Fall of Man Part 2: Crouching Sin, Hidden Dragon

Summary

The Lord of Spirits — Fall of Man Part 2: Crouching Sin, Hidden Dragon

Podcast: The Lord of Spirits
Hosts: Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick & Fr. Stephen De Young
Date: July 29, 2022
Episode Purpose:
To explore the story of Cain (Genesis 4) as the archetypal sinner in Orthodox Christian tradition, trace the emergence of sin as a living, demonic force after the Fall, and discuss the broader consequences for civilization, spiritual life, and the struggle for self-mastery.

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Brief Overview

This episode, the second in a three-part series on the Fall of Man, focuses on “sin” as it enters the world—distinct from the entrance of death (discussed last episode). Using the story of Cain, the hosts investigate how Second Temple Jewish sources, the Church Fathers, and the Orthodox tradition focus on Cain as the archetype of the sinner, sin as an active force (“hidden dragon”), and the foundational effects on society and humanity. The discussion weaves through biblical exegesis, church history, patristic theology, and contemporary spiritual application.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Three Falls, Three Emphases in Tradition

[03:06–14:02]

• The "Fall of Man" is more complex than the singular event often described in Western Christian tradition.
  • Church Fathers and Second Temple Judaism speak of three main “falls”:
    1. Expulsion from Paradise (Adam/Eve -> Death)
    2. Cain & Sin (today’s focus)
    3. Tower of Babel & Demonic Domination (next episode)
• St. Irenaeus: Focuses on the Genesis 6 events—the giants and corruption.
• Eusebius: Focuses on Babel—the division and domination by principalities.
• Augustine: Focuses on Adam’s personal fall—this comes to dominate Western theology, partly by accident due to historical/language shifts.

“If you tried to base your whole Christian faith purely on the writings of one church father, any church father, you’re going to run into trouble.”
— Fr. Stephen [09:00]

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2. The Genesis of Sin: Cain, Not Adam

[11:58–14:00]

• Adam’s sin is real (“He did sin”), but Genesis does not use the word “sin” for Adam’s action.
• Cain is the first person in scripture to be associated with “sin” as an archetypal sinner—someone on the wrong side of the Last Judgment.

“… Adam is not the figure in Scripture who is primarily identified with the origin of sinfulness as an archetypal sinner… That is Cain, who we’re going to be talking about…”
— Fr. Stephen [11:59]

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3. Cain’s Origins & “Serpent Seed” Theories Debunked

[13:14-21:44]

• Cain is the literal, physical offspring of Adam and Eve—this is key to the narrative.
• The “serpent seed” theory (Cain as literal offspring of the devil/the serpent) is a fringe belief with no scriptural basis, but pops up in Pentecostal-adjacent circles and some scholarly speculation.
• Academic “hermeneutic of suspicion” (e.g., claims that Yahweh fathered Cain) is dismissed: it ignores the plain meaning of the text and basic logic.

"Very obviously in the text, the actual text that actually exists that you could actually read. He is Adam's son. And it's important in the narrative that he's Adam's son."
— Fr. Stephen [44:44]

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4. Sacrifice & the Problem with Cain’s Offering

[22:27–33:37]

• Cain’s sacrifice is rejected—not for technical reasons (wrong material)—but because of his character and deeds:
  • 1 John 3:12: “Why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous.”
  • Old Testament theme: Rightness of heart trumps technical ritual correctness; God desires repentance, not empty sacrifice.

“This is a basic biblical principle, and that’s what we’re getting laid out here in Genesis 4 already…”
— Fr. Stephen [33:10]

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5. Sin as a Demonic Force ("Crouching at the Door")

[36:00–43:14]

• Sin is personified as an Akkadian demon: a predatory entity lurking, seeking to master humans (rovetz).
• Sin vs. sins:
  • Paul most often uses “sin” (singular): as a power or force, not merely actions.
  • Sin is “crouching at your door”—it wants to master you; you must master it.

“It’s not sins. It’s not breaking a bunch of rules… It’s sin, and it’s being talked about like it’s this sort of demonic beast.”
— Fr. Stephen [37:03]

• Sin “enters the world” through Adam; Cain is the first human it masters.

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6. The Curse of Cain and the Birth of Civilization

[43:34–60:26]

• Cain’s curse is more severe than Adam’s:
  • For Adam: “Cursed is the ground because of you”
  • For Cain: “You are cursed from the ground”
• Cain is so cut off from creation he cannot farm; so he builds a city for survival (Eridu—the first city in Sumerian tradition).
• Founding the city: The biblical text is interacting polemically with Near Eastern tradition:
  • For Sumerians, Eridu is a divine foundation; for Genesis, city life is the result of sin, violence, and alienation.

“This was not a great moment in civilization. This was not when the divine came to earth... This is Cain murdered his brother. He's the first murderer. He's the first great sinner. He had to go on the lam, and he built this city. It’s like a hideout…”
— Fr. Stephen [58:13]

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7. Cain in Later Tradition: The Exemplar of Evil

[63:26–90:15]

• Cain’s legacy in Second Temple Judaism, patristics, and New Testament:
  • More prominent as an archetype of evil than Adam.
  • Wisdom of Solomon 10: Calls Cain “the unrighteous” whose actions began a downward spiral toward the Flood.
  • Josephus: Cain not only did not repent, he spread evil—teaching violence, greed, commerce by deception; inventing property boundaries and exploitation.
  • Cain as the “first heretic”—his self-willed road leads to idolatry and (in patristic and Second Temple thought) ultimately to the birth of giants and further demonic contamination.

“He is incredibly evil... So not only has he been sort of mastered by sin, but now through him, sin is mastering others.”
— Fr. Stephen [69:39]

• City of God (Augustine):
  • Cain as founder of the “City of Man,” a society built on pride, violence, and alienation.
  • Contrasted with Seth’s line (the righteous path), culminating in Enoch who is assumed into heaven.

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8. Ritual Impurity, Unremovable Curse, and Consequences

[100:00–107:14]

• The word for Cain’s curse (aios): denotes a curse/unremovable ritual impurity associated with murder in sacred space.
  • No ritual can remove it—though repentance can bring forgiveness and sanctity.
• Analogy to Christian practice: There are certain actions (e.g., clergy killing anyone) which, though forgiveable, have permanent consequences for service (see canon law, and stories like St. Basil’s verdict that “you can be a saint, but you can’t be a priest again”).

“Curse is the consequence of sin. Right. And forgiveness does not erase consequences…”
— Fr. Stephen [107:37]

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9. Imaging God or the Devil: Theosis vs. Demonosis

[112:17–118:18]

• Sonship and image-bearing: You become a “son of” someone/something by exhibiting their qualities and works.
  • “Sons of God” = image of God (theosis)
  • “Sons of the devil” = image of the devil (de-monosis)
• Cain is called “of the evil one” (1 John 3:12)—he becomes the son of the devil by doing devilish works (murder, lies, teaching evil).
• This is not an ontological, predetermined status (contra Gnosticism) but an existential, moral outcome: Cultivated by our choices.

“He became the son of the devil by what he did... a lot of forms of Gnosticism, for example, divide humanity into sons of light and sons of darkness. And those are like ontological categories... That’s not how this works...”
— Fr. Stephen [116:53/117:33]

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10. Sin, the Passions, and Spiritual Warfare

[122:23–137:43]

• Sin is not merely breaking the rules but being overpowered by demonic/passionate forces—the ultimate spiritual warfare.
• Self-mastery (“do good, and it will not master you”) is the essence of Christian morality—not “maintenance of a code,” but active resistance.
• Repentance is not just remorse but transformation, fighting against being remade in the devil’s image.

“Christian ‘morality’ is not about maintaining some kind of code of conduct. It's about self mastery.”
— Fr. Stephen [135:03]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On church fathers: “If you base your whole faith on St. Gregory of Nyssa, you're going to end up with a distorted view... Not because there’s something wrong with St. Gregory ... because that’s not how Christianity works.”
• On Bible-reading hermeneutics: “Come to the text and try to discover what the text is saying. If we read the text closely, we'll see why one was accepted and the other wasn't.”
• On the demonic nature of sin: “Sin is crouching at your door. It's not your sins, it's sin. And it's not just a choice you make, it's coming for you.”
• On civilization & Cain: “This was not a divine bestowal, not a crowning moment, but the outgrowth of sin—someone running from God.”
• On permanent consequences: "There are things that you can do for which you can never return to the altar, no matter the repentance—you can still become a saint."
• On demonosis: “The powers of evil are not just out there, but transformative—making people into their own image, just as God does in theosis.”
• Modern spiritual relevance: “Our morality is spiritual warfare. For Cain, there wasn’t a moral choice to murder... There was a power come upon him, and he had a choice to fight or yield.”

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Important Timestamps & Segments

• [03:06] — The three falls in Orthodox tradition
• [11:59] — Cain as the archetype of the sinner
• [22:27] — Discussion of Cain’s offering, sacrifice, and why it was rejected
• [36:00] — The personification of sin (“crouching at your door”)
• [43:34] — The escalation of the curse from Adam to Cain; implications for civilization
• [58:00] — Eridu, the first city: Biblical/Eastern traditions contrasted
• [63:26] — Legacy of Cain and his enduring influence
• [74:55] — Cain as the founder of heresy and cults of desire
• [112:17] — Imaging God vs. devils: Theosis vs. demonosis
• [122:23] — Self-mastery, spiritual warfare, and ongoing transformation
• [143:16] — Practical application: Spiritual formation as training through “small things”

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Concluding Reflections

Both hosts stress that the story of Cain is not a dusty ancient myth but a living reality, illustrating how everyday human choices—especially around self-mastery and repentance vs. yielding to passions and desires—determine what we become: either more like God (theosis) or like the demons (demonosis). The road to each destiny is shaped by innumerable small steps, not singular dramatic moments.

“If you say to yourself, ‘I don’t need to be obedient in this little thing,’ you are training yourself to be disobedient in great things... That’s how it always goes.”
— Fr. Andrew [143:16]

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Flow & Tone

The tone is energetic and witty, sometimes sardonic, deeply scriptural, patristic, and strongly focused on practical, lived spirituality. The hosts frequently turn from ancient exegesis and speculation to very concrete, contemporary spiritual challenges—drawing a direct and relevant line from Cain’s story to daily life, spiritual struggle, and the communal nature of Christian living.

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End of Summary

Next episode: The third fall: Tower of Babel—demonic domination and the fragmentation of the nations.
Questions and interactions: The hosts invite listeners to reflect not just on abstract theology, but on their own daily training for self-mastery, the cultivation of repentance, and how civilization shapes (or deforms) the human soul.

Transcript

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

He will be a staff for the righteous with which for them to stand and not to fall. And he will be the light of the nations and the hope of those whose hearts are troubled. All who dwell on the earth will fall down and worship him. And they will praise and bless and celebrate with song the Lord of Spirits.

The modern world doesn't acknowledge, but is nevertheless haunted by spirits, angels, demons and saints. In our time, many yearn to break free of the prison of a flat secular materialism, to see and to know reality as it truly is. What is this spiritual reality like? How do we engage with it? Well, how do we permeate everyday life with spiritual presence? Orthodox Christian priests Father Andrew Stephen Damick and Fr. Stephen DeYoung host this live call in show focused on enchantment in creation, the union of the seen and unseen as made by God and experienced by mankind throughout history. Welcome to the Lord of Spirits.

Good evening giant killers and dragon slayers. You are listening to the Lord of Spirits podcast. My co Host Father Stephen DeYoung is with me from Lafayette, Louisiana, Cajun country. And I am Father Andrew Stephen Damick in Emmaus, Pennsylvania, exiled among Yankees. And if you're listening to us live, you can call in at 855-AF-RADIO. Again, that's 855-237-2346. As you just heard the voice of Steve say Matushika Trudy is taking your calls tonight. We which we are going to get to in the second part of the show. But first a word from our sponsors. Lord of Spirits is brought to you by our listeners with help from the Theoria School of Filmmaking. Theoria School of filmmaking is the first orthodox film school. The primary instructor is Jonathan Jackson, a faithful orthodox Christian speaker, writer and five time Emmy award winner. To learn more about theoria, please visit theoriafilm.org that's T H E O R I A the film dot org.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You know, I feel like we could do more with our sponsors, right? Yeah, they support the show, you know, you read the thing. But there needs to be something here to more actively involve our listeners. Right. Like a decoder wheel of some sort or one of those rings with the whistle in it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Or like maybe they could, they could download and print a coupon for a free bag of Flamin Hot Cheetos. Right? Like some kind of giveaway to get them invested in our sponsors, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Or I could add as a challenge, I don't know to who it's out there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I could start dropping encoded references within the course of the ad and Then they'd have to add them up, over, decipher them.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Then the Cheetos.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah. Because we're symbologists.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right? Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

No, now it's a different podcast, so. All right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We probably do it better.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh.

