If Adam and Eve were the first in this world, and Abel and Cain were the first offsprings of the world .......

Question

where does Cain's wife come from? According to the Bible:

[Cain settles in the land of Nod "away from the presence of the Lord," where he "knew his wife."] - Sentence from Wikipedia

Oh, no! I've just realized I had two questions of the same name! It must've submitted both when I was modifying it! Well, I'll choose both's Best Answers anyway. Thank ya' all! Your answers make sense. Hmmm...

Answer 1

Adam and Eve had many other children besides the three named in scripture (Cain, Abel and Seth). The Jewish historian Josephus (who lived at the same time as Jesus) records the tradition that Adam and Eve had over 600 children in their 930 years together.

As there was only one family on existence at the time, they would have had to have married sisters. Intermarriage within a family was a common practice throughout much of the Old Testament time. Abraham's wife Sarah appears to have been a half-sister or step-sister. Issac was married to a first cousin, etc.

The genetic consequences of such marriages were not understood at the time. And it was not until the Law was given to Moses (about 500 years after Abraham) that the first laws were given against such marriages. So they occured often out of necessity and ignorance. Once God revealed that such marriaged were wrong, the Jews abandoned the custom of interfamily marriage.

Answer 2

Adam and Eve may have had more children than the Bible says. According to Genesis 5:4 "Adam lived 800 years" giving him plenty of time to have children including Cain's wife. Furthermore, in the passage which you are talking about (Genesis 4:16-17) it talks about Cain building a city which implies that there must have been a lot of people around. A city with only one person would be pointless.

Here is the passage in full:
"Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of Eden. And Cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bore Enoch: and he built a city, and he called the name of the city, after the name of his son, Enoch.’ (Genesis 4:16–17)

Answer 3

The Bible tells us that Adam and Eve had daughters as well as sons.
If Cain married early in his life, his wife would have been his sister. If he married late, it could have been one of his countless relatives.


Cain and Abel were not the only children of Adam and Eve, even though many people think so.

Genesis 5:4 says Adam and Eve had other sons and daughters, and Jewish tradition teaches they had 33 sons and 23 daughters. (Remember that Adam lived 930 years, so he and Eve had plenty of time to have 56 children!)

To get the population started, of course, at least one of Adam and Eve's sons had to marry one of the daughters. It is likely that in the first generation all marriages were between brother and sister. Living so close to the time of the perfect creation, no genetic problems would have developed yet, so no harm would have come from such close marriages.

By the time of Moses, 2600 years later, many biological problems had accumulated, which made marriage between close relatives dangerous, so laws were given against it and are still in place today.

We are not told how old Cain was when he went out to build his city (Genesis 4:17). But Bible commentators have estimated that at least 120,000 people could have been alive on earth within only a few hundred years. So Cain probably had quite a lot of women to choose from for a wife.

If he married early in his life, his wife would have been his sister. If he married late, it could have been one of his countless relatives.

Answer 4

The Easy Answer
If you believe in the literal creationist theory as expressed in the Bible, then the only acceptable answer is that Cain married one of his close relatives - possibly a sister or niece. While the book of Genesis does not specifically name any of Adam and Eve's children other than Cain, Abel, and Seth, it does specifically state in Genesis 5:4 that they "had other sons and daughters". Some Jewish traditions tell us that Adam and Eve had thirty-three sons and twenty-three daughters. Considering God told them (just as he later told Noah) to be fruitful and multiply and that Adam lived to be over 900 years old, even 56 children might be a rather conservative estimate. Knowing that Cain was scared for his own life after killing Abel (Genesis 4:14), we can infer that there were others around for him to fear. If we consider that Cain married a close relative, we can assume that these other sons and daughters did the same, so after several decades of this, there would literally be thousands of potential mates for Cain (most of them much younger).

This idea, of course, brings up the problems of incest. Today, having a child with a sister or even a close cousin brings a high probability of birth defects. However, we must take into consideration that we are talking about a perfect gene pool (after all, God Himself created Adam and said "it was good"), and with only one or so generations from the first perfect humans, there would be little chance of negative recessive genes at this point. It should also be pointed out that the concept of marrying your sister is not deemed to be a sin until Leviticus 18 and Leviticus 20 (more than 2000 years later according to young earth creationists).

