I'm confused about Cain's wife

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Neanderthals would not have been biologically identical with humans, so who exactly are you describing? Why would God create human simulacrums without souls or do you believe they evolved into everything Adam was except no soul. If Adam and Eve were created by God to be our first parents, that would be some evolutionary coincidence. Our souls are who we really are. Our essence. I find the idea of Cain coupling with some soulless “being” horrifying to contemplate.
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It would be something “human” genetically, but not spiritually. Such a thing wouldn’t be detected in fossil evidence or DNA, since the rational soul is neither genetic nor detectable in body shape.

I don’t believe that Adam and Eve were created miraculously alongside these “humanoids”, I believe Adam was physically from them, with a rational soul directly infused by God (as happens in all humans). We as Catholics don’t have to believe that Adam was miraculously formed; we can believe his physical body was evolved, so long as we do not hold that the rational soul is something that evolved.

So the DNA of Adam and Eve, and their children, would be entirely compatible with the non-rational humanoids in the world around them, without any genetic differences whatsoever; again, neither the soul nor the rational mind are products of genetics.

Peace and God bless!
 
porthos11 said:
Right. Except that under the theory of other humanoids, the second set of grandparents are not human (do not possess human souls, but perhaps similar human-compatible bodies). It is a given that indeed there was one man and woman to whom God infused rational souls, and these were our first human parents (Adam and Eve).

But if Cain mated with a non-human humanoid, it indeed brings two sets of parents into the tree, but one set wouldn’t be human. The offspring would biologically be half human but would have a human soul, and subject to original sin due to Adamic ancestry. Over time, this non-human species would have been absorbed or extinguished due to the more aggressive sapiens species, leaving only the modern human species.

Nevertheless, the theory of non-human interbreeding reconciles with the required belief in monogenism.
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Are you saying that monogenism only applies when we’re talking about souls? I have always understood that it refers to the physical aspect as well as the spiritual.
 
Spirithound said:
Are you saying that monogenism only applies when we’re talking about souls? I have always understood that it refers to the physical aspect as well as the spiritual.
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Well, by definition, a human being is body and soul. A humanoid lifeform without a human soul would not be human even if its body were identical physiologically.

But in terms of prehistory, sapeiens and neanderthalis were physioligically separate species too, so at one time in earth’s history, there were two intelligent lifeforms inhabiting the planet simultaneously. Evolutionary theory today indicates that we did not evolve from neanderthalis; we evolved in parallel with them and they eventually died out. They may have been hominid, but if they indeed were a different species, they would not have had human souls, but souls inherent to their own nature.

But let me make it clear that I’m not a proponent of the humans interbreeding with non-humans theory. I’m just saying that the theory can indeed fit into the required Church teaching and account for the prehistoric evidence found so far. I’m pretty much contented with “I don’t really know” as far as “who was Seth’s wife?” is concerned.
 
porthos11 said:
Well, by definition, a human being is body and soul. A humanoid lifeform without a human soul would not be human even if its body were identical physiologically.
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That is true, however I don’t believe that the articles of monogenism say “One set of human parents”, but rather, “One set of parents”, which would indicate that all of humanity is descended purely from one set of parents, to the exclusion of any inter-special breeding.
 
Spirithound said:
That is true, however I don’t believe that the articles of monogenism say “One set of human parents”, but rather, “One set of parents”, which would indicate that all of humanity is descended purely from one set of parents, to the exclusion of any inter-special breeding.
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Do you have any links?
 
I think it makes sense that Cain would have intermarried a sister by his own parents. For the longest time I thought that Adam and Eve were the FIRST people, but not the ONLY people. That maybe there were ten pairs of Adams and Eves placed by God around the world. However, the discovery of Mitochondrial Eve completely shot this theory down.

It’s scientifically proven (not trying open that can of worms, mind you) that if you go far enough back into the history of all humans we share a genetic female ancestor, whom is refered to as Mitochondrial Eve. So if there were other Adam and Eve type pairs around the world giving birth to small groups of first people, then we’d have several different Mitochondrial Eves, not just one.

Between Scripture and science, I think there’s a pretty solid case for Cain marrying his sister.
 
lak611 said:
Do you have any links?
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vatican.va/holy_father/pius_xii/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xii_enc_12081950_humani-generis_en.html

This is the link to Humani Generis, the pertinent section is 37.
In part:
Humani Generis:
For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all
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It says that “true men” take their “origin” through “natural generation” from Adam. This seems pretty clear that Pope Pius XII was referring to a physical aspect.
 