Probably true. Tonight we continue with our series on the fall of man. And the second part is on the coming of sin into the world and its attack on mankind, beginning with the person of Cain, the first son of Adam and Eve. Last time we talked about death, and this time it's about sin. But Father Stephen, shouldn't sin really be associated with death, with Adam, though? Isn't that what the Bible says?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

All right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But also kind of yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. Isn't that a meme? I feel like. Is that the meme of the pirate?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I think it's the opposite, actually.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, but no. Actually, no, no, but actually, yes. I don't know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So I don't think we made this explicit last time, but maybe we should.

And you know, way back in the long ago time, in the before time.

Before the grups all died of the plague.

We.

Had the 5ish falls of the angels. And now we're in the midst of this series on sort of the three falls of man.

And when we talk about these three falls of man, you know, most if not all of our listener base, unless, you know, it's from our material, I imagine most of them are used to just thinking of the Fall.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

The fall.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. As one thing. And.

See, the easy thing here to do here is to knock St. Augustine, but I'm not going to knock St. Augustine. I've come here to praise St. Augustine, not to bury him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Hey, nice first Shakespeare reference. We don't do Shakespeare references very often. That's good.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so.

These three things that we're talking about of these episodes, so two weeks ago, the last episode, we talked about the expulsion from Paradise.

Now we're going to be talking about specifically Cain, some things about Cain's line leading up to the flood. And then next time we're going to be talking about events surrounding the Tower of Babel. All three of these you find discussed in Second Temple Jewish sources and in the church fathers.

And different church fatherswe'll just talk about church fathers for now. Different church fathers tend to stress one of the three, or they see one of the three as sort of being the pivotal one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

While not denying the others.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So Saint Irenaeus of Leon, when you read on the apostolic preaching, for him, the pivotal moment has to do with Genesis 6:1:4, with stuff we're going to be talking about tonight and with the giants, Right. This corruption and sin that has to be destroyed by the Flood. This is sort of the fall. Obviously, he believes the expulsion from paradise happened. Right. Obviously he talks about the Tower of Babel also. But for St. Irenaeus, sort of that, right. This from Genesis 4 through 9, this is the sort of main event. Right. If you read Eusebius of Caesarea's demonstration of the Gospel, he sees the Tower of Babel as the main event. He doesn't deny the expulsion for paradise happened. He doesn't deny any of the events surrounding the Flood. But for him, it's the Tower of Babel, when the nations are divided and the powers of principalities, that for him is the sort of main central event. And so part of how you could tell it's the main central event is that when they come around then to talking about Christ and the Gospel, they're mainly talking about Christ in terms of repairing that one again. He also takes care of the others, but there's one that's sort of the focus.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so.

With St. Augustine, St. Augustine is not different than like St. Irenaeus or any other church father who talks about these events in that he sees one of them as being the central one. Right. And for him it's the expulsion for paradise.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Which then comes to kind of dominate Western Christian theology.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. But that is quote, unquote, by accident. Meaning it. Meaning it's not that like St. Augustine, his followers went out and killed everybody who disagreed with something.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, Right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This is not like an engineered thing. He. He was just the foremost.

And most well written church father. In Latin.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

St. Augustine himself couldn't really read Greek, and after him, almost no one could read Greek in the West. And so they ended up relying on him and sort of he became the whole show. And so all of these things that St. Augustine got wrong because everybody gets things wrong. Right. St. Augustine was more humble and honest than most humans in that he actually wrote the Big Book of Retractions. At the end of his life, he retracted a lot of what he wrote.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And how do you get a publisher for that?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

But. And like De Trinitate, that everybody criticizes his work on the Holy Trinity, he refused to republish it because he thought he got too much wrong in it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay. So.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Like, he was most more aware than anybody. Right. He wouldn't have wanted De Trinitate to become the Western view of the Trinity. Right. But it did. Right. And so anybody who wants to bash St. Augustine himself for that stuff doesn't understand how history works. Right.

But also, I would add, if you tried to base your whole Christian faith purely on the writings of one church father, any church father, you're going to run into trouble.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because there is no single Church Father who is inerrant and perfect and never gets anything wrong and never is at odds with the rest of the tradition or never fails to understand something, never omit something. Right. That. That doesn't exist. Right. So, I mean, pick any example out of a hat. If you base your whole faith on St. Gregory of Nyssa, you're going to end up with a distorted view of what Christianity is. Not because there's something wrong with St. Gregory, anything more than there's something wrong with St. Augustine. Right. You could do that with St. John Chrysostom. You could do it with any one church father, and you would end up with a distorted view of Christianity because that's not how Christianity works. You don't, like, pick your favorite personality and decide that he's right about everything.

Right.

Not to mention the fact that you're going to end up not knowing or saying anything about all the topics that author doesn't address.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Right.

So I would say this idea of kind of emphasizing one or another aspect, it wasn't so much a debate, like. No, it's this. No, no, it's this. You know, it was really just, these are the things that are being emphasized by different church fathers.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because. Because they were. They were humans.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And they thought about things and prayed about things, and they had. They had actual ministries to actual other humans in actual places at actual times. And so when they're preaching and writing, they're not just. We read church history like it's a bunch of talking heads, you know, in this really idealist way. Right. The reality is, you know, St. John Chrysostom was dealing with actual situations, sometimes dire political situations in Antioch and in Constantinople.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He's not just writing in this free way about, you know, systematic theology or something. He's talking to particular problems that particular people are having. He's preaching to actual people to help them with their actual lives, which I.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Think is why especially his work always seems so kind of fresh and present. Because it's. It's not ad hoc exactly, but it is to the moment, you know?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But all of it is that way. Yeah, right, right. All of it is that way. When we read it as some kind of detached systematic theology that could have been written at Any time, in any place, by anyone. We're doing violence to it. We're interpreting it incorrectly.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yep.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You know, but all that to say, all that said.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Adam is not the figure in Scripture who is primarily identified with the origin of sinfulness as an archetypal sinner.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

As.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Someone who's going to be on the wrong side of the Last judgment. That is not Adam. That is Cain, who we're going to be talking about for the rest of tonight. And.

The reason most folks in the west don't know that anymore is not St. Augustine's fault, per se, although his writings were involved.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I mean, and we should, and we should just say here at the outset that the thing that Adam did was indeed a sin. Right. By identifying Cain as the sinner, the primary sinner. We're not saying that what Adam did was not a sin, but the word sin was not used for it there in Genesis. In Genesis.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And we'll get into that in more detail. And sin versus sins and all those kind of things.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yep.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's our topic tonight on Lord of God.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Exactly, exactly. So Cain, where did he come from?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So, yeah, when.

That was the real problem, you know, in Genesis 4 was Adam, you know, he was repenting for 40 days in the Jordan river according to the life of Adam and Eve. And Eve was off raising Cain.

Tip your waitresses, everybody.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Thank you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So.

We have to. Yeah, we're going to start by going through sort of the life of Cain as we have it recorded in Scripture, which is not a ton. Right. There's not chapter after chapter about the life of Cain.

In fact, there's less than one chapter about the life of Cain. But we're going to go through it because what we do know about Cain right away in Genesis chapter four is important that gets dealt with and treated in certain ways in the New Testament and then also in certain ways in other Second Temple Jewish literature and in certain ways.

By church fathers and other writers. But we have to start with what's in Genesis chapter four. And so we start. We begin at the beginning, which is a very good place to start, which is Cain being born.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And.

While some of you may be fortunate enough to not know why we have to say this.

Cain in Genesis 4 is conceived and born in the usual way in which that happens.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But we should mention why some people.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, we will.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. Why do we have to say, yeah, we'll get to that.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But yeah, yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So exciting.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I mean, I think I speak for Father Andrew also, that we are not Going to be explaining to you what the usual way is.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

If you don't know, ask your parents. If you're an adult and you still don't know, ask your priest. I'm going to get angry emails from priests that I won't.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Someone came to me and asked. Yeah, no.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But we have to say this because.

There are a couple of different.

Ways in which people want to say that Cain may not have been the naturally conceived and born son of Adam and Eve.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. There's this and.

It kind of runs mostly in like Pentecostal ish circles and Pentecostal adjacent circles, but not all of them by any means. Not the majority. Not all of them.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's what I was gonna say. Say issue adjacent.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, I know I've already got a lot of them mad at me, but we're not gonna accuse them all of believing this.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, your average assembly of God pastor is not gonna be teaching this.

But there is this idea of something called the serpent's seed, which is this notion that Cain is born of.

Let's say Adam is off somewhere and Eve has a moment with the serpent. And so then that Cain is the son of the serpent.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That is the devil. Right. In a literal way.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. The devil is literally his dad. Is this idea of the serpent seed. And there's all kinds, kinds of just fanciful, crazy, I mean, fun fun for sure. Although awful spin offs from there about exactly what that means and the origins of evil in the world.

And I strongly believe that this might be behind some of the ideas about Reptilians in high places, in the government and that kind of stuff.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So. Well, hey now, don't tar that with the same brush.

If you watch those videos of the Senate frame by frame, it's true. There's little flickers of things.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And if you watch enough videos from the third eagle of the apocalypse on YouTube, eventually he'll sing it for you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So there is another version of this.

That.

Is differentiated by having, I guess, the veneer of.

Scholarship slathered upon it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That is so mixing those metaphors. Father.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

So from everything, all the wonderful things we say about the world of Old Testament scholarship on this.

On this show, longtime listeners will not be surprised that there's constantly. Right. This effort to find what is behind the text. Right. So if there's a story in the text of especially the Torah. Right. Because we've chopped it all up into little bitty bits. Right. There's a story in the Torah, then there's a real story behind It, Right. The story that's in the Torah is trying to cover up the story that's behind it. Right. Which is the real story, not the real story in the sense that it's true. Because of course, Old Testament scholars don't think any of this stuff's true.

But that's the original story. But the original story was too ooky or weird or creepy.

To be allowed to go on and had to be covered up.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So the hypothesis here is that the story of Adam and Adam knowing his wife Eve and her having a son. Right. That story, way too suspicious. Right. What are they, why would they do that?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Why were they hiding? Yes. What are they hiding? And the theory is that the. That right after Cain is born, in Genesis 4, Eve says, I have received a son from Yahweh. Right. Now all of us who are normal, well adjusted people and who haven't spent seven or eight years getting PhDs and aren't 19th century Germans hear that and say, she's thankful to God because God gave her the gift of a son.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, right. I mean, people say this kind of thing all the time. God gave us children.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes, right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

What these folks say is that the story that's being covered up here, see, this is where her wording there is where it sneaks out. And the real story is that the original story is that Cain is actually Yahweh's son with Eve.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, that just skips, you know, chapter four, verse one, where it says, now Adam knew his wife.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's part of the COVID up.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Oh, oh, excuse me.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's all part of the coverup. Right. This is the same strategy. They do this all through. Right. And I get questions about this stuff because they do the same thing. Like for example, the dedication of the firstborn, that Passover.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, yes, right. Child sacrifice.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. The same scholars say, yes, this is covering up child sacrifice that the Israelites were doing. It's covering it up. And so they print these articles like, oh, biblical evidence. The evidence is the story that's in the Bible, which clearly is covering up this other one supposedly. Right. Biblical evidence of child sacrifice in Israel. And then people read that headline and get upset and send me an email. Right. And so this is another one of those things. I mean, I don't have much to say about it other than that. That is just an unbelievably stupid approach to anything. Right. To reading any text.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Just complete hermeneutic of suspicion. Right. Can you imagine if every time someone sent you an email. Right. You know, hey, you want to go see a movie this Friday night? Oh, what do you mean by that question? Does he not want me to ask? He's trying to distract me with a movie. Right, right. Like that. I mean, that's just.

Not mentally healthy as a way to approach the world. But, you know, you got to write journal articles and dissertations. So.

Very obviously in the text, the actual text that actually exists that you could actually read. He is Adam's son. And it's important in the narrative that he's Adam's son.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He's in Adam's image now. Adam post expulsion from paradise. Right. His story is going to be a continuation of Adam's story.

On a bad trajectory.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Spoilers in case you haven't read the.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Rest of Genesis 4, there may be one person listening somewhere who hasn't read Genesis 4 ever in their life or heard the story. But sorry about the spoilers. We'll work through it anyway.

So the main sort of action that we see in the story of Cain is. Starts to unfold when he and his brother Abel, his younger. Or he is. Yeah, his younger brother Abel go and offer sacrifices.

To God. And we're told that Abel goes and offers an animal. Cain goes and offers.

Some of his.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Crops, the fruit of the ground.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And.

Abel's offering is accepted, and Cain's offering is not.

And here's one of the first places where the train pulls into Speculation station.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. Did he not offer the right stuff or did he not bake it correctly? Or God doesn't want the vegetables, he wants an animal because things have to die?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I know we've talked about it in the show, but this is another good opportunity, again, to point out.

Especially in Genesis, but throughout the Bible, the way to approach the text is not to come to it with a bunch of your questions that you're trying to answer.

