Why was Cain's sacrifice unacceptable?

Read your own verse, for pity's sake:

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... for it is the blood, by reason of the life, that makes expiation

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The LIFE. It's the wildest speculation. Adam and Eve never read Leviticus. Once again, and in your own words, it was the fat of Abel's lambs. No blood is mentioned at all in Genesis.For those who are keeping score:1. Genesis does not mention that Adam and Eve sacrificed to God.
2. Genesis does not mention that Cain and Abel were taught how to sacrifice.
3. Genesis does not mention anything about the blood of Abel's lambs.
4. Genesis does not mention why God favoured Abel's sacrifice.The connection to Leviticus seems a little thin, at best.

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considering what liviticus was for theres no doubt

Read the verse yourself Ringo. You are being unbelievably dense here. Take note of these words:"... FOR IT IS THE BLOOD, by reason of the life, that makes expiation"What makes expiation? The BLOOD makes expiation. Why? Because of the life. But a living lamb was not sacrificed. A slain one was. So it was the blood which makes expiation. You are still being extremely dense about this.No they only had the GOD who is the Source of the book of Leviticus with Whom they spoke face to face.Nice try. No, on second thought, lousy try.This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-22-2006 08:39 AMThis message has been edited by jaywill, 04-22-2006 08:43 AM

Now, all you skeptics who say Leviticus has no possible bearing on what happened in Genesis.What happened to your JEPD theory?

How wild is it to assume that Adam and Eve taught their children a lot of things? They were only the FIRST human beings created. The Bible does mention that Abel was received because of faith.
And there is quite a bit in the rest of Scipture about faith in expiatory offering with the blood seperated from the body of the lamb slain.And Christ and His work are the centrality of the whole Bible.
If you doubt, notice that the place where Abraham offered Isaac was the place where thousands of years latter Christ was offered up.Coincidence? True. Genesis does not. But faith in the expiatory blood is mentioned quite much in the rest of the Bible. Hebrews says that it was by faith and implying Cain's was not.That's good enough.And of course we have the same God of Abel and Cain who said:"for it is the blood, by reason of the life, that makes expiation"Let Ringo prove that that fact only begun at the time of the Exodus from Egypt.

But the Bible does not say that the lamb was slain by Abel. That's the whole point of this discussion. You're making up your own story to support your own conclusion. No. As your own verse plainly says, it was the life which makes expiation. And there is absolutely no hint of a smidgin of a clue that He told them to sacrifice or how to sacrifice. You're making up your own story to support your own conclusion.

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It is utterly wild to assume what Adam and Eve taught their children.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.It is not reasonable to assume that they taught their children something they didn't know.As far as we know, Abel invented sacrificing to God - and Cain copied him. There is no indication that Adam and Eve practised sacrifice or knew anything about it, so how could they teach their children? Exactly. It was his faith that was significant, not the nature of the object he sacrificed.As far as we know, Abel invented sacrifice and he did it spontaneously. When Noah sacrificed after the flood, he did it spontaneously. When the widow offered her two mites, she did it spontaneously. When Jesus sacrificed Himself, He did it spontaneously.None of those people had to have instructions on how to sacrifice or what to sacrifice. They gave the best that they had because they wanted to give it, not because they had to follow some ritual. So jaywill's fiction is automatically true until proven false? I think not.As your own verse says, the expiation is in the life, not in the shedding of blood. And until you can show that there were precise instructions for the shedding of blood before the Exodus, I'm going with what the Bible says instead of what you say.Our fans can make up their own minds.

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quote:

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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?

Genesis mentions the fat of the lamb as being offered to God. One may wonder why the blood is not mentioned. Again taking Christ as the central revelation of the Bible the reason should be clear.The blood of the lamb is for the expiation of sins and allows man to be atoned for. But the fat is the richness of the life being offered. The fat is for God's satisfaction. The blood is for man's exceptance.Because no one was like Christ the Son of God, the Father is well pleased with His inner being to the uttermost. His every thought, action, motive, imagination, intention was only fully pleasing to God continually. Throughout His entire life on earth He was the Beloved Son Who was well pleasing to the Father. This satisfaction of the Father with the quality of Christ's entire being is signified by the fat portion which was presented to God.The blood is for man's expiation (Lev. 17:11). And the fat portion is for God's satisfaction that He is well pleased with the One who gave Himself to God's purpose. This is why we see the mentioning of the fat of Abel's sacrifice rather than the blood.The Son of God was slain from the foundation of the world. And in the eternal ordination and foreknowledge of God this offering was signified in the accepted offering of Abel. One so fat, so pleasing, so well satisfying, gave Himself to God to redeem man.The blood of Leviticus 17:11 points to Christ. And the fat portions of Genesis 4:4 also points to Christ.This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-22-2006 02:01 PMThis message has been edited by jaywill, 04-22-2006 02:02 PM

