (Hebrews 12:24)—it calls down the blessing of God, as did the blood and the fat offered by Abel, enabling us to draw near to the throne of grace.

Ascension / Elevation (Land)

• Due to the Oath of Abel’s blood, the faithful man who had trusted his serpentine brother, the very ground over which Cain assumed dominion without God’s blessing now curses Cain himself.
• The opening of the “mouth” of the Land to speak is related to the opening of the ground to receive those who rebelled against the priesthood of Aaron (Numbers 26:10), and also to the splitting of the altar of idolatrous Jeroboam (1 Kings 13:5).¹For more discussion, see “Jeroboam’s Table of Demons” in Michael Bull, Dark Sayings: Essays for the Eyes of the Heart.
• This event is the background for the prohibitions against consuming blood, whether shed by a slain animal or contained within a strangled animal. The first prohibition comes in Genesis 9:2-4, when meat is added to the diet of mankind as a symbol of Noah’s qualification to bear the sword. The reason for this global probation, however, is not given until the Levitical priesthood is established. The one who consumed blood from beasts or birds hunted and killed would be cut off from the people (symbolic death). The one who consumed blood from animals that had died naturally was unclean and required a ritual baptism (symbolic resurrection) (Leviticus 17:13-16).
• The reason that the “life” was in the blood is that blood symbolised a mediation between heaven and earth. In natural terms, Adam became a living creature when God breathed into him (Genesis 2:7). In supernatural terms, the filling of the Spirit brings the authority of God in heaven to bind or loose, bless or curse, on earth. This is also why the heart and the lungs are never mentioned in the Levitical sacrificial stipulations. These are included with the head as the “clean” part of the animal. The lungs are the breath (heaven) and the heart is the red clay (earth). Thus, life is a mingling of heaven and earth, an “incarnation” of the invisible represented in the oxygenated blood. In relation to the idea of oxygenation as “life by the Spirit,” the priests wore white robes with sashes of blue (blood in the body), purple (blood from the wound) and scarlet (blood on the ground). These represent the Triune Office, a process of priesthood (blameless sacrifice), kingdom (John 19:2 and Mark 15:7) and prophecy (the cry of the martyr: Genesis 4:10-12). Thus, for a man to consume blood is to symbolically dethrone God as judge of heaven and claim dominion upon the earth.
• Furthermore, murder of the innocent in the Land continually resulted in famines, right up until the first century after the murder of Stephen and the first persecutions of the Church. The fruit of the land and the fruit of the womb were irrevocably entangled. Enmity between brothers brought barrenness in the Garden (priesthood), starvation in the Land (kingdom), and upheavals in the World (prophecy). That is why Jesus warned that “…nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are but the beginning of the birth pains.” (Matthew 24:7)
• Until AD70, the Jews were still under the Abrahamic Covenant and the Gentiles under the Noahic Covenant. Thus the consumption of blood remained forbidden (Acts 15:20), however, Paul indicates that in Christ such stipulations were coming to an end (Romans 14:14; Colossians 2:16). The believing Gentiles were forbidden from consuming blood in order to avoid causing their Jewish brethren to stumble, but the end of the Temple and its sacrifices in AD70 not only removed the Jew-Gentile enmity but also placed all previous covenants into Christ.²For more discussion, see “Cosmos and Covenant” in Michael Bull, Dark Sayings. Jerusalem is pictured as a combination of an Israelite woman suspected of adultery being given the cup of “jealous inspection” by the priesthood (Numbers 5:18-24) and a Cainite king drinking the blood of God’s witnesses (Revelation 17:2-4). This combination of murder and adultery—a “marriage” of the central stipulations of the Ten Commandments, the “sins of the flesh”—represents the slaughter of God’s sons for the sake of Herodian compromise with Roman state power. Since the blood of Abel was finally avenged on that generation, bringing down on the heads of the Jewish rulers the curses for substituting animal sacrifices for human victims as Cain had done, the consumption of blood is no longer forbidden. The blood of the New Covenant is given to the saints as wine, that men—as brothers—might beat their swords into plowshares.

