Bereishit
Genesis 1:1 – 6:8
Isaiah 42:5 – 43:11
“Bereishit — In the beginning.” Every year, I am charged with a thrill as we begin the Torah all over again. Opening the scroll to its first column, the books to their first pages, brings out more than just a sense of newness. It takes me back to basics; time to reexamine that which I hold most dear.
The narratives and themes are so very rich: origins, purpose, loneliness, companionship, temptation, mistakes, family, murder. I stop. Murder? So soon? But we just got started! Yet there it is: Murder is just a few pages in. And not just any murder, but fratricide. Cain kills his brother Abel while they are alone, out in the field together.
“Abel became a shepherd, and Cain a farmer. After a period of time, Cain brought an offering to Hashem of the fruit of the ground. And as for Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and from their choicest. Hashem paid heed to Abel and his offering, but not to Cain and his offering. This angered Cain greatly, and his countenance fell.” (Genesis 4:2-5)
The rest is history. Spurned, jealous and angry, Cain raises his hand against his only brother in the world. Abel dies and Cain is cursed and sentenced to a life of wandering. Tragedy strikes humanity so early, and it is self-inflicted.
Reading the episode again brought to mind a thought-provoking conversation that I had several years ago with a woman at a Jewish communal event. She contended that “religion is responsible for all the killing and war in the world.”
Looking at the story in front of me, it seemed that she was on to something. Two men express their religious devotion by offering sacrifices to God, something goes terribly wrong and one kills the other. How many untold millions of people have been killed in the name of some deity or another over the centuries? And can’t the same be said today, looking at a world in which religious beliefs are offered as prime reasons for atrocities, oppression and terrorism? Has anything changed since that first murder?
After I took a closer look at the narrative, a different perspective emerged. God does not play the role of the uninterested bystander who allows religious murder, but rather prompts Cain to introspection. “Why are you upset? … Improve yourself … Error waits to trap you at the door and it desires you, yet you can conquer it.” (Genesis 4:6-7)
Hashem gives Cain a moral pep talk before his crime and even after the murder continues to engage Cain in an effort to help him come to grips with his emotions and his actions.
Further, the trigger of Cain’s anger is clearly the contrast between the acceptance of Abel’s sacrifice and denial of his own. In a portrait of Cain’s religious frustration, there is no need to mention Abel’s sacrifice. It is mentioned here to explain Cain’s jealousy of his brother, a jealousy that leads him to kill.
Perhaps then it isn’t religion that is responsible for war and murder, but rather it is those values that we hold higher than the lives of other human beings. The list of interests that transcend honoring the existence of another may include religion for some, but often includes jealousy of money, power and property as well. At times, more idealistic notions are involved, such as defending liberty and human rights. Indeed, people take the lives of others because there is something more important to them than someone else’s right to live, and the reasons are as many as the interests and values (selfish or not) on this earth.
As we return to the beginning of our precious Torah, we are forced to ask ourselves: How highly do we value our lives? What do we value more than life? And perhaps most importantly, how highly do we value the lives of others? To paraphrase Cain, are we ready to be our brother’s keepers?
Rabbi Judah Dardik is the spiritual leader at Oakland’s Beth Jacob. He can be reached at [email protected].