Maybe because the fat and the blood were both still attached to the lamb? God: That's a nice fat lamb you've got there, Abel.
Abel: Well, there's a fatter one, but it has a blemish. I thought you'd like this one better.
God: Thanks. 'ppreciate it. Think I'll call him 'Earl'.ABE: added punchline.This message has been edited by Ringo, 2006-04-22 02:15 PM

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Yes he does. He was very clear that Isaiah 53 was a prophecy ckncerning Christ. Relating this to Cain and Abel, I wonder HOW Abel knew that his sacrifice was excepted and how Cain knew his was not. We are not told in Genesis four. Some speculate that the fire of God from what was called the Shechenah glory consumed the offering. We see the fire of God falling and consuming offerings elsewhere in the Bible.This devouring fire was a type of God's wrath being satiated in regard to a Substitute for sin. It suggests that the acceptance of the offerer was accomplished because the holy wrath of God against the offer's sins was satisfied upon a Substitute.GH Pember has written that he believes that the offerings may have taken place before the intrance to the garden of Eden where the cherubim of glory was guarding the way to the tree of life. It is hard for me to confirm or deny that. But Pember reasons that perhaps the fire from the Shekinah glory of God came forth from that spot and consumed the excepted offering.At any rate Abel and Cain knew when or when not their offerings were accepted by God and I think the devouring fire of God's wrath could have been the way they knew. The point here being that because justice was accomplished in type on the substitute, the offerer was received. Man did something to destroy the proper relationship between God and man. God tells man that man can destroy the relationship but only God can repair it. The matter of God incarnating and focusing that process in His blood is one way to unmistakenly communicate that God Himself is the ONLY one who can restore the broken communion between the eternal and righteous Creator and the sinning and dying creature.If the redemption is in the blood of incarnated God then as much as it is possible for man to understand, God has given everything to restore man to Himself in His great love.Sometimes I think it is as if there is a signpost welcoming every created being that reads "Welcome to the Universe and Existence. Warning the Creator is Eternal, Infintely Righteouns, and Infintely Just and Holy. But He is also everlasting in His Love for you."The writer if Hebrews tells us "And almost all things are purified by blood according to the law, and without shedding of blood there is no foregiveness" This is a reference to Leviticus 17:11.We must consider Leviticus and the New Testament in understanding Genesis chapter 4. Even the mentioning of the cherubim in the preceeding chapter has no explaination until latter in the Hebrew Bible. The writer must have had some familiarity with the "cherubim of glory" (Exodus 25:18-20)Heb.9:5) sculpted on the Ark of the Covenant in Exodus. If Moses was indeed the author, as I believe he was, it is rediculous to think he did not understand the Levitical symbols in what he was being led to write by the Spirit of God.Rainman2, do you have any thoughts why the fat portions are mentined
in Genesis 4 as Abel's offering?

Moses was instructed by God to communicate all things related to the Levitical service. If Moses was the author of Genesis it is understandable that Levitical symbols were understood by the writer and quite possible taken that the reader also understood.Some textural critics have pointed out that a priestly cast must have been behind some of the writing of Genesis. The cherubim are mentioned first in Exodus concerning the figures designed over the propitiation plate where the blood was sprinkled God met the high priest. How can we know what the author of Genesis meant by the cherubim without consulting latter writings related to priestly service?The mentioning Sabbath, the cheubim, and the offerings are matters that make it difficult exclude Leviticus as some contributing typological backround in thoughts conveyed in Genesis' authorship.

Above I wrote: This was a mistake. The site of Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac was not the same place as where Jesus was crucified. I meant it was the same site where the temple was built.Sorry.This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-24-2006 11:27 PMThis message has been edited by jaywill, 04-24-2006 11:28 PMThis message has been edited by jaywill, 04-24-2006 11:28 PM

G.H. Pember in his book Earth's Earliest Ages writes this about Cain: This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-24-2006 11:44 PM

how so? maybe genesis was written before leviticus and since the authors, saw the people didn't do what they were supposed to the writers brought the older ideas to the frontFrom reading leviticus is a reaction to the hebrews adopting many of thier nieghbors religious practices and even worshipping other gods beside yenwah. Lots of the laws are forbiding practices of the caanites and other peoples around them.