Why was Cain's sacrifice unacceptable?

Genesis 4, NLT: Did God reject Cain's offering because it wasn't the best of his crops, or was it because, unlike Abel's, it was not a blood offering?I tend to think the former, because the description of Abel's offering implies that it was of the best: "And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof." (KJV) However, many prefer to think the latter is the case, perhaps because God had cursed the ground before he drove Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden (Gen. 3:17).

Possibly. Yet it would seem that the lineage of Cain was academic, since (presumably) all of his descendants were wiped out at the flood. Noah's ancestry is traced from Adam through Seth, Cain's brother.

Actually, ask the Muslims.I think there are a lot of people (Ann Coulter, e.g.) who wish we were engaged in a "Holy War" against Islam. I don't think Bush is one of them, however.Somebody brought up a point above, however, that is interesting. If blood sacrifices were only required for serious sins, and Abel hadn't committed a serious sin yet, wasn't his blood sacrifice (if indeed it was a blood sacrifice; Gen 4:4 simply refers to it as an "offering" [KJV, NKJV, NASB]) inappropriate?

But remember the comment she made in her column about killing all the Muslims in Afghanistan and/or converting them to Christianity?I was not aware of her dating a Muslim, though I know she has dated or been rumored to be dating (or even having sex with) Geraldo Rivera and Bill Maher, neither one what you'd call a flaming right-winger. A sacrifice may be an offering, but is an offering a sacrifice? A vampire bat is a bat, but not all bats are vampire bats.

I assume this is in response to the Zechariah prophecy. I think the prophet is trying to say that God would remove his protection from the Israelites, and they would not be protected from anything that happened, moral or immoral.

Nor do I quite see what the point made below is: Was Abel's offering really a "sacrifice"? Saying that a (or most, or even every) sacrifice was an offering does not necessarily mean that every offering was a sacrifice.

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Never overestimate the intelligence of someone who thinks you're wrong.

Skimming through the discussions made in this thread (I tended to skip over those that seemed to be full of personal attacks and/or off-topic), I'd like to get back to the points that started this and have been touched upon by others:

1. Cain and Abel each made an offering. For some reason, God liked Abel's offering more than He liked Cain's, and Cain got angry.
2. The Bible says that Cain offered some of his crops, while Abel offered some of his sheep. Abel offered the best of his flocks; nothing is said of the quality of Cain's offering, but by the silence, we usually assume it was not the best of what he had.
3. A few other passages in the Bible refer to the story of Cain and Abel, but don't add much more insight beyond what we can infer from reading it ourselves.
4. Some people believe, for a number of reasons, that Cain's offering was unacceptable because it was not a blood sacrifice, which Abel's presumably was. Some point out that, after Adam ate of the forbidden fruit, God cursed the ground. Therefore, the fruit of the ground was also cursed, and unacceptable as a sacrifice.
5. Other people believe that Cain's offering was unacceptable because of his attitude, possibly revealed in the quality of the vegetables that he offered.
   
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   When the day came to make an offering to God, Cain and Abel brought their tribute. Abel brought some of the very finest from his flocks, while Cain deliberately brought an average-quality offering from his crops. Cain could have done better, but he chose not to for some reason. Perhaps he thought that the all-knowing God would not notice.

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   God accepted Abel's offering with favor, but He rejected Cain's offering. It wasn't due to a preference of meat over vegetables, but rather that Abel had brought the best that he possibly could, and had done it willingly. Cain knowingly brought not his best, and even then brought it grudgingly. The very same offering would have been accepted if it had been the best that he could do, and if he had offered it with the right attitude. Abel was cooperative and generous; Cain was selfish and miserly.

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   Daily Bible Study - Cain and Abel
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   Although I think you have to read a lot between the lines to come to the conclusion quoted above, I think it makes the most sense.

Jehovah's Witnesses believe Abel was the first "witness." (Later ones would have included Noah, Abraham, Jeremiah, Jesus, etc.) If we think of Abel as a "witness" (irrespective of what we may think of the modern-day religious organization), does that affect our understanding of why God found his sacrifice or offering acceptable but rejected Cain's?

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It is reasonable to assume that they taught their children to walk and talk, as parents always teach their children. It is reasonable to assume that they taught their children a sense of right and wrong (which they themselves had learned in the garden), as parents always teach their children.

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They probably also taught them how to put on their clothes. Obviously, anything in Leviticus is irrelevant here, unless it can somehow be shown to be based on something in the GoE or the Cain and Abel story. Leviticus was for the Levites, was it not?

It seems that, looking at some of the recent posts that have managed to stay on-topic, we're back where we started. God liked Abel's offering, but didn't like Cain's--that we can agree on. But as to why God liked one and disliked the other, we can't say for sure why.Whether Abel's offering was a blood sacrifice is not even certain; we can be sure Cain's wasn't. Even if Abel's was a blood sacrifice, we can't be sure that God rejected Cain's because it wasn't a blood sacrifice. It's possible that Cain's sacrifice was rejected simply because he did it grudgingly, or because he didn't offer up his best.BTW, here's another point that perhaps has been brought up, but between the on-topic and off-topic posts, I can't recall seeing anything about it: How did God reveal to Abel that He had accepted his offering? How did He reveal to Cain that He hadn't accepted Cain's offering?

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Never overestimate the intelligence of someone who thinks you're wrong.

Presumably, Abel received some unspecified reward from God (but it wasn't enough to keep him from being clobbered by his brother), while Cain either received no reward or was forced to suffer in some way.Is there any evidence, either in the Bible or elsewhere, of how God communicated his acceptance of the offering from Abel and his non-acceptance of Cain's offering? In other words, how did Cain know that God had not accepted his offering? Did God say, "Good job, Abel," and/or "Better luck next time, Cain"?