To satisfy your curiosity about different things, but to read the text and try to discover what the text is saying. Because I think if we read the text closely, we'll see why one was accepted and the other wasn't.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. But if you just sort of stop there. Right. You can go all over with conjecture. Right. So there's the. Yeah. Was he. Were they both supposed to be animals? There are people, some of our Protestant friends out there, who base huge theological things on. No, it has to be an animal.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Because it has to die.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Because it has to die. And it can't be plants. And then it's like. Yeah, but like, we're in The Torah, there's plenty of offerings that are like first fruits and grain offerings.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Offerings that God commanded very explicitly. It's not like he ever said, you know, do not bring me grain offerings and drink offerings. I only want stuff that you have to kill before you bring it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. Even some sin offerings were just wheat cakes, if you read Leviticus closely. Right. But beyond that, we're not even told what kind of offering this was to be able to adjudicate that. Right. It doesn't say it was a sin offering.

Doesn't say if it's a thank offering, if it was for first fruits, if it was for. I mean. Right. There's.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And there's no point in the three chapters prior or in this chapter where it says, and God commanded them to offer sacrifices, and this is how he said he should do it. I mean, there's not even a point where it says that God is commanding a sacrifice. You just see them doing it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So the text gives us no way to assess.

It. Tells us nothing about the technique. There's literally nothing about the technique.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

Offerings made.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And it doesn't give us any basis to judge what they should or shouldn't have been offering. So we can't do that.

But we can look, for example, to other places in the scriptures where this might be talked about. And one of those places that we're going to be coming back to sort of over and over and over again tonight.

Because as I explained to Father Andrew yesterday, when you go and get a PhD, you learn more and more about less and less until you know everything about nothing. And so your knowledge of things is like this cone that comes down to a tiny point. And so my tiny point is in, like, one John chapter two. So first John chapter three, that we're going to keep coming back to tonight is, like, really close to that. So if we keep coming back to 1 John 3:12, I can feel like I know what I'm talking about.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So this is just kind of a general warning, Right, for anyone who wants to argue about One John with you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, I suppose they have a lot.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Of reading to do, at the very.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Least, or open season on everything else.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This is one of those things that people tend to treat.

Scholars sort of the way Marvel comics treat scientists.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Like, if you're. If you're in a Marvel comic and you're a scientist, like, you can build an interdimensional portal.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. That's what scientists do.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Make a chemical potion to shrink people. You can, like. Like, you could do, like, there's no particular science you've studied, you just know science.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And you could invent things and engineering, you know, too, apparently. Right. And people treat scholars that way. Right. But the reality is being a scholar means you know an incredible amount about something very, very specific.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so when you're talking about the further you get away from that specific thing, the less you actually know.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

As a scholar. Right. So anytime a scholar is talking outside his field, you should listen to him at all. Because usually they'll say, if a scholar is talking outside of his field, it has the same value as a layman. I think it has less value than a layman because we get pompous from having a Ph.D. and so we think we know more than we do.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Are you saying that Neil Degrasse Tyson may not be the person to listen to on philosophy and religion?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. And. Or Richard Dawkins.

And. Or Sam Harris. Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And I'm not the guy to listen to on theoretical physics either.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

But you have a PhD. Come on.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I know. I'm a scientist.

So, Anyway, back to first. Or for our first time, to first John 3, verse 12. My comfort zone, my happy place.

Or actually here first we'll read 12 and 13, although it's 12 primarily that we're going to keep coming back to.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, right. Okay. First John, chapter three, verses 12 and 13. We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother's righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So these evil deeds of Cain's, the evil deeds is not he tried to sacrifice some herbs to God. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. That's not an evil deed.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, there's no basis to judge. It would be at most one deed. And this is deeds plural. Right. So this is talking about who these two people are. Right. Cain was already evil and doing evil deeds. Right. And Abel was righteous and following God and doing good. Right. And so this is why when Abel then went and offered a sacrifice to God, God accepted it. And when Cain, while still doing evil, went and offered a sacrifice to God, God did not accept it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yep. Which, I mean, obviously we've seen this. Well, yeah. In the Old Testament we get. We get this lots of times. But probably the one that's the most memorable. Right. Is in Psalm 50:51, where St. David says.

You have to be contrite and humble before God and then you can offer bullocks upon his altar. Like that's the last Verse, it's that the character of your heart, who you are, is what's. What. What makes a big difference in the sacrifices. It's not, it's not the only thing. Right. It's not like you say, well, I'm really humble before God, so I don't have to, you know, do all these sacrifices that he commanded. It's that it's, it's a, it's a very important prerequisite, you know?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. And. And this is, this has to be a major theme in the Old Testament. And we see Israel not getting it in the Old Testament.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Over and over.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because this is very different than the way things work in the pagan world. In the pagan world, the whole job of various kinds of priests is to know how to do the rituals correctly.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. They're professional ritualists.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You go and you offer the sacrifice and you make all the cuts correctly and you read the entrails correctly, you do all the stuff correctly. And if you do it all correctly, then the God accepts the sacrifice and does what you want.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. It's about skill.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And if you mess it up somewhere, then it doesn't work. But that's not.

How Yahweh, the God of Israel, works. Right. And that's why over and over again in the Old Testament.

It'S that God desires mercy and not sacrifice. Right. At certain points, he tells Israel to stop offering the sacrifices because they're not repenting, they're living completely, wickedly. But then following the instructions from Leviticus about killing animals.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And you don't see that in paganism.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know, you know, like you. Okay, look, you guys, you did the offering correctly, but, you know, your hearts were messed up when you came to the sacrament. Like, Thor never shows up and says that. It's just gimme, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, it's the exact opposite. Opposite. Like you look at when Rome lost the legion to Arminius in Germany.

And the people were mad because they're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. They were like, we did all the stuff we were supposed to do. We were not supposed to get beaten. And so for years after that, they would throw rocks at the temples in Rome.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Because the God had swindled them.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. The gods had not kept up their end of the bargain. Right. That's how that worked in the pagan world. Right. But in Israel, God's saying, look, I don't want, I don't delight the blood of bulls and goats. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I don't need that stuff.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's not the point. Right. It's supposed to be an expression. And so if it's not going to be an expression of repentance, an expression of love, an expression of praise, an expression of thanksgiving, then just knock it off, man. Save your time.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, it's hypocrisy then. Which is worse than not doing it all.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. And this carries over, Right. Even in the New Testament, when Christ says, if you're on your way to the altar, right. You realize someone has something against you, leave your gift, go find them and be reconciled first.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, exactly.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Then come back and. And make your offering. So this is a basic biblical principle, and that's what we're getting laid out here in Genesis 4 already. And if you read Genesis 4:7, for example, very closely, this is part of where God comes and talks to Cain after the sacrifice incident. He pretty much says that. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Yeah. In verse seven. I mean, it starts out with verse six. The Lord said to Cain, why are you angry? And why is your face fallen? Then he says to him, if you do well, this is the esv. If you do well, will you not be accepted?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The Hebrew there is literally, do good.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. If you do good.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

If you do good, will you not be accepted?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So he's telling Cain what the problem was. If you repent and you start to do good, if you turn your life around, I will accept your offerings. Right.

He's not rejecting Cain as a human. Right. He's rejecting the offering because it's not being offered to him with a pure heart.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

Yeah. And this goes back to the idea of. I mean, we've talked about this a bunch of times, but what is sacrifice? It's about hospitality. If you're sitting down to do hospitality with someone that you've been horrible towards.

What kind of meal is that?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And you're still gossiping about him at the table while he's sitting there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right? Yeah, Yeah. I mean, we have to remember that.

You don't sit down and eat a meal with someone that you're on terrible terms with. I mean, you do. Does happen sometimes, but wow, awkward and maybe even offensive.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And if part of the purpose of that meal is reconciliation, sitting there, insulting him and his wife while you're doing it is not a good way to go about that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You're better off probably not inviting them over if that's what you're going to do.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. I mean, that's the logic behind what God says when he rejects sacrifices.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So.

As you mentioned there. Right. So notice again, God doesn't. And this is the proof that God isn't rejecting Cain as a human. Right. Because after he rejects the offering and Cain is angry and upset, God comes to him and talks to him and tries to help him. He doesn't write him off. He doesn't say, good, you were never one of the elect. Anyway.

He comes to him.

And talks to him and says what we just said, and then he says.

Something very important that we're now going to kind of dissect.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He says, sin is crouching at your door. It's desire. Well, somebody put a weird translation in the notes. It desires to master you, but you must master it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Is sort of what the Hebrew says.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

If you do not do the good, sin is crouching at the door. So it's dependent upon the way he acts.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know, and then it wants to master him. And God says, you got to get control over this. Yeah, it's going to control you, dude.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so I'm pretty sure we've mentioned it on the show before, but the word that's translated crouching there, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Is.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And it's in Hebrew. It's the word rovetz.

But that is derived from an Akkadian word that refers to a certain type of demon that was believed to crawl up through cracks in the ground and.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Sort of prowl around and, like, jump on people. Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's creepy every time I think of it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So the idea is that sin. And notice sin here is singular, Right. It's not sins. It's not breaking a bunch of rules. Is crouching at your. Right. That's not how sin is being talked about here. It's sin, and it's being talked about like it's this sort of demonic beast.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. It's a monster. There's a monster at your door, prowling around.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's getting ready to jump on you. Right. And it's going to automatic. You must master it. You're gonna have to struggle with it. You're gonna have to fight it. Right. When it comes for you, you're gonna have to fight it. And so it's portrayed as this sort of demonic power.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And this isn't just this one weird place. Right. In Genesis 4, this is going to be the primary way that St. Paul, for example, talks about sin. There are a handful of cases where Saint Paul uses sins plural.

Where when he says sins plural, he's talking about.

Offenses. Right.

He more often uses the word transgressions for those things. But sometimes there's a handful of cases where he uses sins. Usually St. Paul uses sin in the singular, and he's thinking of it in the same way as a power or a force in the world.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That seeks mastery over us and that we have to master. Right. And of course, a famous passage that has that language in it is when he says, you know, all things are permissible to me, but not all things are beneficial. All things are permissible for me, but I will not be mastered by anything.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, there's that active versus passive thing again.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. And we talked about this last time a little bit. Right. This is that same kind of view of sin sort of as this force. Every time I talk about this in terms of Cain, somebody. Not the same somebody. I'm not referring to one person. There's always somebody. It's always a different somebody. It's a certain man.

We'll say, well, what about Romans 5:12?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. And my immediate response is, what about Romans 5, verse 20?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Explain yourself.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes, I stare at them intimidatingly. No, so. Right. And so this is obviously the one man is talking about Adam, and it's talking about the relationship of sin and death. But notice he says sin singular. Just as sin came into the world through one man.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So that one man is the door.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So Adam is like the door that lets it into the world. Because in Genesis 4, sin's already out there prowling around in the world, looking for Cain. Yeah, right. It's looking for Cain. Cain doesn't let it into the world.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. His dad did that.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So it's in the world now. Right. But Cain is the person who we're going to see. Spoilers again. That is the first person who sin masters.

Sin seizes, and who sin masters and takes control of, not his father, even though his father is how.

How he came into the world. And so.

Again, St. Paul could say what he wants to say. Right. And so since he's using sin in the singular there, he's sort of deliberately giving that perception because he could have said. Right. He could have used a participle. He could have said, therefore, just as sinning began in the world with one man.

Right. If he wanted to talk about, you know, breaking rules and Adam, right. As the beginning of sinning, he could have said that.

Etc. Etc. Right. There are lots of ways he could have said it, but this is what he actually said. And then death comes into the world also through Adam.

And Spreads to everyone as all. Now, notice there, St. Paul says sinned there he uses the verb. Right. So there he's talking about a person taking an action. He's not talking about the force out in the world. World.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And we don't really have time to go into the complicated relationship between sinning and death and sin. The force. The demonic force. I almost wish we would just capitalize that. Although that's the name of a desert, isn't it? This desert of sin. And a Roman Catholic cardinal. I remember when Cardinal Sin was the cardinal of the Philippines. That was.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Wow.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Cardinal sin.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Cardinal sin. Sounds like a villain in one of those bad Christian comics, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I know, but apparently not the Archie ones.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Not the Archie ones. The other ones.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, man, that brings me back. But yeah, the cardinal of the Philippines for a while was Cardinal Sin, I'm sure in whatever his native people's language was, which I don't know if it was Tagalog or not, sin was not the same thing as it is English. But yeah, it is kind of complicated. Maybe we'll get into that in a future episode. What is the relationship between sinning, death and sin? Capital S. But that's kind of not what this is about. But in any event, we should just know that it doesn't work in a kind of mechanical way. If you do this, then this will happen. Right. Like, if you sin this amount, then you're going to die. That's not what's going on here. And also that there are different ways that gets talked about in various parts of the orthodox tradition. So it's okay if it's a little bit muddy at this point. Maybe we'll cover it in the future.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But for now, before we get to the end of this first half, we've got cuneiform to read.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right. There's cuneiform here in our notes, which I can't read it, but it looks pretty cool.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So.

We'Ll move on. So there's this dialogue, right, where. Where God is almost pleading with Cain not to go down the path that he's been going down and that he's now about to go past the point of no return.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. It's almost like a father saying, don't do drugs. It's gonna kill you, dude.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, you know.

Serious.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, way more serious.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So, spoilers again. Cain kills his brother, murders his brother.