Ascension / Presentation (Fruits): Law Opened

• Just as Israel failed to enter into God’s promises after the testimony of the twelve spies who bore a “firstfruits” cluster of grapes, Cain would be condemned to wander. The image is that—as a creeping thorn—Cain would not only be fruitless but also rootless. As with Nebuchadnezzar, the process of humiliation works from the top of the tree and cuts it down to the ground. This would make him dependant upon the Adamic priesthood for food as a priestly “Tree of Life.” However, even the fruits are mentioned in kingly terms.
• The word “yield” is associated with priesthood. The word “strength” is associated with kingdom, and thus appears at the center of the construct. Without roots or fruits, Cain could not be a “mighty man,” that is, a god. Despite the continual promises of the serpent, true godhood comes only from the hand of God.
• The word fugitive carries the idea of quivering, waving or tottering. It is not only used of Israel’s wanderings but also of their trembling at the thunder and lightning at Mount Sinai. The word vagabond carries the idea of shaking, either in sympathy with grief or as a reed moving to and fro in water. Placed at Ethics: Prophecy, Cain would “quiver and shake” under the wind or breath of God’s judgment, just as Adam and Eve had done when they heard the sound/voice of the Lord moving to and fro in the wind of the day (Genesis 3:8). Paul uses the same image to describe the judgment of the rulers of Jerusalem (2 Thessalonians 2:8).³For more discussion of the Adamic allusions in 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4, see Altar of the Abyss – Part 1. This scattering of Cain would be a “de-creation,” an inversion of the “fluttering” of the Spirit over the abyss in Genesis 1:2.

Testing / Purification / Pentecost: Law Given

• This “social de-creation” is then reflected in the nature of Cain’s response to God’s judgment: its symbolism runs the order of the Creation Week (and the festal calendar) in reverse, ending in the abyss, the polar opposite of the godhood intended for Adam. Ironically, in this reverse order, the phrase “face of the ground” puts the priestly and kingly offerings in the order that God desired.
• Being driven from the face of the ground, and being hidden from the face of God, means that Cain considered himself to be cut off from both heaven and earth, that is, the past (creation) and the future (dominion).

Maturity / Transformation / Trumpets: Law Received

• Cain then correctly prophesies his own doom, and the order reverts to the correct process of maturity. The “finding” of Cain here corresponds to the “uncovering” of the kings of Israel, culminating in the judgment of the Land on the Great Day of Coverings in AD70 (Isaiah 2:19-22; Luke 23:30; Revelation 6:16). Hosea combines imagery from Genesis and Isaiah to describe the judgment of Israel’s idolatry.

The high places of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed. Thorn and thistle shall grow up on their altars, and they shall say to the mountains, “Cover us,” and to the hills, “Fall on us.” (Hosea 10:8)

Conquest / Vindication / Atonement

• In this Atonement stanza, the Lord temporarily covers Cain’s blood-guilt with a “mark.” The text does not explain this, but we do find the significance of this seminal event expanded upon in later texts.⁴For more discussion, see The Marks of Jesus – Part 2. The two most important factors that must be read back into this event are that,

1. as the firstborn of Adam, Cain was the Lord’s “anointed,” and thus regicide was to be avoided, since it set a dangerous precedent for murder. The mark put all vengeance—and thus Cain’s fate—in God’s hands. Perhaps it was this text—along with the inspiration of the Spirit of God—that restrained David’s hand from killing Saul.
2. The temporary mercy offered to Cain was based on the continued priesthood of the line of Adam, a ministry that would be restored with the birth of Seth. This is the same relationship that existed later on between the Jews and the Gentiles. The “mark” of circumcision upon humanity—expanded upon in the ministry of the Levitical priests whom God “took” instead of the firstborn of Israel (Numbers 3:12)—was a sign of temporary mercy until Christ came to fulfill it. That is why Abraham was given a barren womb and a barren land to be made fruitful by faith on behalf of the nations. Thus, with the ending of the significance of the Circumcision, the sins of the Gentiles would no longer be overlooked and all nations were now commanded to repent (Acts 17:30-31).
3. Thus, whatever it actually was, this “mark” upon Cain that represented priesthood served as a symbol of Abel and his ministry on behalf of the firstborn of humanity.

• The sevenfold vengeance relates to the seven sprinklings of blood in the Most Holy Place on the Day of Atonement, and the sevenfold re-enactment of the Creation Week in the Ascension Offering in Leviticus 1. The number seven adds the vertical triune tiers of heaven to four “compass” horns of the earth in order to reconcile them and bring peace and reconciliation, the Sabbath kingdom of God.
• Notice that the final two lines reverse the order of the finding and killing of Cain.

Glorification / Representation / Booths

• The final stanza is an ironic commission whose irony is compounded by the fact that line 6 (corresponding to Joshua’s Conquest) is not possession but wandering. Instead of rest, rule, and legal representation of God, there was unrest, humiliation, and judgment. Just as Adam sinned and remained under the priestly sword he was intended to bear, so Cain sinned and abided under the kingly sword he was intended to bear.
• Notice that the presence of the Lord is placed at Ascension, locating it at the mount of Eden and the location of priestly mediation.
• In another sense, this stanza works backwards as a reverse ascension. Just as Israel was commanded to “go up” to the land of Canaan, here Cain is descending from the presence of the Lord. Placing the titles of the books of the heptateuch alongside each step makes this apparent.

In the final part of this series, we will observe the ramifications—and significance for later Scriptures—of Cain’s sin in the Land as it served as a foundation for global rebellion in the World.

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