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Cain and Abel and Jesus and the Jews
There’s a biblical story, narrative event if your prefer, that is shocking to the point it is almost unfathomable to believe it is true. I have no doubt it is because it is in the Bible; but skeptics wonder if it is hyperbole, exaggerated to make an etiological point. That point would be that Cain’s biological line was doomed to commit evil. Is there another lesson on a higher plane?
Going beyond and above my first impressions, when I view this event from a Christological perspective, it becomes less shocking, sadly. I say “sadly” because both events should forever be utterly shocking. They are crimes, and crime can become common and accepted. While familiarity breeds contempt, familiarity also breeds numbness resulting in emotional detachment. This is sad.
What biblical story is this? Cain and Abel (Genesis 4) and…
Have you considered the possibility of Cain and Abel foreshadowing Jesus and the Jews?
- Cain/Jews is about a brother killing their brother, Abel/Jesus.
- Cain/Jews offered inferior sacrifices; Abel/Jesus offered the right and perfect sacrifices.
- Cain/Jews get angry at Abel/Jesus although the latter are innocent.
- Cain/Jews beg for grace as seen when Cain asks for protection from vengeance and on Pentecost Jews ask what they can do to be forgiven (Acts 2:37).
While there are parallels, there are essential differences:
- Abel’s blood cries out for vengeance; while Jesus’s blood cries out from the cross, “Forgive them for they do not know what they are doing”.
Genesis 4:10 (CSB) “Then he said, “What have you done? Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground!”
Hebrews 12:24 (CSB) “and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood, which says better things than the blood of Abel.”
- Abel foreshadows the resurrection by “speaking” from death; while Jesus is the resurrection!
Hebrews 11:4 (CSB) “By faith Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was approved as a righteous man, because God approved his gifts, and even though he is dead, he still speaks through his faith.”
- When Cain begs for protection God gives him a “mark”. That is an interesting word. The first time it is used, is here referencing Cain. The CSB translates it by a different English word. The next time it appears it is connected to the rainbow after the flood (Genesis 9:12,13,17). This “mark” is a “sign”. That “sign” is connected to God’s Noahic covenant.
Then again, this time concerning the Abrahamic covenant, we have the “sign” or “mark” of the covenant which is circumcision (Genesis 17:11).
Jesus is not only the resurrection, Jesus is the mediator of a better covenant. In fact, Jesus is our covenant!
Isaiah 42:6 (CSB) ““I am the LORD. I have called you for a righteous purpose, and I will hold you by your hand. I will watch over you, and I will appoint you to be a covenant for the people and a light to the nations,”
Isaiah 49:8 (CSB) “This is what the LORD says: I will answer you in a time of favor, and I will help you in the day of salvation. I will keep you, and I will appoint you to be a covenant for the people, to restore the land, to make them possess the desolate inheritances,”
What is the “mark” or “sign” of Jesus as our covenant? As with Abraham, it is a circumcision, but made without hands:
Colossians 2:11-12 (CSB) “You were also circumcised in him with a circumcision not done with hands, by putting off the body of flesh, in the circumcision of Christ, when you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.”
Have you received Jesus’s “mark” which will protect you from God’s wrath and vengeance?
When I read the almost unbelievable story of the first brother killing the second brother, I will now forever see my Brother Jesus, and say, “I believe”.
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