And then in response to that, he receives a curse. And the language is deliberately. He comes into this state of curse, and the language is deliberately reminiscent of the curse that his father Adam came under in the previous chapter in Genesis 3, at the expulsion from Paradise.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. I mean, if you read these chapters together, you'll immediately see this kind of language repeated, and it'll be clear that.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There'S this parallel, but there's also this sort of intensification, right. When you compare Cain's to his situation, to his dad's situation. So remember, in Genesis 3:17, Adam is told that cursed is the ground because of you. Right? That sort of as a result of what Adam had done. Now the ground was under a curse. Whereas Cain is told, you are cursed from the ground.

Right.

So instead of the ground being cursed, that from. There's this separation now between Cain and the Earth. Right? And the result of that, for Adam, the result of that in Genesis 3 was that he was going to have to bring forth food from the ground by the sweat of his brow, by hard manual labor. There's going to be thorns and thistles. There's going to be difficulty and struggle for him to bring food out of the earth. With cain in Genesis 4, verse 12, it's not happening, right? He's not going to be able to bring food out of the ground at all. He's going to be unable to farm, unable to sustain himself.

From the earth.

And.

So there was.

In paradise, remember, they're told they can eat from the fruit of any tree, right? So they didn't even have to kill plants.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Just pick the fruit, eat it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The rest of the creation offered itself to Adam and Eve for nourishment, Right. Offered them fruit for nourishment. They just had to walk by and pluck it off the tree. Right. Adam has to now go and work the ground to bring forth that food. Right? And Cain now is cut off from the rest of creation in a way that the rest of Creation will not sustain him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Isn't there. I can't remember if this image of the ground being like bronze or something like that. I can't remember.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's in Deuteronomy.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's in Deuteronomy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In the laying out of the curse. But it's the same kind of curse. The state of curse is the same kind of thing we're talking about.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this raises the question within the narrative of Genesis 4, okay? How is Cain going to survive?

Right? And he's got two main problems. Problem number one, he killed his brother. Abel is the first human to die.

Right? He's done this horrible thing. Parents, if nobody else, are probably going to want revenge, right. Potentially other Children of Adam, you could want revenge. Right. So he's not. So Cain's not safe anywhere from sort of the cycle of violence that he's now kicked into motion. And then secondly, how's he going to survive in terms of. How's he going to eat?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right. Is God just cursing him to be. To starve to death here?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

So these two.

Aspects of that problem get dealt with in two different ways.

So the way in which that cycle of vengeance is dealt with is dealt with by what has been traditionally called the mark of Cain.

This is the part of the program where we get to talk about how stupid racists are.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, it's true, everybody.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And I don't feel bad about using these words, racists are idiots, because, hey, if you want to send an email to Ancient Faith Defending Racists, send it to Father Andrew [e-mail] that's an insult. Pick on racists.

But so.

There. There have been at various points.

Folks trying to justify racism from the Bible. And one of the. I mean, every way they've tried to do it is stupid. But this is the stupidest by saying that the mark of Cain had something to do with the color of Cain's skin being different.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Which there's nothing in the text that suggests that at all. Like, it's just zero.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But more important. Right. If you've actually, I don't know if you can read. Right. So that's. That's step one of why most racists probably didn't see this problem. Can't read. But.

If you continue reading, you get.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

To.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Genesis 6 through 9 in just a few chapters when everyone except Noah and his sons is wiped out by the flood.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's everybody descended from Cain.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. So there's not a Cain race around. Everybody.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, sorry. There's no one descended from Cain around.

So that's why. I mean, it's on the face. Stupid. So, yeah, hopefully none of you had that in your head. Many of you had probably heard about it.

And it belies belief that there were people who believed that. But that is a big negatory. So.

But as Father Andrew said in the text, there's not even anything that really tells us that this is some kind of physical mark. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This is like a cow licking his hair or something. Right? Like.

Because. Because first of all, I mean, that wouldn't really make sense either, right? Because like, if the whole point is he says, anybody who sees me will kill me. And God says, okay, well, I'll make you really identifiable. That'll solve the problem.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Again.

That doesn't really work. So the word here in Hebrew, that's translated mark, is ot.

And that is a word that means a pledge or a witness or an oath.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And yes, we looked it up. This is not an opportunity for Father Andrew's etymology corner. Oath and oat are not cognate. They are.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Even though oat means oath.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. Right. They are false friends.

False friends.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So.

Yeah. And so this is like a pledge. And the point is, God makes this promise to Cain, this pledge that anyone who harms him. Right. It will be God who avenges him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So it's mark in the English sense of like, mark this. Well, which is a sort of archaic way of speaking. Right. But if you read the books that we do, you get this all the time. Mark this. Well, pay attention.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He will mark Cain in that. He's going to keep an eye on him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Be aware of what happens.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, exactly.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And this is also the beginning of a theme. Right. Notice God says the way you end the cycle of violence is God says, I will deal with it.

And this is the beginning of God being the one who silences the avenger. And ultimately vengeance is mine, says the Lord.

Right. God takes care of breaking the cycle of violence. So that. That takes care of that part of Cain worrying about being hunted. So then the next part is, how is he gonna live? And that solved by the founding of a city.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. You set up a system and you can live off of what other people do.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. Right. And so there's gonna be now commerce. There's gonna be these other things that are gonna allow him.

To survive without being able to live an agrarian lifestyle. So the city that is mentioned here.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Founded in the land of Nod. Yes, yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Is an actual city. So there's a little bit of unclarity in the way that the Hebrew is translated, sometimes.

A better translation of it for various reasons. You'll often here it translated in a way that makes it sound like Cain named the city after his son Enoch.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. So shouldn't the city be called Enoch?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, but it's. Cain actually names the city after Enoch's son.

Irad is how it's spelled in most English transliterations. That's Irad, I R A D. Okay. And that.

Is the city of Eridu, which is southern Sumeria.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, if you listen to it, right, it's got. The vowels are a little bit different, but it's still got the same consonants of R and D. Irad, Erudu. You can hear the similarity. I hope everybody.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, right. It's Eridu and Father Andrew. Do you want to describe the cuneiform to people?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, yes. So there's actual cuneiform in our notes. Thanks.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Fun with fonts, ladies.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right, exactly. So the first cuneiform character, pictogram, you see four spiky things pointing downwards with one across it, moving from left to right. And then next to all those, there's a big one going from top to bottom, right. And then the second character is four, four of those marks pointing right. And then they're surrounded by a diamond shaped box of four other marks. So basically a square, but turned on one of its points. Right. So those are the two images that you get from the cuneiform. That's about as good as I can do. I'm sure there's some official way of describing this, but I don't know it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I was just curious how you do it. I'm glad you went with it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Spiky things, hash marks.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Little wedges.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, wedges, right. We don't need no sticky wedges.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That Sumerian name is pronounced Nunki Eriduki.

And the Akkadian, right, which is northern Mesopotamia Semitic language called it Iratu.

But.

Eridu.

It was considered in the ancient near east in a lot of places at a lot of times, not everywhere at all times, but maybe even most places at most times to have been the first city. We now know it actually isn't archaeologically.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But this is the tradition about it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's not even the first Sumerian city archaeologically, but they believed it was at the time. Right. And so the idea here is that Genesis 4 is, as we've seen time and time again, it's sort of interacting with the traditions of Israel's neighbors.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In terms of. Right. So for.

Example, the Sumerian king lists, Right. In many, but not all of them, Eridu is the first city. And the founding of Eridu is this, because it's the first city, is this incredibly important event in the history of civilization. Right.

So the kingship comes down from heaven for the first time in Eridu. And their first king is Alulim, who lives like 28,000 years.

And he has, as we've talked about before, when we talked about the Apkallu, when we talked about giants, he has a sage, an apkallu, right. This divine being named Adapa, who advises him and brings civilization to Earth.

In the city.

We have other.

Sumerian material that talks about Enki, who was the God of the city. Founding the city, Enki was believed to have brought up the city and all life in the world, for that matter.

Out of what's now the Persian Gulf, right up out of the.

Out of the seas to the south. Enki was believed to live in the far waters. His temple in Eridu was an aquifer, which.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Wow, that's crazy. But just consider the maintenance on that.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Like, it's always wet. Yeah, man.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I live in Louisiana, man.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right, exactly.

Perpetual flooding. That's what we want.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We want it flooded. But this isn't just right.

When Eridu is sort of this big, prominent Sumerian city early on, much later in the Neo Babylonian empire. So we're talking about, like, Nebuchadnezzar. We're talking about thousands of years later, the Babylonians still believed that Eridu was the first city. They just, of course, said it was founded by Marduk there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, their guy.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Their guy.

But. So at the time of the Babylonian exile, that would have been the view of the city of Eridu. Right. And so Genesis 4 is saying is, again, this is sort of correcting the record.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This was not a great moment in civilization. This was not when the divine came to Earth. This was not. This is Cain murdered his brother. He's the first murderer. He's the first great sinner. He had to go on the lamb, and he built this city. It's like a hideout to try and survive because he couldn't farm.

So you could see how that inverts the whole view of human civilization.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Sort of in one fell swoop in a few verses here in Genesis 4. And for the record, Eridu was founded around 5,400 BC.

And this was one of those a lot of times on the show when we give very ancient dates, we know there are certain folks in our listener base who don't like dates that go beyond a certain point.

But the great thing here is 5400 BC works either way. So. So regardless of your view.

Of things, 5400 BC founding of Eridu, it even works for Cain on certain people's timelines. So.

Yeah. And so that sort of comparative condemnation of city life versus nomadic and agricultural life is a theme that runs through Genesis and through most of the Old Testament. And we've talked about that at various points.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah. This idea that.

Civilization is not the result of a divine endowment, but is actually the outgrowth of sin. Someone running from God.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. And that moving, you know, when Abram and Lot separate the land. Right. Abram, of course, wants to live nomadically on the plain. Lot's like, ah, let me go hang out there down by Sodom and Gomorrah. It seemed like fun, happening places, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Dun, dun, dun.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Kind of regrets leaving ur in the first place. Maybe.

Yeah. So there's a very different.

Perception here.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. All right. Well, that is the end of our first half of tonight's episode of the Lord of Spirits. We're going to take a quick break and we'll be right back.

Father Andrew, Stephen Damick and father Stephen DeYoung will be back in a moment to take your calls on the next part of the Lord of Spirits. Give them a call at 855-237-2346. That's 855-AF-RADIO.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

New from Ancient Faith Publishing. Secret Turning, a collection of short stories by Stephen Signari. So I'm out in the lot at Odo Heaven and up comes Father Naum from behind, grabs me, gives me a kiss and tells me he's happy to.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

See me wearing his worn out dungaree.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Bib overalls with the beat up straw Stetson pulling his wire basket, going shopping on the avenue.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

How old is Naum anyway?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Sharkey asked.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Older than he acts lefty.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Said to be red. He said yeah, and younger than he seems. So he says to me, the Audrey.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

The church is much better when you're there. It's not the whole family when we don't see you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You know, God misses his children and.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Nana Olga misses her son. Now available in paperback, ebook and [e-mail].

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Faith.Com we're back now with the Lord.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Of Spirits with Father Andrew, Stephen Damick and Father Stephen DeYoung. If you have a question, call now at 855-237-2346. That's 855-AF-RADIO.

This is the second half of Lord of Spirits. We're talking about Cain walking the earth, sin, all that stuff. This is the second part of the show and as the voice of Steve just said, you can call us at 855-AF-RADIO. Again, that's 855-23-7-2346. I have no commercial for this half, so.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, if, if you wanted to be the new CEO of ING should faith, I'm afraid time has passed you by.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's true. That's right. Applications are closed, everybody.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You have to wait a few decades for the next guy to Tyler.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's true. Yeah. So, all right. Well, we've got Cain having founded the city and civilization begins Right.

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So unlike Cain from Kung Fu, he will not be walking the earth anymore. He will be in a city.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

The.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this half, our second half, we're going to sort of start looking at the figure of Cain.

As he develops in sort of later writings. Right. So in Second Temple Judaism and some of the church fathers in the New Testament, how is the figure. What is the figure of Cain? Sort of his legacy? How does it function? Why is he important?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because again, as we talked about.

Post Legacy of St. Augustine, for a variety of reasons in the West, Cain doesn't get talked about that much.

There's not a lot of Cain, but lots of people were talking about Cain. In Second Temple Judaism, more people were talking about Cain than were talking about Adam.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And I mean, it's interesting that Cain does show up a lot in other kinds of. I don't want to call it legendary material, but like a lot of stories, for instance, here I'll throw out the obligatory Beowulf reference. Beowulf references Kane, Grendel, the monster, the big monster of the beginning of the story. And suddenly I'm reminded of that Sesame street book called the Monster at the end of this Book.

But Beowulf does have a monster at the end of the book, and it's a hidden dragon, but.

See, there you go. But Grendel is said to be a descendant of Kane, and it also says that Kane is the father of orcs and of all kinds of evil giants and elves. Elves are bad creatures in Beowulf, I'm afraid.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Mostly elves are bad creatures in everything.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In the fantasy world, elves are responsible for everything bad. That's true.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Even in Tolkien, a lot of the bad stuff gets really started because of one particular elf named Feanor.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The elves have much to answer for.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They do. They really do. But yeah, Cain, I mean, Cain is a big deal in.

