Let There Be Cain: A Clash of Imaginations in Genesis 4

Abstract

This article contributes to the ongoing discussion of the story of Cain by exploring the speeches within Genesis 4 as speech acts. The investigation will focus on two narrative levels of analysis, the story level (the viewpoint of the characters) and the storyteller level (the presentation of the narrative to the audience). The speech acts in this story display a clash of imaginations, with Eve and Yhwh on one side and Cain and Lamech on the other. On the story level, Eve and Yhwh imagine the world in ways that resist human sin and violence and that celebrate God’s relationship with humanity. Cain and Lamech reject this notion and choose to focus only on themselves. On the storyteller level, the speech acts of Genesis 4 invite the audience to adopt and celebrate the imaginations of Eve and Yhwh and to reject the imaginations of Cain and Lamech.