# Bible question: Why did God favor Abel's offering over Cain's? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 19, 2009, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321 "2009-06-19T19:07:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2009, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/41 "2009-06-20T01:53:39Z")
> [@Shawn1767](#): > > Er, I mean, why would the most powerful being in the universe who can create matter at will need a meat or any other kind of sacrifice? It’s very simple. God was made in Man’s image. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2009, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/42 "2009-06-20T03:04:12Z")
> [@Shawn1767](#): > > Er, I mean, why would the most powerful being in the universe who can create matter at will need a meat or any other kind of sacrifice? To prove your faithfulness? Um, couldn’t an all-knowing God just read your mind and tell your faithfulness without having to kill something? I would say that it would be important not only for it to be known to God, but to the person, otherwise they’d call bullshit. Cain: So, hey, I notice you asked Abel for a sacrifice and not me. What gives? God: Oh, I know you’d fall short, being omniscient and all. So I thought i’d save you the trouble. Cain: Bollocks, God. I’d most certainly have given you the greatest and most tasty of my vegetables. It’s as much a matter of proving your faithfulness to _yourself_ as it is proving your faithfulness to God. Not only does he need to know how far your faith will truly take you, but you need to know how strong your faith really is, too. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2009, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/43 "2009-06-20T05:48:36Z")
[rant] If God were a FAIR god, and not prejudiced (postjudiced?) against Cain because of BS Ex post facto claims of others, He’d’ve cut a deal. The two proffered sacrifices. Both sacrifices should’ve been accepted. Were God NOT a jerk, that’s how it would’ve gone. But the OT God, still smitten by the claims of a dozen other NE gods, feels He has to be a Hardass, and Cain, the simple farmer, only looking to feed his kids by worshipping several (Biblically) non-humans, pays what he hopes will both feed his family but also appease God the Hardass. This doesn’t work (GtHA being a serious Hardass). Cain got screwed by most of the subsequent J/C traditions. Those that disagree are propped up by imaginations THOUSANDS of years old, and they should consider the Scriptures as they were written, not as they were explained in school/schul. [/rant] Note: Rant status deleted if some people realize I am serious and want them to think outside the (ETA:theological) box. (stern 🙂 ) ---
**Author:** ![mr.jp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/48db29/32.png) [@mr.jp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mr.jp)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2009, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/44 "2009-06-20T08:15:58Z")
If we read it as a piece of literature, I don’t see any basis for 2-4. 5. might be true, but it’s more an explanation of why it was written like that, than the internal motives of the work. The God character in the older times was rather more person-like than later on. He walks about, and returns. He has specific, more minor needs and demands. Now, he wants that people give him a sacrifice. Obviously he wants the sacrifice that is most delicious to him. And he does have specific tastes. As Dropzone mentions, Leviticus often has mentions of this and that being “a sweet savour unto the LORD.” ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2009, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/45 "2009-06-20T12:47:09Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > Or, to expand on that premise a bit, the social norms of the time, or perhaps the prejudices of the tale teller, put a greater value on meat than veggies. I do, myself. Nothing mysterious or supernatural about it. > > If I had written the story, the giver of cheese curds would be honored more than the supplier of spinach. “Thou who givest of the curds be dairy blesséd among men. Curséd be he, the green leaf bearer! For he shall be visited with grief, nay, unto the 3rd and 4th generation; verily, he shall not rest because of his abomination. His berry patch shall be torn asunder and scattered to the four winds…” So in short “Blessed are the cheesemakers”? ---
**Author:** ![Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malleus_incus_stapes/32/3293_2.png) [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2009, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/46 "2009-06-21T02:06:41Z")
> [@Shawn1767](#): > > So, why does God need a spaceship? > > Er, I mean, why would the most powerful being in the universe who can create matter at will need a meat or any other kind of sacrifice? To prove your faithfulness? Um, couldn’t an all-knowing God just read your mind and tell your faithfulness without having to kill something? Again, I’m trying to remember what I’ve heard on the subject. From what I understand, a sin-offering animal is supposed to be a substitute for the sinner. That is, the sinner is supposed to watch the animal get killed, and say to himself, “That should be me there. I’ve committed a crime, I should be the one getting sacraficed and chopped up and burned.” If someone really is meditating on “That should be me”, and not just going through the motions, it would leave a powerful impression. As for voluntary offerings (which seem to be the type we’re talking about here), I think the idea is that you’re giving up your possesions God. I’m guessing the idea would be that you’re aknowledging that it was God who gave you your sheep by symbolically “giving back” a sheep or two. ---
**Author:** ![PlainJain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5daacb/32.png) [@PlainJain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PlainJain)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2009, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/47 "2009-06-21T06:31:54Z")
Abel represents the pastoralists, Cain the agriculturalists. Pastoralists traditionally share the land. The whole hunter/gatherer thing went askew when people started growing crops and needed to protect their land. This story is passed down from before Jesus’ time. IMHO, the bible is just war propaganda that is misunderstood and mistranslated. ---
**Author:** ![Small\_Hen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ad7895/32.png) [@Small\_Hen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Small_Hen)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2009, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/48 "2009-06-21T16:08:56Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > [Genesis 4:](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%204:1-16;) > > Why did God reject Cain’s offering? The story does not say. > > Possibilities: > > 1. Abel made his offering in a spirit of pious humility, Cain with pride and self-satisfaction. (Got that one from a DC Bible comic book – aimed at children; it completely glossed over the “sodomy” aspect of the story of the destruction of Sodom.) > > 2. Cain offered “the fruits of the soil.” Vegetables won’t do. Vegetables don’t bleed. God demands **blood** sacrifice in atonement for sin. (Got that from one of Jack Chick’s comic books; don’t know if it’s original with him. In doctrinal terms, obviously relates to the blood-atonement of Christ.) These were the two reasons I always heard growing up, from at least two different churches (Baptist and Non denominational Christian). Animal sacrifice was a metaphor for the Jesus’s death on the cross, which was the only thing that could wash man of his sins. By bringing veggies, Cain was a)disobeying God, b)failing to atone for his sins, and c)valuing his own works (aka, saying that the works of man are enough to earn passage to heaven and denying the need for Jesus, which is the only sin in Christian doctrine that earns a ticket to hell). ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2009, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/49 "2009-06-21T17:26:09Z")
> [@mr.jp](#): > > To me, the obvious guess would be that God _liked_ meat. with Bacon Salt - at least in some of the Apocrypha ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2009, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/50 "2009-06-22T12:04:17Z")
