Cain's Cancer and Radical Therapy

The Genesis narrative is incomplete from the time of Cain up to Noah. What information is given is bizarre by our standards. Things like the "sons of God" married the "daughters of men" in Genesis 6:1-2 are written. Then there is a reference to the Nephilim, who "were the heroes that were of old, warriors of renown," according to verse 4. I am convinced there is a SciFi Channel movie in this mix somewhere. No one really knows what these verses are about, but amid these X-Files-like passages are some important pieces to the narrative we have been following.

At the end of Chapter 4, we learn that Adam and Eve have another son named Seth, who has a son named Enosh. It says people began to "call upon the name of the Lord" in his day. What exactly would this mean? Some scholars suggest that God had always initiated the conversation up to this time. This passage indicated that humanity had matured to the point that they could initiate contact conversation with God. Whatever the case, something about the nature of the relationship changed and apparently for the better among Seth's descendants.

The flip side of this story is increasing violence. This catchy little ditty by Lamech is in Chapter 4:

"Adah and Zillah, hear my voice;
you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say:
I have killed a man for wounding me,
a young man for striking me.
If Cain is avenged sevenfold,
truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold."
Gen 4:23-24 NRSV

There appears to be an escalating level of violence and destruction. Not only are the people not "filling the earth" as God commanded, but they are murdering each other with such cavalier indifference that it would make Al Qaeda blush. Certainly, this unchecked violence would eventually kill off or engulf the godliest folks. Genesis 6:11 says about Noah's time, "Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence." Noah and his family, descendants of Seth, were the only godly people left. Righteous humanity was on the verge of extinction.

Another key verse is 6:3, where it is recorded that God will limit the life span of people to 120 years. The centuries-long life spans apparently allowed those who were evil to get really good at being evil. Shorten their days, and you limit the damage they can do and how evil they can become. The point is that the impending flood was not so much the act of a wrathful God as it was a radical intervention to prevent his precious creation from self-destructive extinction. God had not given up on his plan for humanity.

Two side notes. I know some of the thoughts reading this right now. "People living hundreds of years? Global flood? Come on!" Okay. But let us rewind one hundred years to describe any of a number of our present quantum physics discoveries and see how many of those would have generated the same response. The evidence for how people might have lived for centuries is not conclusive, but it is scientifically plausible.

As to the flood, the Bible says it covered the "earth." Only Moderns would read back into the passage the idea of a globe covered in water. For the ancients, the idea of the earth connoted "the place where humanity lives." If the Bible is accurate about humanity refusing to spread, they would still be concentrated in Mesopotamia. The entire region is believed to have completely flooded more than once in past eons.

I am an old earth creationist. My concern here is not to get bogged down in a debate about the accurate historicity of these events. I am reviewing these events as elements of a story being told in Scripture to point us to God's character and plan. And the story is about to take a familiar turn.

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Comments

[Michael Kruse]

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Rodger Sellers said...
Wow! What a metaphor! (I haven't even finished reading the post.)

The flood wasn't so much a pissed off God having "had it up to here" as it was a surgeon saving the body from self-destruction. (Assuming I'm seeing your interpretation correctly.)

To be sure, no one ever taught me that one in seminary, but sure does make sense (both faithfully and logically.)

Gotta get back to finish your post!

RPS

June 20, 2005 11:39 AM

[Michael Kruse]

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Michael W. Kruse said...
Cool! I'm glad this connects.

I have become aware of just how much I miss in Scripture because I read it through Western individualist eyes. When I read it as a God's desire to create and be in loving community with an entire race that fills the globe, it takes on a whole new meaning for me.

I suspect that anger and wrath was involved but I also suspect that God was also deeply mournful and filled with sorrow. He let humanity go right to the brink before saving a remnant.

June 20, 2005 1:41 PM

[Michael Kruse]

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will spotts said...
The flood echoes the expulsion from Eden. There is a way in which refusing to let man and woman eat the fruit of the tree of life in their fallen state is an act of mercy. It is a limit to sin -- and even from their perspective it is perhaps a limit to the bitterness of that life -- I mean a life of spiritual death with perpetual physical existence through some kind of technicality seems that it would make humans kind of like Satan.

Thanks also for the perspective on creationism.

June 22, 2005 6:48 AM

[Michael Kruse]

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Michael W. Kruse said...
"There is a way in which refusing to let man and woman eat the fruit of the tree of life in their fallen state is an act of mercy." Great insight Will! Thanks for this. I suspect this thinking has application elsewhere in the OT.

June 22, 2005 4:13 PM