Like, especially the medieval imagination. He shows up all the time.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He is this figure. Right. He is this figure. And that disjunction with Adam is important because as we mentioned on the show before, we see in the icon of the harrowing of Hell, the raising up of Adam and Eve. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Don't see the salvation of Cain, the repentance of Cain. That's not who Cain is.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, in a lot of all saints icons, you see. See Adam and Eve, and in many cases they have halos showing that they are among the divine council, but you don't see Cain. Cain's not there. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So, yeah, we're going to sort of trace out where that talk about Cain comes from. So Cain is an example of something. He's not just the first, he's also the worst.

So one of the places that he's talked about that is in your New Testament, if you are in your Old Testament, if you're Orthodox or Roman Catholic, in your New Testament, if you live in the second century.

Is in the book of wisdom.

In chapter 10, verses three and four.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Which goes like this. But when the unrighteous went away from her, and we should say that her is Wisdom. Right. That's if you read earlier in the chapter, you get that. But when the unrighteous went away from her in his anger he perished also in the fury, wherewith he murdered his brother, for whose cause the earth being drowned with the flood, Wisdom again preserved it and directed the course of the righteous in a piece of wood of small value. That's a really great way of referring to the ark.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, it's cheap.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

A piece of wood of small value. How much for gopher wood these days? I don't know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

So you notice here, Cain is just referred to as the unrighteous. Right. The unrighteous one. Right.

And.

Interestingly, Wisdom wants to note that Cain also perished when in his anger, he murdered his brother.

And that's talking about a little bit what we talked about last time, that idea of spiritual death, of being cut off from God, from which then sort of further necrosis sets in.

And someone perishes.

Physically later on. Right. And then also Cain. And this is going to be one of the major themes in terms of how Cain is seen is that he sort of sets things in motion.

That will end up causing the flood. Right. The flood of Noah. Because the flood is going to come to purify the creation from humanity.

So at the time of the flood, we're at everyone's thought was always evil all the time. Right. Which is worse than me, because some of my thoughts are not evil once in a while at least.

But this is always evil all the time. Everything has snowballed up to that point. But that begins with Cain. Right. That begins with Cain allowing himself to be mastered by evil. And so Josephus.

Is going to. He refers, he uses the word.

Panerotetos, which is not the same as Potetos.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oil them, mash them, stick them in a stew.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Means most evil.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So he's not just the evil one or the unrighteous one, he's the most evil one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Like at the end of the Lord's Prayer, you've got that word Pony Ru. The evil one is like, this is a. Yes. The most evil one.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. So, yeah, Joseph. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Not only is he the most evil one, but he's also a teacher of evil. Like he is. He is incredibly evil. And it's. And so not only has he been sort of mastered by sin, but now through him, sin is mastering others.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, he's making it worse.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Lead people into evil.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So we've got this quote from Josephus Antiquities.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This is chapter one, translated by a very Victorian gentleman.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, 59, 6. I know. When I was reading this, I was like, I really feel like I need to say. However, he did not accept of his punishment in order to amendment. Because that's how it reads anyway. I won't do that. My fake, fake Victorian accent.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It gets tedious after a sentence and a half.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It does. It kind of does. And then you like. It only gets really interesting if you do sort of like a grand Moff Tarkin thing. Then it becomes compelling and nasty in.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Our moment of triumph.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, so, okay, so here's Josephus. However, he did not accept of his punishment in order to amendment, but to increase his wickedness. For he only aimed to procure everything that was for his own bodily pleasure, though it obliged him to be injurious to his neighbors. He augmented his household substance with much wealth by rapine and violence, or rapine, I'm not sure actually how that's usually used. Rapine and violence. He excited his acquaintance to procure pleasure and spoils by robbery. Wow. And became a great leader of men into wicked courses. He also introduced a change in that way of simplicity wherein men lived before and was the author of measures and weights. And whereas they lived innocently and generously while they knew nothing of such arts, he changed the world into cunning craftiness. He first of all set boundaries about lands, which doesn't mean borders, I guess, but is more like deeds. Buying and selling real estate, property markers. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So that land could be bought and sold.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah. Because there are not nation states in 5,400 B.C.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This is.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Or whenever it is.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this is Josephus in the antiquities. Right. And notice the points he makes about Cain. Cain does not repent. Right. So even Josephus sees, based on the way the story is, the way that God speaks to Cain, that even the curse that befalls Cain, just like the curse that befalls his father, was there to drive him to repentance. But Cain does not repent. Right. It was not purely punishment. It was to bring him to repentance. Which he refused. And rather than going.

Returning in repentance, right. He chooses to pursue all of his own pleasures, right. So he just lets sin take over, Right. Whatever desire comes to him, he allows to control him, and then he leads others into it. But then also you notice he sort of related to the city. This is where Josephus is getting this. This is related to the founding of the city.

That before this, right, People had lived in this way of simplicity where they lived together, they shared things, right. Everybody contributed what they could to the family, to the community, and. And everyone supported each other for help, which is what Cain could have done, Right. If your question is, well, if he can't farm, how could he support himself? Well, he could have returned to his parents in repentance, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And he didn't have to be the one doing the farming. He could have done other things to contribute to the community, right. And people provide food for him. But that's not how he chooses to go about it. He goes about it the opposite way, Right. He chooses to go and he violence and take and steal, right. And then to put in place these means of commerce and these means of cunning, craftiness.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's a system very much, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

A system where you're able to exploit others, take advantage of others.

Do everything except honest work with your hands, right. In order to. In order to extract money and. And receive sort of bodily pleasure.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so this is who Cain is. And this understanding of communal life is why, you know, at the beginning of the book of Acts, when it talks about the early.

The early Christian community in Jerusalem and it talks about them having everything in common and living together in common, right? And then you get the folks who, as soon as they're done reading and have to explain, now, this is not communism, right?

But this is. That at the beginning of Acts is. It's referring to this idea.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, it's this communal life with the family.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, it's referring to this. That. That is the type of life that the early Christians returned to, right. They pulled out of the life of this, even the city of Jerusalem, right. Which had become horribly corrupt, as we know, right. By the time of Christ.

And many times before and after.

They had retreated from that, to go back to this kind of simplicity of life. That's the reference there in Acts, that they're trying to show us this way of life that was sort of more God's intent from the beginning, right.

So not only does he do all this stuff, right? But he's also presented very frequently as the first Heretic.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, which is interesting. You wouldn't think like, wait.

Is Cain violating some kind of Christological dogma or.

What does that mean exactly?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He's an anti Trinitarian.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He's obligated. So he's trying to works righteousness, man. Gotta snipe it off, King. No.

So he's referred to it this way in a bunch of places, right. In Philo, in two of the Targums that we call neophyte and Pseudo Jonathan, Clement of Alexandria uses him in this way. Tertullian uses him in this way. But more importantly, he's used twice this way in the Bible.

Once in Jude, verse 11, because there's no chapters in Jude, it's a paragraph. And once in. Here we are again. 1 John 3.

Welcome back.

In both of those places, these false teachers or sort of heretical groups that have come into the church and are leading people astray and are afflicting the church are compared to Cain directly, they become like Cain, they followed Cain. And the way that works is if you look at in both cases, what these people are doing, these people are coming into the Christian community and exploiting people in order to gratify their own desires.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Which I mean, not to put too fine a point on it, but there are people in our time who will try to divide out certain kinds of dogma from morality and ethics, especially sexual morality. Even people who their voices are from within the orthodox church. And.

As you like to say, that dog won't hunt. This sense of gratifying your desires, being associated with false teaching and of course, as we see many times in scripture with idolatry means that, yeah, morality is not up for grabs.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Especially sexual morality. Especially sexual morality, Right? Yes. Always intertwined in this way. And this is why it is a general truth.

Worthy of acceptance that all cults eventually become sex cults.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. I mean, I've spent. Because I have a weird little interest in this. I've spent a lot of time reading about new religious movements, especially various kinds of cults and sects. Sects. And they do. I mean, they head in that direction almost to a man. And it's always men, it's always men running these things, you know, taking advantage, dominating women, dominating, you know, whoever comes within their orbit.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. They get power and they want to sacrifice. They want to indulge all of their desires.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yep.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And the power they get through.

These heretical communities, they then used to do that. And they are like Cain in that regard. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So now we're gonna say some more nice stuff about St. Augustine because of course, Cain is a major figure. Figure in the City of God. Right? Because the whole premise. So St. Augustine writes the City of God as the Western Roman Empire is collapsing. And.

One of his major intellectual contributions there is the idea of the seculum, which is not the same as what we now call secular. But the word siculum in.

Latin before that had just referred to a period of time. Right. Like an age or an era. Right.

And.

What St. Augustine does is he uses seculum to refer to. And he's mingling some Plato in here, as is his want.

That there's this realm of becoming. Right. There's this realm of this world that is always shifting and changing. It's always sort of temporally determined and in flux. Right. And that's the seculum, that's the city of Man. And so for him, Genesis 4 is Cain founding the city of Man.

And you can read about this in city of God. 15:17 is where he talks about Cain in particular.

So there's that world of change, and then over against that, there is the City of God, the new Jerusalem, which is eternal, which is unchanging. And so St. Augustine writes the City of God, which is epically huge. It covers everything in the world. But the thrust is he's trying to. To say to people who literally, their world is crumbling around them.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In ways that fortunately, I mean, who knows, in the United States at least, the way things are going. But.

We thankfully have not had, most of us listening, have not had to experience yet. But I mean, we're talking about, you know, one day people on horses come into your town and just start murdering and raping people.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

House to house.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And the authorities are crumbling and there's no food in the market.

And people are starving. Right. This is the reality of the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Okay. This is the world they're living in. And St. Augustine is writing to them and saying, this is the way of the world. City of man. And Rome was the city of man. It never stays.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Is it not the eternal city?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, there is another city to which you belong. Right. And that is unchanging and that is pure.

But so.

He not only sets up this paradigm with Cain as the founder of sort of this city of man, but he points to, in 1517, not the year, sorry, Lutherans.

City of God, book 15, section 17.

He points to the two genealogies of Seth and Cain. And he takes. He treats these genealogies.

In a way that's actually reminiscent of wisdom literature. It's kind of a clever thing he does to be these two ways, these two paths that a person can pursue. And he points to the seventh generation.

Of each of these genealogies. Right. As being sort of. Because it's the 7th and 7, you get reached completion.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's like the end of the road. That's the fullness. That's the end of the road where this road leads. So if you do that with Seth.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The genealogy of Seth, the seventh from Adam, is of course, Enoch.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Who gets taken up into heaven. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Assumed up into heaven, walks with God with his theosis.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

As we talked about last time, you look at.

Seth's or you look at Cain's genealogy, and the seventh is Lamech, who's the one who sings the song to his two wives about how great he is and how he's gonna murder anybody who messes with him and doesn't need God to avenge him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So he's the super murderer, you know. Yeah, right, exactly. And it's interesting to me, actually, that, I mean, we see this in Revelation, of course, but then this theme also persists in other places as well, that.

What'S held in contrast, ultimately, against the city of man is not the untrammeled wilderness. It's another city. It's the city of God. As it says, we have here no continuing city, but we seek the one that is to come. And so there's this idea that civilization is redeemable, but it's only because God sends it, only because God makes it happen. You know, the Cane city is not gonna. Is not it. There's no. No salvation there.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. And polishing it won't help.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Putting, you know, having. Having less crime in it won't help. Right, Right. Less. Less obvious crime, less of the crimes we don't like, you know, even spray painting Bible verses on the walls. Is it gonna.

Is it ultimately going to help? Right.

Yeah. And so then, as those are understood, right, as those figures are sort of the culmination, Lamech is sort of this antichrist figure. Right.

Lamech has these sons.

Then in the genealogy. And those sons are treated not so much as a continuation of the genealogy as. As they are treated as sort of based on the contributions they make to civilization.

They are treated as sort of divisions of the types of sin and wickedness that sort of come out of Cain's line or come upon you and take you over as you go down that road.

This road that Cain began. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Started traveling.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And they're each described as being the Father of a certain, you know, way of living or skill really is what it comes down to. So this is Genesis, chapter 4, verses 21, 20 through 22. Ada Bor Jabal. He was the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock. So you've got.

Keeping livestock. Verse 21. His brother's name was Jubal. He was the father of all those who play the lyre and pipe music. And then verse 22, Zillah also bore Tubal Cain. He was the forger of all instruments of bronze and iron. And the sister of Tubal Cain was Naamah.

So you've got, you know, husbandry, you've got music and you've got metallurgy.

Yes, man, that's too bad about music.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, and so.

What'S going on these, the livestock thing, right? This livestock is food. Livestock, Right, right, right. So nobody has permission to eat meat yet in Genesis 4. But more importantly, they're making a contrast in sort of the movement, right, where again, as we said before in paradise, the trees are offering their fruit to Adam and Eve for nourishment. Then Adam's having to work the ground. Now they're going out and killing. They're going out and fighting, killing things to feed their own desires. And this has to do with sort of the predatory nature of it. We talked about this when we talked about the rules against blood drinking. But it's also why, frankly, we fast for meat. Right. There is permission given later for people to eat meat. So I'm not saying you have to become a vegan. If you're orthodox, you're vegan like half the year. But I'm not saying everyone has to become a full time vegan. But there is something about meat eating that is not ideal.

