Dear Friends,

In our last newsletter we started a series about interpretation of the Bible. What I would like to do this week is discuss different interpretations of the Bible, which existed in antiquity. In order to do so, I would like to examine different ancient sources and see how they deal with one very small question: what was it that Cain said to Abel in the field before he killed him?
The problem arises from the simple reading of the text in Genesis 4:8:

And Cain said to his brother Abel. And it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.

The text of the Bible does not specify what it was that Cain said to Abel. We also do not know when and where the conversation took place – was it in the field, or is the text describing an event which occurred before the actual murder scene? The syntactic form of the verse is unclear, thus leaving a tempting window for interpretation that will clarify the events or the structure of the verse, making it more comprehensible.

The first ancient source I would like to review is the Septuagint. The Septuagint is the ancient Greek translation of the Bible. The Septuagint of the Pentateuch was made in Alexandria (Egypt) in the third century BCE, and we will dedicate an additional newsletter to the Septuagint and its exegetical aspects in general. Naturally, when translating a text, the translator is often required to interpret and clarify what is before him in order to create a comprehensive translation of the text which will be understandable to those who have only his translation for reference. In this case, the translator of the Septuagint did something quite simple, and translated:
“And Cain said to his brother Abel: ‘Let us go out into the plain’. And it came to pass when they were in the plain . . .”

The translator adds a few words in his translation, which solve many of the problems: the conversation took place before they went out into the field, and it did not contain a fight nor does it reveal any more of the reasons for the murder than were previously known – Cain merely suggested that they go out into the field. This solves the syntactic problem, because the clause “And Cain said to his brother Abel” is no longer left stranded with no content of what he said revealed. However, we still do not know any juicy details about the actual murder, which the translator obviously did not know either, and therefore left vague: was the purpose of Cain’s suggestion that they go out into the field so that he would be able to murder Abel there? Or was the outing not connected to the feud between the brothers? Was this a premeditated murder, or a spontaneous act of rage? All this is left unsolved by the Septuagint translator.

An interesting interpretation of these verses can be found in the writings of Philo of Alexandria. Philo was a Hellenistic Jew of Alexandria, who lived in the first century BCE. He composed many writings in Greek, not all of which survived. He suggests allegorical and philosophical interpretations of the Bible, and is much concerned with apologetics – justifying the Jewish faith to the gentiles and giving it Greek philosophical meanings. Philo’s writings were sanctified by the church.

Philo’s base text is usually the Septuagint, and in his interpretation “That the Worse is Wont to Attack the Better” he first quotes Genesis 4:8 as it appears in the Septuagint. He then explains, allegorically, that Cain represents the love of self while Abel represents the love of God, and the dispute between them represents the struggle between these two approaches. As for the interpretation of the point at hand, Philo understands that:

Philo uses the Septuagint text, but draws a clear-cut conclusion from it: Cain, who in his eyes represents the evil of self-love, purposely drew Abel into a fight. The suggestion that they go to the plain was not only part of a pre-meditated plan to kill Abel, Cain purposely drew Abel into a dispute, at a place which is prone for such battles, and killed him as part of their struggle.
 

Alexandria, Egypt

An important resource for ancient interpretation is the texts of the “Targum” - different Aramaic translations of the Bible, which are Jewish translations from the first centuries CE, made for the benefit of the Jews who no longer spoke Hebrew as their first language. In translations made in the Land of Israel, we often find exegetical expansions. In these “targumim” (known as Pseudo-Jonathan and Neofiti) for Genesis 4:8, we find two interesting translations: the first is apparently the literal translation of the verse, and there we find that it is identical to that of the Septuagint – “And Cain said to his brother Abel: ‘Let us go outside’”. Thus, the Targum solves the syntactic problem in the verse, in exactly the same way as the Septuagint. We then find an expansion of approximately 10 lines which describes in great detail what exactly happened between the brothers. In this dialogue, they argue about the pillars of faith: Cain wants to understand why his sacrifice to God was not accepted, while Abel’s was. Abel tries to explain that his sacrifice was better than Cain’s, but Cain refuses to accept this, and his conclusion from the episode is a complete lack of faith in God. Seeing that he no longer believes that he will be punished for his bad deeds, in the heat of the fight, Cain kills Abel.

The Targum here solves many problems: it gives a simple solution for the syntactic problem, just like the Septuagint, and also expands on the actual events, based on Jewish traditions, so that the readers of the Targum are given a very clear picture of what happened. Incidentally, it appears from the Targum that Cain did not plan the murder and it happened in the heat of the fight – unlike Philo’s version which ascribes Cain with pre-meditation.

Another approach which we often find in ancient interpretations, when dealing with difficulties in the biblical text, is to ignore them or smooth them over. A good example of this can be found in the description of Abel’s murder in the Book of Jubilees (we discussed this book in our previous newsletter). In Jubilees 4:2, we simply hear that Cain killed Abel in the field – there is no record of anything that Cain said to Abel, and therefore we do not need to try to guess what he said. The readers of Jubilees simply knew that the murder took place in the field. This naturally does not satisfy the readers’ curiosity as to how the murder took place and what set of mind Cain was in, but it does solve the syntactical problem which arises from the biblical text, by simply ignoring it.

Have a great week!

Naama Baumgarten
The Biblical Hebrew Online Team