Today, I am reading and commenting on  Genesis 4-7.

I find it interesting that Cain’s first son was named Enoch.  We normally think of Enoch as the father of Methuselah, and as the man who walked with God and then was not because God took him.  We tend to overlook the other Enoch, Cain’s son.  I actually find it interesting that the account spends so much time telling us about the descendants of Cain and their accomplishments.  It makes me wonder if perhaps when the Flood account says that every one except those on Noah’s Ark were wiped out it was hyperbolic and not intended to be taken literally.  It was only after I wrote this that I realized that we have two Lamech’s as well.  One of them was Noah’s father.  The other was a descendant of Cain, who said that he had killed a young man who had attacked him.  Cain’s descendant Lamech made the claim that if the revenge on anyone who struck down Cain for murdering his brother was seven-fold, then the revenge on anyone who struck him down would be seventy-seven fold.  I am not quite sure what we should make of this claim by Lamech being included here.  Perhaps it represents the way in which seeking revenge for wrongs people suffered got out of hand.  This provides us with a contrast to the law of “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.”

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.