The scriptures are very clear about that. And that not ideal part is that you're going out and killing. And that represents a fundamentally different relationship to the rest of creation than what there was in Paradise. Yeah, it's come, come far from there. And so playing the lyre and pipe, I played the drums in school, so I guess I'm fine.

No, the idea of music is again, what it's used for. Right. Festival. Right. Which were festivals to pagan gods. They didn't have secular festivals. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And so no Woodstock.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No. Well, Woodstock might be an example because this was about giving people the place and space to indulge their.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Desires. There's often this association of music within a lot of contexts with seduction and all this kind of stuff.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Sadly enough right now, that is not saying music is innately Evil. More on that here in a minute. And then you get to Tubal Cain, and he's making instruments of bronze and iron, and you say, well, metallurgy, that seems like a nice thing. The idea here is that these are weapons for war, for mass murder, right? Cain could kill somebody with a rock, but now we've got swords, implements, right? Armor, we can go to war, we can have mass slaughter, we can take what we want, right? And this, this sort of dovetails with what gets fleshed out even more. Like if you look at the version of this genealogy that's in the Book of Enoch, in the Book of the Watchers. And we're not gonna, we're not gonna. I know this is gonna be a letdown, but we're not gonna talk a lot about giants tonight because we kind of already did that and we do that frequently. We're focusing more on Cain tonight. But obviously the Nephilim lay at the end of this, right? The end of this chain. But all along the genealogy, when you read it in the Book of the Watchers, in the Book of Enoch, these.

Demonic spirits are giving the people in Cain's line these secrets, right? And this knowledge of, you know, potions, sorcery, allergy, right? All of these things, all of these sort of techniques, technological aspects. And the idea is that all of them are being given to humanity before humanity is ready to use them in a way that is good and is righteous.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's not that there's not any way to use this technology.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right? That's a question. Whenever we bring this up, we usually get a whole bunch of questions like, well, which technologies are okay to use and are not from demons, you know, or. Or how do we know when we're ready? Or whatever. And it's like, well, that's not the point. The point is, what am I using this for? How. What is the purpose the telos? What am I accomplishing by using this technology? That's the question, Right, Right. Yeah. And there's the big example is like nuclear energy, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. That's one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

A good example.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We, we always use we. I mean, humans, us, humans, humanity, right? Yeah, yeah.

Give us a thumb, we make a knife, right?

That's an obscure reference. But the. Any technology we find, we immediately use in the most destructive way possible and then maybe later develop less weapons based and killing based uses for them. So nuclear technology you can use for power, you can use for all kinds of things.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Medicine is actually.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Treat cancer, right. With radiation. Right.

And the first thing we, of course, did with it was massacre thousands upon thousands of people. And I know me saying that now there will be people upset. Okay. But I have to tell you a fact that you may not know.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And that should make you more upset about it if you don't know it. Before.

Harry Truman made the decision to vaporize Nagasaki, it was the most Christian city in Japan.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Multiple Christian groups, including, I'm not sure it was the largest, but there were at least 14,000 Orthodox Christians living in Nagasaki. Before the bomb was dropped, more than.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

50% of the Roman Catholics in Japan lived in Nagasak.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And one day, most of the Christians in Japan, in the most Christian city in Japan, men, women, children going about their lives had nothing to do with World War II, were not worshiping the emperor. They were Christians, were vaporized by a bomb.

So you can at me, you can call me unpatriotic, you could be mad at me about that. Father Andrew might read the email, but that's the reality and we have to deal with reality. A bunch of Christians, your brothers and sisters of Christ were murdered.

That's it. That's what happened.

So moving on from that happy note and completely non controversial with whatever listeners we have left.

The other big way that.

King gets talked about sort of going forward, his legacy in some of these writers has to do with his.

State as cursed. Right. So he's sort of taken as the exemplar of a human who is sort of fully under.

This state of curse that we've talked about before when we talked about blessings and cursings in one episode and in Deuteronomy 20:30. But this gets sort of developed out as this curse is described. He sort of take it as exhibit A. Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And it spreads in the world like as Adam and Eve were supposed to spread blessing in the world. Instead what happens is curse gets spread.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Things get messed up by Cain and his descendants.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. He's the anti Adam really, in a lot of ways.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The flood needs to sort of wash this all away. But so Philo of Alexandria, who I know we've quoted a bunch before, but just for the record for Everybody, is a 1st century BC.

Jewish philosopher in Alexandria, Egypt.

Wrote a text whose title is roughly Questions and Answers in Genesis.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's not just answers in Genesis.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, please. You find it named all kinds of things in translations, like questions and interrogations to questions. It's called questions and Answers, man. Come on. Q and A. Q and A. Q and A in Genesis.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But he has a couple of.

Questions and then answers related to Cain and his curse, where he kind of lays this out.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay, so this is in the first chapter, section or book, I'm not sure which, part 71. The earth is the last portion of the world. Therefore, if that utters curses, we must consider that the other elements do likewise pour forth and adequate maledictions. For instance, the fountains and rivers and sea and the air and the land and the fire and the light and the sun and moon and stars, in short, the whole heaven. For if inanimate and earthly nature, throwing off the yoke, wars against injury, why may not still rather those natures do so which are of a purer character? But as for him, against whom the parts of the world carry on war, what hope of safety can he can have for the future? I know not. And the he there, of course. Right. Is Cain.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. And so this is sort of laying out in a more full way. Right. This enmity between Cain and the rest of Creation.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And.

If you go and read, like, various versions of the life of Adam and Eve, when you read stories of Adam's repentance, the sun and moon and stars and these same things Philo lists are all praying with him and offering incense with him in his repentance.

So there's this idea that in his repentance, the whole world is cooperating. Cain is in the exact opposite state. His lack of repentance, his continued evil, means that he is at odds with everything.

In the creation. The whole created order he is now out of whack with.

Because he won't repent. And so then he goes on to answer. I mean, he's posing himself these questions, but it's a rhetorical device.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's almost like catechism, really. Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And.

He goes on to talk about.

A little more about what all is included in that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Okay, so this is part 74. In the first place, he might have received injury from the parts of the world which indeed were made for the advantage of the good, and that they might partake of them, but which nevertheless derive from the wicked no slight degree of revenge. In the second place, it may be that he said this because he was apprehensive of injury from beasts and reptiles, for nature has brought forth these animals with the express object of their being, instruments of vengeance on the wicked. In the third place, some people may imagine that he is speaking with reference to his parents, on whom he had inflicted an unprecedented sorrow and the first evil which had happened to them before they knew what death was. And, of course, the, you know, the thing that he's referencing Cain saying is like, I'm going to die, I'm going to get killed. Why would Cain say this? That's essentially the question that he's asking.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. This is all the stuff that might have killed him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, right. Why would he say this? Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The first thing is the idea that he's so cut off from the world that the things of the world that are there to benefit the righteous would actually do him harm.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. And, you know, this is that same idea we see expressed with St. Paul with the Eucharist. Right. That someone going and receiving the Eucharist, like if Cain went and received the Eucharist, it could kill him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Because he is not prepared to receive it. He's not receiving it in repentance, he's receiving it in impurity and wickedness.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And I love this idea that the animals are at odds with him because that's sort of the vengeance from God. You know, mosquitoes. Mosquitoes are vengeance from the Lord. But I mean, this is this notion of the left hand of God.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Certain types of animals were brought forth in the world for this purpose. Purpose, right. For this purpose. And you're like, wow, that makes sound mean. Right. Once again, remember what we've said before about.

The way God is seen to relate to the demons who he allows in the world throughout the Old Testament and in Second Temple Jewish literature, which is. Again, this is all for bringing about repentance.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. This idea of the left hand of God.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. It's all about trying to bring about repentance. Not just. Not just to punish, but also, this is. This is Philo's answer for the. Wait, did lions eat grass before the expulsion from paradise? Right. Like, no, all the beasts didn't show up until there were sinners who needed repentance and the reptiles.

So wow.

In the. Like I said, that's Philo's answer. I'm not saying that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The teaching of the church or what the scriptures say. That's Philo's answer to that question.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And then the last thing he says, of course, is that he's afraid of his parents. What are they going to do to me? Right, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this state, the word that's used by Philo and Josephus and other other Greek writers to describe this state of curse that Cain is in, is iOS.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Alpha Gamma omicron sigma.

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There's no iota.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. It's not agios, which is holy.

Which, I mean. I mean, if I was a hymnographer, man, Would I make a lot of use of that pun? Right. Which they do. They do.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There's only one. One iota of difference.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So, yeah. And that word. There's lots of words for cursed, right? I mean, anathema. Right. That kind of thing.

In Greek. But this one is.

About.

Ritual impurity. And it's a particular type of ritual impurity.

That comes upon a person from sacrilege and murder, often when mixed together. And that sacrilege usually takes the form of the desecration of some sacred space. So both Herodotus and Thucydides use the word to describe people who, for example, massacred people, like massacred priests inside some God's temple. Right. So they defile the God's temple by murdering people, and that means they're now AIOs. Right. They're under a curse. Right. They have this status of being ritually impure. Josephus uses it at a couple of points to describe some massacres that took place in the Jerusalem temple, that everyone involved. One time it was just some Levites who took up arms and killed some people, not in the temple, but that they had contracted sort of this state. And the important part of this is that this kind of cursedness or the ritual impurity part of this. The ritual impurity part of this is not removable.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So it's this permanent mark.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It can never be removed. There's no sacrifice for it. There's no ritual washing for it. There's nothing for it. Right. You maintain the ritual impurity. That's not the same as saying you can't be forgiven for the sin involved. That doesn't mean there's no repentance. There's no way back. But the state of impurity, of ritual impurity cannot be removed. And there are other places where we see this sort of ritual impurity aspect attached to Cain, one of which is in First John 3, verse 12. Back again.

Where when St. John says that Cain murdered his brother, the word that's used for murdered there is not the normal word. The word that's used for murder there is svadzo, which means literally slaughter. Literally means he slaughtered his brother.

But in the Greek Old Testament tradition, that word is used entirely for killing a sacrificial victim.

So St. John uses this word in describing Cain and Abel, to place what Cain did, it's not just a fratricide, but to place it in this kind of ritual and ritual impurity.

Context.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so I know there are people who get worried anytime you say that, like a state of impurity. Is not removable and get worried about there's something unforgivable. Did they do it? I'm pretty sure nobody listening has gone and massacred any priests inside of churches. Right? So I mean, this isn't one that you're going to accidentally do, right.

Just slip one day, have a bad day and do it. Right. Like, but.

This idea we see in scripture, for example, King David, right, is told he can't build the temple because there's blood on his hands, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And it doesn't matter how many sacrifices he offers.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. And that's not saying like the prophet and King David is not a saint. It's not saying he's not wasn't holy at the end of his life. It's not saying he was not forgiven for the sins he committed. All those things are true. But at the same time, right, what he did, killing Uriah, right. Mary taking Bathsheba. Well, actually committing adultery with Bathsheba, then killing Uriah to cover it up, then marrying Bathsheba. Right. You can't undo that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Like, right, you know, you can be forgiven. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But you can't undo it, can't fix it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Abel can't be un. Murdered. And you know, and this plays out right, like there's canons in the church, especially canons having to do with clergy, that if they've done various things, especially if they killed anyone in any way whatsoever, even accidentally, they can't be ordained. And in some cases they have to be removed from the priesthood or the diaconate or episcopacy, whatever the order that they're holding. And it's not that they can't be forgiven, but they can't serve anymore. And I'm reminded of a story and I can't remember what the source of this is. So write in, let us know if you happen to know this one.

About St. Basil the Great, who you know, as you know, he's a bishop and he's got priests serving in his diocese and one did something and Basil deposed him from the priesthood. I don't remember what it was that this man did. He deposed him from the priesthood and then sometime later, the two of them are both at the same funeral and this ex priest walks up to the body and prays over it and the man comes back to life. And so then he goes up to Basil and says, so I mean, you see what just happened now, can I please be a priest again? You know, and St. Basil says to him, and now this is the best of my recollection. You can be a Saint. But you can't be a priest again. You know, what he did left a mark. And that's just the way that it is. I mean, you can talk about how.

It'S wise to do that because it would scandalize people even if the man was really repentant and so forth. But. But there's this deeper thing going on here, you know, this. This ritual impurity that just can't be washed away again. You can be forgiven. You can become a saint, which is the goal of Christianity, by the way. The goal of Christianity is not to be ordained.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Being a priest, Being a saint.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah. In fact, ordination might even be an impediment to salvation in many cases.

You know, the goal is to be a saint. There's nothing standing in the way of you becoming a saint. If you're willing to repent, you can do it. You know, it doesn't matter what you've done.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And that. And that's because sin and curse are not the same thing.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Curse is the consequence of sin. Right. And forgiveness does not erase consequences. The fact that you're forgiven does not mean you don't have to face the consequences. In fact, when someone comes and asks for forgiveness and says they're sorry and you know that they're only doing it because they're trying to get out of the consequences. Right.

