dad
From: Stephen Williamson
Sent: Friday, August 16, 2013 8:54 AM
Subject: Cain and Abel :-)
Hi family
Interesting how we don’t always value the things we get easily.
Cain was born, and Eve says “I have gotten (me) a man, by Jehovah.
That tiny word ‘by” is used to indicate nearness, closeness, contraction, even lament. It’s the same word used in Genesis 49: 25 regarding Joseph, in those well-known words of how
“the arms of his hands were made strong ...... by the Almighty, who shall bless you with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lie under, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb: the blessings of your father have prevailed above the blessings of my forefathers unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills”
Well, Eve didn’t get to say all of that :-) but doubtless she was thrilled when Cain was born, which is why she named him “Cain” – to acquire, to get.
Then Abel was born , not much is said of his birth, his name means “transitory”, a breath, an emptiness - as nothing, a vanity. as in. “vanity of vanities” says the preacher in Ecclesiastes.
There was a prophetic aspect to all of this of course, but yes, after the hard work implied in getting Cain, his birth may have been just all too easy.
Interesting.
lots of love dad
Stephen Williamson Computing Services Pty Ltd
www.swcs.com.au/aboutus.asp
From: Stephen Williamson
Sent: Wednesday, August 21, 2013 2:32 PM
Subject: Enoch and Enosh, and some more Hebrew bits and pieces :-)
Hi all
Well, after writing about Cain and Abel last week, thought I’d look up the etymology behind the first grandsons, Cain’s son Enoch and Seth’s son Enosh.
Firstly Enoch, it’s a name that means to “Train up”, to “Initiate”, or to have “Narrowed” options.
Yes, Enoch was the first intern a word associated with the word for "Dedication", seen in the
So, after the Lord had told Cain how the red ground (adamah) would no longer yield her strength to him, due to his envious murder of Abel,
in Genesis
4:16 it says about Cain that after “drifting” around the land of “Nod”,
he married someone (presumably his sister according to Jewish teaching, as there were no other ladies around ) and then he built a “guarded”
place for himself (the literal meaning of the word “city”), and named the city after this son, yes, Enoch would have certainly had “narrowed” options. :-)
But the generations came, and as they prospered (in the natural), we get to the seventh generation through Cain, Lamech, boasting to his wives about how he’d executed a man who’d simply hurt him - ouch.
Eve in the meanwhile had a son she named Seth – a “substitute” , as she said, God has set / appointed me another child instead of the one Cain slew.
And Seth’s son was “Enosh”. Enosh or in its shortened form Iysh, derives from a word that means “frail”, yes, frail in comparison to God.
Iysh is the name that man had given himself when the woman (ishshah) had been drawn out of him back in Genesis 2:23.
God’s name for man was of course “Adam”, from the “rich red ground” (Adamah) man was made of.
Gen1:25 |
And God made ..... every thing that crawls / moves upon the ground (i.e. the adamah) after its kind: and God saw that it was good. |
Gen1:26 |
And God said, Let us make man (i.e. the adam) in our image, etc, etc. |
But now with Enosh, or “frail one”, in Gen 4:26 it says how people began (or literally, there was opened up a wedge towards) calling out upon the name of the LORD.
And then we get to the seventh generation through Seth, another Enoch / “trained up” son, but this man walks with God, and goes straight to heaven.
Much safer place to be in :-).
Blessings all Steve