Question:
Hello! Please tell us how people multiplied on earth after Adam and Eve? So God created man, called him Adam, and then God took out a rib from Adam and created a wife for him, Eve. Then two sons were born to Adam and Eve - Cain and Abel. Forgive me, but then I don't understand, but how did people multiply later? It's just interesting for me to know.
Archpriest Andrei Efanov answers:
Good day! The Bible does not say anything about where Cain's wife came from, it simply states the fact that Cain knew her. Saint John Chrysostom also thought about this, and this is what he writes: “But maybe someone will ask: how is it, when the Scripture nowhere mentions another woman, Cain had a wife? Do not be surprised at this, beloved: the divine Scripture nowhere does the exact calculation of the female sex, but, avoiding everything superfluous, briefly mentions men, and even then not all; and about them very briefly tells us, for example, that such and such gave birth to sons and daughters, and died. And in the present case, it can be assumed that Eve, after Cain and Abel, gave birth to a daughter, whom Cain took as his wife. Since this was in the beginning, and meanwhile the human race had to multiply, then it was allowed to marry sisters. That his sister became Cain's wife,says Blessed Theodorite of Kirsky.
The words of St. John Chrysostom are supplemented by Blessed Augustine: “But one should not conclude from this that this was his first son. The basis for such a conclusion cannot be the expression that he knew his wife, which, as it were, indicates that he was then first united with her. For about the very father of all, Adam, this is said not only when Cain, who was his firstborn, was conceived. But even after that the Scripture says: And Adam also knew his wife, and she bore a son, and called his name Seth.
The book of Genesis does not describe the entire genealogy of Adam, but only briefly notes: and he begat sons and daughters (Gen. 5: 4); this book was not intended as a compilation of statistical data on the life and population of the first people on earth. What its author draws our attention to - be it the names, events or words of God Himself - always concerns directly our soul and our correct understanding of the Creator's plan for the world and humanity. However, you can refer to third-party texts indirectly related to the Bible. So, for example, in the Old Testament Apocrypha the Book of Jubilees says: “And in the third week, on the second jubilee she (Eve) gave birth to Cain, and on the fourth gave birth to Abel, and in the fifth gave birth to her daughter Avan … And in the fourth year of the fifth week he (Adam) was comforted (after the murder of Abel), and again knew his wife, and she bore him a son, and he called his name - Seth; for he said:"The Lord raised up another seed for us on earth instead of Abel, for Cain killed him." In the sixth week he gave birth to his daughter Azura. " The famous Jewish historian and military leader, Josephus, referring to the ancient Jewish tradition, notes that Adam had 33 sons and 23 daughters.