It’s scientifically proven (not trying open that can of worms, mind you) that if you go far enough back into the history of all humans we share a genetic female ancestor, whom is refered to as Mitochondrial Eve.
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The problems with Mitochondrial Eve being in any way related to the real Eve are manifold. Most significantly, Mitochondrial Eve, the common female ancestor, did NOT live at the same time as the common male ancestor (our common male ancestor lived thousands of years seperate from her). Second to that is the fact that Mitochondrial Eve, and all the humans living at her time period, had their OWN Mitochondrial Eve, and that Mitochondrial Eve and her fellows had THEIR own. There is no such thing as “one” Mitochondrial Eve, just the Mitochondrial Eve that humans today trace their ancestry back to.

Basically, all a Mitochondrial Eve can tell you is that at some point way far back we had the same grandmother. It doesn’t tell you that we had only ONE grandmother, only that we all have this one grandmother in common. For example, taking just your own family, your mother’s mother is the “Mitochondrial Eve” for your siblings and all your cousins who were born from a daughter of your grandmother. This tells you nothing about their fathers, nor about the cousins who’s fathers are the sons of your grandmother.

In short, Mitochondrial Eve has absolutely nothing to do with putting human descent on a single woman; the poetic use of the word Eve to describe the current Mitochondrial Eve is simply that: poetry.

Peace and God bless!
 
Spirithound said:
It says that “true men” take their “origin” through “natural generation” from Adam. This seems pretty clear that Pope Pius XII was referring to a physical aspect.
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Hardly. It’s saying that we naturally come from Adam, period. That doesn’t mean that our genes come only from Adam, since the human nature is the rational soul united to a body, and that comes from Adam alone even if the material of the body doesn’t.

Peace and God bless!
 
Who ever Adam and Eve were that was certainly not their names at the time they lived. I have thought that somehow the names mean the first man and the first woman from whom all mankind have descended. Why is it so hard to accept that such is possible? We had all the time in the world for this to happen. It’s not much different than owning two unique rabbits. Given a year or two you would have a whole yard full. I also do not think our concepts of in-breeding and incest were at the top of the minds of these first people either. Adam and Eve could have been brother and sister, the unique off-spring of parents who were not fully human with an infused soul. Did the real Adam and Eve somehow have a knowledge of one God and all that Genesis attributes to them. I really don’t think so. Even Aquinas recognized that some aspects of Scripture will not meet the test of contemporary knowledge.

Summa/106801: The question of Genesis 1:6: “God said: let there be a firmament,” and further on (verse 8); “And the evening and morning were the second day.” “I answer that, In discussing questions of this kind two rules are to observed, as Augustine teaches (Gen. ad lit. i, 18). The first is, to hold the truth of Scripture without wavering. The second is that since Holy Scripture can be explained in a multiplicity of senses, one should adhere to a particular explanation, only in such measure as to be ready to abandon it, if it be proved with certainty to be false; lest Holy Scripture be exposed to the ridicule of unbelievers, and obstacles be placed to their believing.”

So perhaps we need a new explanation.
 
Gen. 5:4 tells us that during Adam’s 930 years he had other sons and daughters.It would have been necessary, in order to obey God’s command to be fruitful and multiply, to marry brothers and sisters for some time and later cousins. There seems to be no definite word about the incestuous charater of brother and sister marriage till the time of Abraham.
 
Genesis 4,14:

“Today you have driven me away from the soil,and I shall be hidden from your face;I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth,and anyone who meets me may kill me.”

This suggests that there were,by the time of Cain and Abel,other people in the world outside of
the lineage of Adam and Eve. Why would Cain be afraid of being killed by strangers if they did not exist? The Church can teach that all of humanity is descended from Adam and Eve, because according to the Bible,Noah and his family were the only people to survive the flood. But the writers of Genesis seem to take it for granted that there were other people outside of that lineage.
 
Remember that Adam lived 930 years. We are not told when Cain married. He could have been 50, 100, or more. That would have allowed plenty of time for him to marry one of his sisters. There does not need to be an alien race. There is no evidence for it in Scripture.
 