> [@FriarTed](#): > > So in short “Blessed are the cheesemakers”? Right. “Blessed are the cheesemakers, for they can show us the whey.” ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2009, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/51 "2009-06-22T12:33:04Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > Right. “Blessed are the cheesemakers, for they can show us the whey.” Translated from the Kurdish? ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2009, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/52 "2009-06-22T20:55:15Z")
Question for those who attribute it to Cain violating some sort of rule or principle: How should Cain have known this? Can you point to anywhere in the Bible that this rule was declared chronologically prior to Genesis 4? I think this speaks to nothing more than the primacy of meat-sharing in social interactions, which is fairly well documented in primates and humans. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2009, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/53 "2009-06-22T22:19:55Z")
> [@kanicbird](#): > > Cain being the first child of Adam and Eve after the curses placed on them for eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil may have something to do with it, along with the curses on Eve being basically about reproduction, and the only real known rule of the Garden of Eden ‘be fruitful and increase’. Children can inherit the curses of their parents. It is very likely that Cain did and was born evil. As such he would not have the same motivation of the heart that a good child would have, so it was simply impossible for Cain to make the proper sacrifice as his heart was evil. God looks at the heart when judging us. But, why would that curse of an evil heart fall on the first-born child but not the second? ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 10:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/54 "2009-06-25T10:54:15Z")
> [@Yllaria](#): > > Is there some biblical reference to the smell of the sizzling fat in the sacrifice rising up and pleasing the Lord? Not necessarily in Genesis. Or am I mis-remembering? Your memory is not faulty. I was taught it’s reason 4 and the smell being pleasing to the Lord was the exact explanation why meat was a better sacrifice than plants. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/55 "2009-06-25T14:37:36Z")
I don’t understand all this talk about God only wanting an animal sacrifice. Cain tilled the soil. What was he supposed to do? He wouldn’t have had an animal to sacrifice. Are we to conclude, then, that it was impossible for a farmer to please God, so that tilling the soil was inherently sinful? I understand that there are cultures that think that way—Mongols, plains Indians, cattle barons in old Westerns. Were the early Hebrews such a culture? And if so, why, when God casts Adam and Eve out of the Garden, does he say, “cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life . . . and you shall eat the plants of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground . . .” This appears to envision that tilling the soil will be common practice–punishment, perhaps, but not _further sin_. I’ve always assumed, without thinking about it much, that Cain’s sacrifice _must_ have been of inferior quality, as opposed to being inferior by virtue of being vegetable. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/56 "2009-06-25T15:35:04Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > But, why would that curse of an evil heart fall on the first-born child but not the second? The curse on Eve is basically a curse on reproduction, which would seem to indicate that her sin has to do with reproduction. If you look at what Eve saw in the fruit, namely pleasing to the eye, good for food and desirable for obtaining wisdom, this is the exact reason women chose to delay having children, They can stay in school (desirable for obtaining wisdom), easier to make money to feed oneself and one less mouth to feed (good for food), and increases her attractiveness not to have children (pleasing to the eye). Also the instruction that God first gave man and woman is be ‘fruitful and increase’ This I believe is the only ‘commandment’ if you will that is required in paradise. God does not impose additional commandments unless the standing ones are broken. So in order for the fruit of the tree of good and evil to be something different then the result of delaying children a prior violation of ‘be fruitful and multiply’ must have occurred. But since no violation of that is noted then the fruit of the tree is same as a violation of be fruitful and multiply. With that Cain should have come earlier, but was denied entry. Scriptures speak of we are formed in the hidden places underground and you will return to the ground from where you are taken. The place where we will go to after death (w/o Jesus) is spoken of as Sheol, or the abode of the dead, or Hades in the NT commonly translated as Hell. Scriptures state we start in that place where we end up. So Cane apparently (IMHO) spent much more time in Sheol/Hades then he should have being in such a cruel place for so long would cause the heart to freeze over and become evil (again IMHO). After Cain, it appeared like Able was not held back but A&E let God determine the timing of their second child. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Ashtar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ea924/32.png) [@Lord\_Ashtar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Ashtar)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/57 "2009-06-25T16:21:43Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#): > > Are we to conclude, then, that it was impossible for a farmer to please God, so that tilling the soil was inherently sinful? I understand that there are cultures that think that way—Mongols, plains Indians, cattle barons in old Westerns. Were the early Hebrews such a culture? I can’t speak to whether the Hebrews were that kind of culture or not, but I don’t think that Cain’s sacrifice was rejected because it was vegetables. My interpretation is similar to others in this thread, where they say that Cain’s heart wasn’t really in it. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321/58 "2009-06-25T17:01:25Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#): > > I don’t understand all this talk about God only wanting an animal sacrifice. Cain tilled the soil. What was he supposed to do? He wouldn’t have had an animal to sacrifice. He was supposed to sacrifice his brother - Abel was made of meat, after all. Cain’s punishment was because he didn’t follow the proper rituals in doing so. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bible-question-why-did-god-favor-abels-offering-over-cains/500321.md?page=2)