Gardener, Shepherd and Hunter: 4- Tragic Death of a shepherd

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I had opened my eyes (just for a moment) and thought that I saw a sunrise from long long ago.. Watching for a long time (it seemed) or maybe for just an instant (I could not tell). I then observed the sun waning beneath the surface of this paradise.

Tragic DEATH!

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This instant of time quickly reverted into a darkness.. and my eyes (I thought) were not even closed again. I quivered and held my breath (I thought), as an eerie sense of a chaotic scene drew me down beneath the place where I thought I had just stood above the once magnificent paradise.

So I was no longer filled with any breath of joy at what I had already seen.

Then a scene planted my mind into a still and horrific place which pierced the ash-like fog into which I had fallen. I knew that this place emerging into the strain of my blinded eyes was not only beyond the garden, but it is beyond the fields where I had just witnessed a contentious conversation between two brothers.

I looked deeper into the darkness.. and then, I now realize, — beneath it.

Just then, I remembered my Guide, who I guessed had not only led me to the garden east of Paradise but also to this place. And I remembered straining to hear what the two brothers were saying: Kahyin, the gardener, and Heḇel, the shepherd whose offering had pleased the LORD.

.. It was only then that a dark and joyless truth wounded my briefly revived heart.

HE KILLED HIM!

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So it came about in the course of time that Cain [qayin] [Smith {like Moses’ father-in-law}] brought an offering to the LORD from the fruit of the ground.

Bereishit (Genesis) 4:3 :: קַיִן The same as קַיִן (H7013) The KJV translates Strong’s H7013 in the following manner: spear

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Once again I wanted more knowledge from my Guide about what I had just seen.

So CAIN, a disgruntled gardener, KILLED his brother, a shepherd?

You have just witnessed its result, my Guide confirmed.

So Cain was ALSO the Hunter, wasn’t he?

No.

I was wrong already..

Who then, I wondered as my Guide continued His response.

He murdered Abel, just as later in your timeline you know that Moses would murder a Hebrew brother.

WHY? Why did the Lord allow it?

I plead for the bloodied body I had just seen of the shepherd brother of Cain not even thinking (in my response) of the man Moses had killed.

I reasoned with my Guide:

This shepherd, Abel, was a righteous man. AND the LORD even accepted his offering at the same time He rejected what Cain brought Him.

And logically I added:

HE could have stopped Abel’s murder.

Yes, of course the LORD could have prevented Cain from killing Abel.

AND The Almighty could have prevented the guilty man to whom HE gave this story, Moses, from killing a Hebrew slave when he lived as a prince in Egypt.

I had no answer..

You asked why the LORD allowed these things to happen to Cain who mostly lived as a good man trying to please God.

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I thought of Moses (this time)..

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and Joseph in Egypt before their slavery..

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THEN I remembered what my Guide had just asked me an instant ago, “Why would it make any difference to you if one brother’s offering is better than the other’s OR if either brother knows about the offering of the other?”

And I even remembered that David was also a later shepherd, just like Abel, yet like Moses and Cain King David had murdered a man.

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Do you think it would be better for these men to have NO choice in what they do and just have God lead them here and there to do as the Lord their God pleases?

I began thinking about Cain and Able BOTH being FREE to choose their own actions and reactions in the paradise of God.

Each of them Slaves!!? — I thought. IF we are NOT FREE to choose wrong, it would make us like slaves of GOD..

I’m thankful that I am free from slavery, even to GOD.

I wondered if maybe I shouldn’t have said that out loud.

Of course you are free to say whatever you would like to me.. and to God.

And even though you may say anything to any other man you encounter on the earth the LORD does not restrain you, think of those words you cannot hear. You just witnessed the consequences of only one such encounter.

Now look ahead to right judgment of the LORD when we freely choose to accept His Word.

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For an instant I looked back.. further to the west of the endless line..

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I thought I heard sobbing.. and “I’m so sorry I didn’t raise you right” and “We didn’t want you to know the mistakes we made..” ..and yet more wailing the way I felt over the death of Abel. Adam and Eve loudly lamented all of this.. and the separation of a father and mother from one sinful son: Cain, who had just killed the other son they loved..

I could only imagine my own father or mother IF I had actually killed any of my siblings.. (or anyone, for that matter).

“Not only is this tragic death of their son Abel new to them,” my guide pointed out to me, “the impact of DEATH itself has just gripped Adam and Eve — two parents who the LORD had told many years before,

‘You shall surely die.’”

I thought of those times one of my brothers had been MAD at ME… What if it were my blood in that field?

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Then the LORD said to Cain,

“Where is Abel your brother?”

And he said, “I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Genesis 4:9 NASB20

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Then He said, “What have you done?

The voice of your brother’s blood is crying out to Me from the ground.

“Now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.

“When you cultivate the ground, it will no longer yield its strength to you;

you will be a wanderer and a drifter on the earth.”

Genesis 4:12 NASB20

4:16 וַיֵּצֵא קַיִן מִלִּפְנֵי יְהוָה וַיֵּשֶׁב בְּאֶֽרֶץ־נוֹד קִדְמַת־עֵֽדֶן׃

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קַיִן [

Once upon a time there was a man named Kahyin.. who brought an offering to the LORD from the fruit of the ground.

I heard the Voice of my Guide in Hebrew, yet somehow I understood every word.

I have told you about qayin and heḇel his brother for good reason.

Now it’s time for me to introduce you to the hunter.

3:1 וְהַנָּחָשׁ הָיָה עָרוּם מִכֹּל חַיַּת הַשָּׂדֶה אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים וַיֹּאמֶר אֶל־הָאִשָּׁה אַף כִּֽי־אָמַר אֱלֹהִים לֹא תֹֽאכְלוּ מִכֹּל עֵץ הַגָּֽן׃

Genesis 3:1 – Masoretic Text [Click this link to meet the Hunter, the first character Moses mentions here]

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