That's considered a bogus apology.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. That's not repentance.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Like, I'm really sorry. I did it because I got caught. Right. Like, that's not how that works. Right. So repentance includes and often begins with accepting the consequences of our actions, whatever they are. And if the consequences of my actions someday, God forbid, mean that I can't be a priest anymore, then part of my repentance from those actions, whatever they were, will be accepting that I can't be one anymore.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Yep. Yep. Alrighty. Well, that wraps up the second half of this episode of the Lord of Spirits.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And we've got one more half to go. We're gonna take another break. Our final break for this episode, and we'll be right back.

Father Andrew Steven Damick and father Stephen DeYoung will be back in a moment to take your calls on the next part of the Lord of Spirits. Give them a call at 855-23-7-2-346. That's 855-AF-ADIO.

For all of us, male or female, parent or not. That's what it's often like, isn't it? It's at the end of our own tether that the miracle happens. It is in our greatest weakness that God's strength is known. It's when we decrease that he can increase. It's in losing our life that we find it. To put it another way, it's in the spot where Saint Morwena falls down exhausted that her spring rises up. It's when the people of God curse Moses in the wilderness and wish themselves back in Egypt that they hear the crack of the staff, the gush of water through the rock. It's when God himself is spat upon and mocked and bleeding and dead that the glorious resurrection is ushered in. From seven Holy Conversations with Saints and Friends, now available as an audiobook at audible, Amazon and itunes.

We're back now with the Lord of Spirits with Father Andrew, Stephen Damick and Father Stephen DeYoung. If you have a question, call now at 855-237-2346. That's 855-AF-RADIO.

Hey, welcome back. It's the third half of the Lord of Spirits podcast and we are in the second part of a three part series talking about the fall of man. First part was about death. This part's about sin. Next time we're going to talk about being dominated by demons. But today we're talking about sin. We're talking about Cain as the sinner. So here we are. It's the third half kind of where do we go from here? Right? What do we. How do we. How do we understand? Well, it's a curse, death, destruction. The creation hates you. Kane, you know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah. Super metal. Yeah, yeah.

I'm trying to think of how many Kane related metal band names there are. I mean, there's Avenge Sevenfold. Right? You got.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Anyway, so I have not made a special study of this topic.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

What would be awesome is if there was like an easy listening album or like a yacht rock album that had something to do with Kane.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Write in, let us know. Is there a lounge singer out there that you guys love?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Some bluegrass maybe.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I don't know. Actually, bluegrass does know about sin for sure.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, No, I can see plenty of bluegrass song about. About Cain and Abel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, yeah. Yep, yep.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They might be picking, but they wouldn't be grinning on that one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, nice.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But so.

Where we're going in this third half shock, we're gonna end up in first John 3, verse 12. Any spoilers before we go there? Yeah, that's.

By way of a little review. So there's sort of one more thing to talk about with Cain.

In terms of First John 3:12. And in a lot of ways this aspect of Cain sort of sums up the rest. Right.

And so if last. In the last episode, we kind of ended up talking about theosis.

We'Re now going to talk about the other end of the other genealogy here in terms of Cain. So to start with, we have to quick review. We've talked about this before, but the idea of fatherhood and how that relates to image bearing.

In the scriptures. Right. And so being the son of something.

Means that you are the image of it or the embodiment of it or the.

Sort of incarnation of it. Right. So if we look at the common examples, Right. Barnabas. Barnabas.

He is the son of. And encouragement, or the son of consolation. Right.

And what we're saying there is that he is a person who images or who embodies these qualities.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, you know, James and John. Right. The sons of thunder is that same thing. Yeah. Because they're. They're thundery guys.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah. Although there's also a rift there because the place where Jesus calls them that was not far from a shrine to Zeus, Boanerges. And Boanerges is the word that's used there. But you know when we'll talk more about that one month from today when we talk about thunder gods.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, we're going to do a thunder gods episode, everybody.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So.

The. Or the son of perdition.

Right.

Right. And that's literally sort of son of destruction.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. In Greek it's apoleas. Yeah. Son of destruction. And then of course, the English word perdition comes from a little bit of etymology. I'm not going to play the jingle, but a little bit of etymology. Perdition comes from Latin perdere, which means, you know, to destroy. Right. It's destruction.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. And for the record, the road to perdition is near Holland, Michigan. Oh, on the coast, that's where.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I do not know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Anyway.

So.

All those ideas, right. The son of the Son is the image of the Father. Right. So that's the idea that they're embodying sort of these properties, these qualities. Qualities, these aspects, these things. Destruction in a real way. And this is also true with the sons of God language.

That we refer to it with angels and humans, and especially with humans. Sons of God means we're imaging God, which we've talked about, as we talked about last time, that sons of God, in the same way that image and likeness sort of were on both ends. Right. Of the. Of the spectrum where I confused everyone.

It sort of wraps around because this is the. This is the theosis as a Mobius strip.

Imagery.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's always rough when you get to that half turn in the middle. Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But you know, Adam is called the sun of God. Right. He's made in the image of God.

In St. Luke's Genealogy of Christ. And also we are made sons of God, as St. Paul says. That likeness aspect. And that again, is the theosis. Right. Because we're imaging God.

In the world. Right. So.

Cain doesn't get called the son of God.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

No.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

1 John 3:12, back again. We're told that he is of the evil one.

He is the son of the devil.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Remember the first half not mean literally.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Not literally. He was conceived to. Born in the usual way, but he became the son of the devil. Right. He became the son of the devil by what he did. Right, right. And this is important to hammer not just because of the kind of wonky theories we started out talking about, but also because a lot of forms of Gnosticism, for example, Right. Divide humanity into. Into like sons of light and sons of darkness. Right. Or sons of God and sons of the devil. And those are like ontological categories. You are born as one or the other. Right, Right. It's like two different species of human that you're either one or the other. It has nothing to do with who you are and what you do. And. Right. So Cain becomes the son of the devil. He's the first one who sort of becomes the son of the devil. Devil. And he does that how? By imaging the devil. Right. By bringing the devil's works into the world, by embodying him, by doing this wickedness, by committing murder, by doing all these things and by teaching them. Right. So not only does he have a demon sort of walking him around, but he's then walking other people. Right. He's passing it on to the next generations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Both a user and a dealer.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

Not high on his own supply, though.

And Christ uses the same kind of language of being the son of the devil.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Or the son of the evil one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah. So In John, chapter 8, verses 39 through 44, you see this conversation between Christianity, Christ and some of his critics, they answered him.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Critics. That's being polite.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Well, you know, I was raised soon to be murderers. Yes, yes, Right, right. They answered him, abraham is our father. Jesus said to them, if you were Abraham's children, you would be doing the works Abraham did. But now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth. That I heard from God. This is not what Abraham did. You are doing the works your father did. They said to him, we were not born of sexual immorality. We have one father, even God. Jesus said to them, if God were your father, you would love me, for I came from God and I am here. I came not of my own accord, but he sent me. Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. You are of your father, the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

Pretty sharp words there from the Lord.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, Kind of unchristlike. Wait.

Yeah. And so notice here what is it that makes them.

Of their father, the devil. Right. It's not coincidental St. John's also writing this, and that's why the same kind of wording appears.

Because of what they are doing. Right. Christ says so in verse 41. You are doing the works your father did.

That's what makes them. Right. And if they were sons of Abraham, they would be doing the works Abraham did. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So it makes you a son of Abraham, makes you a son of God, is that you do the things God does. Right? Does.

And so again, this is this, this active imaging. Works both ways, right? Works both ways. And so it working in this bad way, in this negative way, in this way of sin and wickedness is what we've kind of been calling in a makeshift word.

Wish we could up with something better, but I don't know what.

As demonosis. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, demonization maybe, but I mean, demonosis is nicely parallel to theoses.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, sort of. It's an actual word.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, it is if we all say it is.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I won't go along with your ruse. Anyway.

So the demonic powers are in the world promoting sin, this force.

And sin, the passions that we talked about last time, they make people passive and they take over and they take control. But then that's also transformative in the same way that that theosis is transformative, that following Christ is transformative, that love is transformative, hate is transformative. Right. In the same way that kindness is transformative, cruelly is, cruelty is transformative.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In an opposite direction. So these aren't just, you know, oh, I chose to do this, I could have chosen to do something. Otherwise, we assess whether it's morally bad or good. We have an ethical argument on and on and on and on and on. This is much more deeply related to our being and our Humanity and who we are.

And it has nothing to do with whether you get caught. It has nothing to do with whether anyone knows. It has nothing to do because this is in you, right? If you steal, you can steal your whole life and never get caught and you're still a thief.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You can kill and get away with it and you're still a murderer. You still have blood on your hands and there's no changing that. There's no changing what has happened to you because of it, Right. Outside of repentance.

And transformation in the other direction. But it will change you.

I know we've used this example before, but we probably all know people and have known people who have gone down a dark path in life and by God's grace, turned around at some point and you could physically see when you've looked at them, the difference.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So are you saying that when you go down the dark path, it doesn't necessarily forever dominate your destiny?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It does not.

So.

And that state of curse, that's what that is. That's what that change is. That's what that negative change is. That's what that is. That's not there again, because God's going to punish you for your sins because you've been bad. That's again to drive you to repentance.

If we have known those people who have gone down that dark road and have gotten to a point where just physically they're falling apart mentally. Right. Emotionally. Right. Things are crumbling. A lot of times it's when they hit that, wherever that rock bottom is for them, that's when they turn around. That's what finally kicks in, the repentance. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I recall.

One of my professors in seminary saying for a lot of people, the only time they actually will eventually repent is. And this is how he gave it an event starting with the letter D. Death, disease, disaster, divorce, depression, and I mean, you know, I did pastoral ministry for 13 years and it's often true if people are comfortable, they're not likely to repent. Just kind of, I mean, it happens, but not super often.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. I personally need to be hit over the head with a two by four.

To get my attention, but. Right. And this is what we're talking about when we talk about like the Apkallu and the ancient kings and the Kings list, or we talk about the humans in Cain's line and the watchers in the book of Enoch. Right. Or what we saw in Genesis chapter four tonight, this sort of, of symbiotic relationship that develops between humans and these demonic spirits, right, these demonic powers, it's not symbiotic in a positive way. It's more parasitic. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because there's always promises, right. There's always promises of power and knowledge and pleasure and this and that, that never quite pay off. Right. They never quite come to the kind of fruition.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, you think people would read enough fairy tales to know that when a magical being shows up and promises are going to make you beautiful, rich or powerful, always say no. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But that's why they don't show up anymore.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right? Right. Because there's enough fairy tales out there to.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. It's not a being appears to you, it's a TV commercial or an ad.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Right. Different modes of enchantment now.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. And it tells you, buy this, go here, do this, and then you will be happy, you will be fulfilled, you will.

Impress the ladies and, or men.

Whatever it is that it's promising. Right.

And the ultimate result of this for a human like Cain being our exhibit A, who gives themselves over to this, is that they become like demons. And then Even in that St. John Chrysostom quote, which we are want to quote in some cases, like with the Nephilim, even become demons, become demonic spirits.

So this is.

We mentioned last time when we were talking about the expulsion from paradise that, that people have gotten from Milton, this idea that the Devil decided he was going to somehow make God not be God anymore and make himself be God.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Which as we pointed out last time, makes absolutely no sense.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, Right. Not a thing.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. But so this is what we've seen with Cain. Right. The Devil was only partly successful with Adam. Cain is where we see.

The Devil's plan sort of go through to fruition with a human. Right. This is what he wants. This is what his plan was. This is how he's. He's rebelling against God as creator. And that's if, if God's plan is theosis, if that's God's plan for humanity that made the devil envious, that made him jealous, that made him angry, that filled him with his pride, if that's God's plan, then he is going to make at least some of these humans his imagers instead of God's, his worshipers instead of God's, his followers instead of God's. That's where he's going to try and usurp God is in the lives and the minds and the hearts and the souls and the bodies of, of some of these humans. Not because he just loves humans and wants Some of his own, but to destroy them because he knows God loves them and he hates God.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Hey, so related to that, actually, we just got. Someone is calling from Kentucky. At least that's where his phone number is from, I've learned. Now, I can't say that they're in Kentucky or whatever, because just. That just happens to be where your area code is. But anyways. So, Nathan from Kentucky, are you there?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes, Fathers.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Hey, Nathan. Welcome to Kentucky. You are in Kentucky.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Great.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Well, that's good to know. Welcome to the Lord of Spirits podcast.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

What is your old Kentucky home? Oh, no, I had to move recently.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I'm in a new apartment. Oh, he's in his new Kentucky home.