If you are still concerned with the concept and problems of incest, think about this:
1.) Abraham married his half sister (Genesis 20:12) - a union that God blessed. It was still another several centuries before God forbade such things.
2.) Eve was even more closely related to Adam than any sister could be to Cain. Remember that Eve was created from Adam's rib (basically she was a clone), so was actually made from the same DNA.

The "Others"
Some try to explain the appearance of Cain's wife by saying that God created some more people after Adam and Eve. While this is a logical theory, most biblical scholars denounce this concept as there are many places in the Bible (especially the New Testament) that refer to God's love and mercy as it applies to the descendants of Adam. It would not be consistent with the rest of the Bible that there are whole groups of people that can never be saved because they don't have the right heredity.

Similar to this, some people suggest that this woman was actually not a Homo sapien, but rather a less evolved humanoid species such as Australopithecus, Homo erectus, Neanderthal, or Cro-Magnon. While at first, this concept of interspecies breeding may seem a likely possibility, it is actually completely illogical to discuss these pre-evolutionary stages of modern man with the presumably (for this argument) historical figure of the wife of the son of Adam and Eve*. It should also be noted that Adam had this same problem at first, and could find no solution. Genesis 2:20 tells us that while all the animals had a mate, Adam searched all over, and could find no compatible partner, and it was only after this that God created Eve. We can only assume that the man who encountered and named every species on the earth (Genesis 2:19) would have run across these other humanoid creatures first.

There is, however, mention of a breed of giants called Anakim (though some believe them to have been Nephilim) mentioned in Genesis 6:4 which Cain could have bred with. This verse specifically states that humans who "knew" these giants bore children who became the men of renown. Because a curse was placed upon Cain, it is unlikely that such an honor would have been given to his descendants.

Answer 5

Adam and Eve had more chlldren than just Cain and Abel.

The bottom line is that Cain's wife was his sister or another relative such as niece or cousin. If you do not like my answer for any reason you can research your question further and find out more information at Answers In Genesis.

Answer 6

It's make-believe, not a true story. Like Santa Clause and the Easter Bunny. Santa Claus was created so that little children would behave. The Bible was created so that adults would behave. Same thing, just different target audience.

***>Update: I find it amazing that with all the media that was around at the time of JFK's assassination, 50 years later we still don't have the definitive answer to why he was killed. Yet when it comes to the bible, events that occurred thousands of years ago, in a time where stories where embellished and passed on by word of mouth, some people take it as "the truth".

Anyone who had anything to do with what is now in the bible, was "edited" by leaders of society (Emperor Constantine for one). The goal has always been to conquer lands or to control populations. Religion was the very first form of government.

My father went to seminary to become a Jesuit Priest so I've heard all the "stories" about the bible I can stand. Thank goodness he saw the "real" light and decided to leave and join the real world.

I could go on forever, but I fear that I'm surrounded by a bunch of narrow-minded, brain-washed bible thumpers.

I look forward to all the negative ratings.

Answer 7

this question is commonly asked throughout history.

if you read the book of urantia you will get a completely different history of the beginning of Belief in God in the world.

first of all Adam may NOT have been the first Male on this planet. if God presides on a planet called KOLOB! than the garden of eden may be where God Lives. this is a mormon doctrine.
others dictate that this planet was a planet of criminals where persons were sent to be punished.
It is very possible that this planet had inhabitants before Adam and Eve were alive and that when they became ambassadors of God they became the most notable. as for Cain and ABLE being the first or even the only children of adam, is completely rejected!
Cain and Able might have been first born OR very clearly the most notable of their children. Somewhere it is taught that EVE had 56 children. But it is also written that NOT all of the children of adam and eve served GOD. in fact it is written that the children of adam loved satan more than God.
Hence, Cain chose to covenant with Satan and because of this When cain offered his sacrifice to God it was rejected.

Answer 8

Some of us believe that Adam and Eve resided in the garden for millions of years before they were tossed out, and that evolution occurred all around them.

Some believe that Adam and Eve, while the first people, were not the only people.

Take your pick, the Bible doesn't say which is true.

Answer 9

According to Islam. Abel had a twin sister and Cain had a twin sister.
God commanded Abel to marry Cain's twin sister and Cain to marry Abel's twin sister. Cain's twin was more beautiful than Abel's twin because of this Cain wanted to mary his own twin sister but he could not because it was commanded by God. Cain became jealous to his brother Abel. This jealosy lead to the first murder of the mankind.

Answer 10

All the offspring come from Adam and Eve- Why don´t YOU read the Bible instead of Wikipedia.