Ok I promised to post the chart when i found it so here I am. 😃
Table: Expected Population Growth in Adam’s Lifetime According to Genesis 5, life spans from Adam to Noah averaged 912 years. Each of the patriarchs mentioned had “other sons and daughters” in addition to the sons recorded by name. The table calculations are based on:
  • life span = 900 years,
  • first child comes at age 50,
  • child bearing years =500, and
  • one child every 5 years during child bearing years.
    year, reproducing couples, children born, total population
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0, 1, 0, 2
50, 1, 0, 2
100, 1, 10, 12
150, 6, 30, 42
200, 21, 100, 142
250, 71, 352, 494
300, 247, 1210, 1704
350, 852, 4180, 5884
400, 2941, 14,450, 20,334
450, 10,167, 49,892 , 70,226
500, 35,113, 172,358, 242,584
550, 121,292, 595,378, 837,962
600, 418,980, 2,056,530, 2,894,492
650, 1,447,245, 7,103,862, 9,998,364
700, 4,999,176, 24,538,536, 34,536,930
750, 17,268,444, 84,762,338, 119,299,368
800, 59,649,613, 292,790,780, 412,090,500
850, 206,045,003, 1,011,374,120 , 1,423,465,830
900, 711,732,063, 3,493,544,650, 4,917,014,660
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OK the thing it hard to read in this forum go to the site and see it there.

Anyhow, Cain had choices of whom to marry. we don;t; know how old Cain was when he got married. if it was early on, it would have had to be his sister as well as his wife. But if he waited a bit, there were WAY more women to pick from. We aren’t talking about modern day Americans with an average of 2.5 children here! Remember the population could easily have been large enough for several seperate cities by the time of Adams death (World Pop est. 4,917,014,660)
 
avflf said:
How about taking Gen. 2 as a different and subsequent creation to that of Gen. 1?
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There is nothing in the Bible to support a different creation or aliens. The long life spans make sense in terms of the rapid rise in population. Cain could have married his sister. If he waited until he was 50 or 100 to marry, she would have been quite a bit younger than him. But women also were able to have children when they were much older.
 
lak611 said:
There is nothing in the Bible to support a different creation or aliens. The long life spans make sense in terms of the rapid rise in population. Cain could have married his sister. If he waited until he was 50 or 100 to marry, she would have been quite a bit younger than him. But women also were able to have children when they were much older.
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If one reads Gen.1 one notes that man and woman appear to have been created at the same time while in Gen. 2 there is a time period between the forming of Adam and the creation of Eve. Also in Gen. 1 the human pair were permitted to eat of the fruit of every tree while a prohibition was placed in Gen. 2. Thees two accounts are not compatible and can be interpreted as two different creations. As it is in Gen. 1 God’s command to the human pair to “multiply” was to “replenish” the Earth, which carries the idea of “replacing that which was depleted” and it may mean that other sentient beings had been created before Gen. 1 and had become extinct. However, no such command was given to the pair in the Garden of Eden. So there is, in the Biblical account, enough evidence to support the two creation theory.
 
Ghosty said:
Saying that all humans descend from Adam and Eve doesn’t necessitate that their children married their siblings. It’s equally possible theologically, and much more likely biologically, that they had children with humanoids, or creatures with human bodies and non-rational souls.

Peace and God bless!
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I agree with Ghosty’s theory. I do not believe that Genesis tells us that Adam was the first homo sapiens, per se. I think that the truth it conveys is that Adam and Eve were the first humans, or a homo sapiens with a rational soul.

After Cain murdered Abel, the Lord placed Cain under a curse and Genesis records Cain’s reaction as such:
Cain said to the LORD, “My punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.”

But the LORD said to him, “Not so; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over.” Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him. So Cain went out from the LORD’s presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden. (Genesis 4:13-16)
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Who could possibly find Cain and harm him if there were no other people around? If we take Genesis literally, all that was left was Adam and Eve. It is possible that Adam and Eve did have other children in addition to Seth. But if they did have daughters, why would Adam and Eve allow Cain to marry one of them? Wouldn’t they be afraid of Cain murdering another one of their children?

I think the ones that could possibly find Cain and kill him were other homo sapiens. Furthermore, I think it is reasonable that all the children of Cain would inherit their father’s genetic trait and posess a rational soul as well. According to ancient beliefs about reproduction and genetic inheritence, the role of the man was to provide “the seed” and the role of the woman was to provide “the field”. Hence, all hereditary traits came from the man according to ancient beliefs.

Seth’s lineage is more interesting to me. Because out of him came Noah, and the rest of humanity, including our Lord, Jesus Christ. Seth did beget a son, but the Bible never said how he begot it or even mentioned the wife’s name. The reason why she was omitted from history was because to the ancients, it wasn’t important to know who the mother was. Everything came from the male, including the posession of a rational soul.
 
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