Yes. I'm suddenly hearing Blue Moon of Kentucky. I mean, all the. Yeah, all the. The old bluegrass songs and stuff are coming to mind now, so. So, Nathan, what is on your mind about Cain?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So ever since I listened to you guys and y' all talked about the three falls, I noticed that there was, like, three temptations of Jesus and that a lot of them seem to be like reputations or what you might call discontinuities with those falls. So you have the obvious Tower of Babel with the nations, and then Satan offering Jesus the nations and him refusing the worship which, you know, the humanity gave into. And with, of course, Adam and Eve in the apple dealing with God's intent and Jesus with the stone and breads, that is also, you know, him submitting to what God intended instead of doing his own thing, which, of course, leaves the temptation on the Temple Mount and Cain's fall. And those two, I can't. I haven't figured out. I can't mesh them.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And I keep struggling to figure out.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

What I need to, like, you know, kind of complete this. This idea.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

What do you think, Father Stephen? Is there an alignment between Christ's facing off with the devil in the wilderness and this. This way of talking about three falls of man?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So I'm not totally sold on the idea, but, yeah, if I were to try to make the link you're wanting to make here, I think this is how I would do it. And I would have to think about this a lot more before I would endorse even what I'm about to say. So shooting from the. Giving a direction to research in would be great, Father. Yeah, to me. Right. Because the issue of throwing himself off of the pinnacle of the temple has to do with trusting in God. Right.

Versus testing God. And I think if I was going to try to connect that with Cain, I would go to after Cain had sinned. Right. And he hears the curse that he's not going to be able to provide for himself. That the correct thing to do would have been for him to repent and rely on God's protection.

So, I don't know. Like I said, I can't totally sell it, but that's the direction I would maybe go.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I think there's a paper in it though, Nathan. So if you have to write any papers anytime soon.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. Any journal articles or dissertations you need to write, you could have that one I was just worried about against PhD tonight. So. I don't know, but.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, yeah, well, it's true.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

At least get a master's. Thank you very much. I appreciate that much.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Alrighty. Well, thanks for. Very much for calling in, Nathan. All right, well, we're. We're actually getting close to the end here. Right. On our way.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's the end, my only friend. The end.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So. Yeah, yeah, I mean, yeah, go ahead, go ahead.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So, yeah, we're talking about the Devil, sort of his main plan. Right. And so we talked last time about how, right, death gives this our mortality. Right, our death, the end of our life in this world, and therefore our life in this world that's bounded by death, gives us this realm.

For repentance.

And so when we understand that sort of this is what the Devil is about, this is what the Devil's plan is, it casts a new light on the idea of sort of morality and repentance. Right. So a lot of times Christian morality is approached especially in the modern West. Not just the west in general, but the modern west in particular, as Christian morality is trying to get through life without doing too many bad things. And if you do do those bad things, as you invariably will do, at least some, but when you do do them, you repent of them, meaning you ask for forgiveness and then you go on trying not to do it anymore.

That is sort of a woefully insufficient view of.

Morality because morality is spiritual warfare.

They're not two separate things.

For Cain.

He didn't have a moral choice to make about whether it was right or wrong to murder his brother. Right, Sorry. Immanuel Kant.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

What if everyone murdered their brother? This is untenable, right?

That's not how this works. Right.

He had this power come upon him. Anger, rage, resentment.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, that's how it always works, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Shame over his own wickedness that caused his sacrifice to be rejected. All of this came over him and he had a choice to yield to it, which would result in violence or to fight it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And master it. Right. And and Christian quote, unquote. Morality is not about maintaining some kind of code of conduct. It's about self mastery.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. It's not like ethical choices where you can sit back and study out. I mean, there are moments like that. Right. But generally speaking, that's not how it goes. And even then, your reasoning is going to be affected by the kind of person that you are.

You can talk yourself into anything.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right? Well, yes. And Right. In order to get to the point where you could placidly sit and say, I am facing this situation, what is the right thing to do? You have to have achieve self mastery.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because otherwise you're not gonna be able to sit down and make that choice. You're gonna do, you're gonna react, you're gonna act based on whatever's in the driver's seat. Whether it's anger, whether it's lust, whether it's your laziness, whether it's resentments, whether it's, you know, irritation, stress, whatever it is.

This is across the board, self control. St. James talks about taming your tongue. If we can master ourselves, if we can master the forces that are acting upon us.

That is what then allows us to follow Christ and to serve God and to do good.

But that's the basis of the ethical or the moral struggle for a Christian. Right. It's resisting the desires, the passions, all of the forces acting upon us, trying to drive us being tossed to and fro, like St. Paul says.

And being able to do and to act and to follow Christ.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah. And you know, an important point to make here is that we as human beings do not know who is actually engaging in the struggle. Right. Like someone might look super sinful to us, but actually be really struggling hard. Someone might look pious and righteous to us, but actually just be yielding to all of every temptation that comes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We're almost always 180 degrees wrong.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Seriously, the people we think are the good and upright, noble people are almost always scumbags. The people we think are scumbags are almost always holy people.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So we've got all those holy fools. Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's why I'm so popular. I'm a scumbag.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

There you go. I'll sell some books.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I'm going to put that on my tombstone.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

There you go. I'm a scumbag.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's why I'm so popular.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

All right, so in wrapping up and summarizing a lot of what we've talked about, and applying the thought that came to me especially was, as I've mentioned a number of times on this show, I'm the father of four kids.

And the other day I actually brought all four of those kids to a candy store, you know, which is not something that we do regularly, but, you know, there was a new candy store. And so we're like, okay, well, we'll give their mother a few minutes by herself, take the kids to a candy store. And you know, naturally, of course, especially the younger kids are, the more they're ready to just grab hold of in the candy store. And.

A father's job is to say, here's the limit, everybody. I brought you the candy store. I'm not telling you you can't have any candy, but here's the limit. You can have this many or this much, right? And then when we get home, you cannot eat all of it. You may have this much and then save some for tomorrow, right? And.

This is a normal part of parenting, right? Fathers and mothers both do this.

And the thing that occurs to me, especially in light of especially we were just talking about, about the Christian struggle and morality and so forth, mastering the demonic.

Influence that's attempting to leap upon us and to take hold of us, is that the way that we do that is through these small choices, right? With. With raising children. A lot of what you're trying to teach your children to do is to restrain themselves, to have self restraint. Like, yes, I understand you have a desire for candy, and maybe I did a foolish thing by putting this all in front of you. But also, you know, we're trying to enter into this and to have some restraint. You can have one piece, you can have two pieces. Pieces, you can have three pieces, whatever it might be. But the same is true for us adults, except theoretically, by the time we're out on our own.

We'Re training ourselves. We now have been given the tools by our parents, and we're continuing to get counsel from our spiritual fathers and our spiritual brothers and sisters. Encouragement to.

Restrain ourselves, to master ourselves, to master that desire that comes up within us. Right now. Candy is a desire that seems kind of small and unimportant, sure. But if you feed yourself as much candy as you want and you give it to yourself every single day.

Then you are not just teaching yourself that that's okay. You are forming yourself into someone for whom this is the norm. You're forming yourself into someone who simply has a desire and then fulfills it. I see something, I want it, I'm gonna take it. Right. And while we don't imagine ourselves to be doing horrifying things like, you know, murder and rape and theft and, you know, whatever else, right. The road there, the road to perdition is gotten there. We get there by many small steps of training ourselves to be that way. Right? Almost no one wakes up one day and just suddenly snaps into being someone who just grabs for whatever they desire. They have been transformed in that direction. They've been transformed in that direction. That, yes, it's true that the slippery slope argument is a logical fallacy, but it is a spiritual reality.

It is a spiritual reality. You gradually head deeper and deeper into sin. And.

Holiness works in the opposite way. You train yourself to have that self restraint. You train yourself to have self sacrifice, to have humility. You know, you engage, if you engage in.

The little prayers, that is simply daily prayers, morning and evening prayer, right? If you engage in the little bit of fasting that's asked for a couple times a week and then in longer periods at other times, you know, if you, if you engage in these things, what you do then is you gradually build your ability, frankly, to become like God. You know, you do the works that he does. And we train ourselves in small ways initially, and then it becomes greater and greater. The Lord said this, right? You've been faithful over a little and now receive much. Right? And so if you say to yourself, you know, I don't need to be obedient in this little thing, then what you're training yourself is to be disobedient in great things.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Things.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's how it always goes. That's how it always, always goes. And so I think one of the big lessons from the story of Cain comes again from that crouching sin that's at his door that God says is, look, it's going to master you. You got to master it. This is God behaving as a spiritual father to Cain.

Encouraging him, you're going down the wrong path, sir. You need to come back. And this is what spiritual fathers and mothers and spiritual brothers and sisters do for those that God has brought to them is to say, come back. And so when someone says to you, hey, chill out, restrain yourself, you know, or hey, take a look, just look at where you're going. You got to, don't be like Cain, don't be like Cain. You got to turn back and come back to the Lord and do his works. And so we become truly then, the sons of God. Father Stephen.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So, you know, there's certain.

Issues with this audio only format because with the title of the episode. I've been dangling from wires this whole episode and no one can even tell.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I just realized I heard some whooshing in the background. I heard some whooshing and kind of wondered what that was.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Anyway, so.

This week, as I was kind of thinking about.

Cain and how he ended up living his life after.

What he did and the choices he made, I heard some comments from Christopher Lasch, who was talking about our sort of contemporary culture of overwhelming narcissism. And he pointed out that, you know, the way we look at our lives now.

Has a lot of affinities with how Josephus described Cain living his right.

And, you know, it's obvious we can all think about some celebrities with reputations or something. We think of people who are just sort of totally debauched and wicked or violent or, you know.

Some kind of arch criminal or these kind of things as being that type of person. But there's much more nuanced version that is ultimately a version of the same thing that is how a lot of us live our lives. And that's that, you know, we're not looking for gratification of sort of crass sensual desires all the time. We may not be promiscuous or substance addicted or those kind of things, things, but we're looking to satiate certain desires of our ego and of our pride.

And, and our desire for even. Even a lot of this will be controversial, but, oh well, even a lot of.

The search for meaning stuff now has an undercurrent of this in it that each of us sort of looks at our individual lives. We say, hey, I have this one life to live. That's what I've got, and I need to make the most of it. And again, most of us aren't crass about it, but we make the most of it because we want to be successful at something. We want to make a name for ourselves. We want to be recognized by others. We want to get our ego stroked.

We want sort of money. Money is a measure of that sort of success and that we're doing well and we're doing the right things and we're the right kind of person, and we're willing to spend a lot of that money to make ourselves appear publicly, whether we're talking about clothes or whether we're talking about carefully curating our online profiles to give the right impression to everyone of who we are and that we believe and think the right things and, and we're on board with all the right causes and we support the current thing and all of this. We devote all of our time to this. And then at some point along the line, we kind of look and go, hey, I spent my whole life chasing mammon. What's the meaning of all this?

None of this really means anything, right? And it never did.

And then we go and look for meaning. But what Christopher Lasch pointed out is that that way of living life is very recent.

That's not how most people in the history of the world, or even most people in the world today, live their lives. Most people in the history of the world and the world today live their lives, he said, like a thread stretched between their parents and their.

That their life is not this individual thing that belongs to them. For them to maximize and curate and invest.

In such a way that it has an ultimately gratifying shape and result.

Their life is a connection between the generation before and the generation after, between the past and the future.

And if we approach life less like Cain.

And we want to be less like Cain, a good place to start is.

Going to the generation above us.

Trying to learn from them and what they have to teach us.

And that's a whole lot of things.

Every day.

People pass away with stories and truths and knowledge and experiences that vanish because none of us cared enough to talk to them and learn them and be able to pass them on.

And every day, people younger than us struggle to figure out what to do and how to live and where they belong in their communities and in the world.

Because we don't go to them and pass these things along to them and help guide them into where they need to be. Because what our life is really about is about being a part of something much bigger than ourselves. This is what St. Augustine was getting at in the City of God.

What our life is about is contributing our little bit.

To the history of God's salvation, of his creation.

Contributing our little bit to the story of the progress of Christ's gospel. And we do that through these little small things that we could all do every day to play our part in our shift in our time on this earth, by being a part of our communities, our families, our church.

And when we get plugged in and we're playing that part, the meaning thing, the idea of what our role is, the idea of what we should be doing, those things all immediately start to clarify. They immediately start to clarify when we stop approaching the world and the universe and. And life and Christ as individuals, disconnected and alienated from everything else, and we start approaching everything together.

So those are my thoughts.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Amen. Well, that is our show for today. Thank you everyone for listening. If you didn't get through to us live this time, we'd still like to hear from you. You can email us at Lord of [e-mail] you can message us at our Facebook page, or you can leave us a [e-mail] LordOfSpirits and join us for.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Our live broadcast on the 2nd and 4th Thursdays of the month at 7pm Eastern, 4pm Pacific.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And if you are on Facebook, you can like our page, join our discussion group, Leave reviews and ratings everywhere, but please, most importantly, share this show with a friend whom you know is going to love it. It's all about the word of mouth.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Be sure to go to ancientfaith.com support and help make sure we and lots of other AFR podcasters stay on the air and have yourself some only good canes, the chicken fingers which are better than Chick Fil A.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Thank you, good night and God bless you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Stay mad everybody.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You've been listening to the Lord of Spirits with Orthodox Christian priests, Father Andrew, Stephen Damick and Father Stephen DeYoung, a listener supported presentation of Ancient Faith Radio and I beheld and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne, and the beasts and the elders, and the number of them was 10,000 times 10,000 and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and Blessing. Revelation chapter 5, verses 11 through 12.