Expert: Pastor Don Carpenter - 2/5/2010

Question
Hi Pastor Don,

My wife and I are a little confused about the sequence of events in Genesis and thought maybe you could clear things up for us.

In the book of Genesis, Chapter 3 God created Adam and Eve.  Then Genesis 4:1-2 Eve gave birth to Cain and Able.  Then Cain goes on to kill able and in 4:17 Cain had sexual relations with his wife and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch.  Then in 4:25 Adam had sexual relations with Eve and she became pregnant and gave birth to Seth.  (Therefore Eve had three sons - and no daughters).  So my question is; where did Cain's wife come from?

Then Enoch had sons, Methushael had sons.  In 4:19 Lamech married two wives.  So where did the women come from?

Thanks in advance,
Rob and Yvonne Cole

Answer
Hi,

Thanks for this great question.  We are not told of every person born to Adam and Eve.  Here is a verse sumarizing their activities showing that they did a lot of procreating.

Gen 5:4  And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:

Adam and Eve were created as adults, they had the ability to reproduce right away.  Family lines were not polluted or forbidden to marry within for thousands of years after creation.  Cain most likely married a sister or maybe even a niece... We are not told.

I hope that this helps you.

In Christ
Pastor Don