06.2.3. Their Lives
III. -- THEIR LIVES AND the lives of these two seeds are as marked as their religions. As it was in Cain’s day, so is it now. The seed, whose religion is to improve the fallen creature, "goes out from the presence of the Lord," and seeks to make a ruined world happy without God, by "building cities," and "inventing harps," and "instructing every artificer in brass and iron" (Genesis 4:17; Genesis 4:21-22); in a word, by civilising the world with arts, striving to make life easy, and the world a safe dwelling place. The other are happy in God without the world; dying out of it, or rising to a better world. The one judge and slay their brother: the other do not judge even the murderer; but, inasmuch as the world is not purged from blood, they are as yet strangers and pilgrims in it. The one call lands after their own names, and cities "after the names of their sons," to make the world their own, and not the Lord’s, if possible (Compare Genesis 4:17). The other "call themselves by the name of the Lord," and would make themselves the Lord’s and not their own, with His name upon them (Genesis 4:26, margin). So the one live, -- for as I have already said, no death is recorded in any of Cain’s seed; the other die, writing death as their portion; "And he died," is recorded of every one of them, save of him "who was not, for God took him;" while they count their years by days, as it is written of each, "All the days of such a one were so many years, and he died" (See Genesis 5:1-32 passim). So run the seeds each in their course. The carnal line have by far the most to shew on earth; but the end of their cities and music is foreseen; Enoch warns of the day when the Lord shall come, and all His saints with Him; when the earthly city shall fall, and "the voice of harpers and musicians and trumpeters shall no more be heard in her; when no craftsman, of whatever craft he be, shall be found in her; because in her is found the blood of the saints, and of all that are slain upon the earth" (Revelation 18:22-24).
Further distinctions are shewn in other points recorded here. There are, however, some similarities. The last generation but one in each line is Lamech; and as name denotes character, this sameness of name marks some resemblance. For the Church and world, the carnal and spiritual seed, in the long run, and just before the judgment, become too much alike. Still they differ. Lamech "dies" in Seth’s line: he yet has faith of better things; while his speech (for the words of both are recorded) points out how deep a difference exists under the outward similarity. For Lamech in Cain’s line boasts that Cain had been preserved spite of his sin, and argues from this that he may also sin with impunity: -- "I have slain," he says, "a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt;" but since God has set a mark on Cain, lest he be destroyed, "if Cain shall be avenged seven-fold, surely Lamech seventy and seven-fold" (Genesis 4:23-24): that is, God has spared one who sinned like Cain; how much more will He preserve me, though I too am a murderer. So from grace this Lamech argues that sin may abound. The other Lamech also speaks, but it is of "the ground the Lord hath cursed," and of the "rest" out of it, which "shall comfort them:" -- "This same shall comfort us concerning our toil, because of the ground which the Lord hath cursed" (Genesis 5:28-29). The one says in effect, "Where is the God of judgment?" The other confesses sin, in hope of better things. All this is timely truth for us; for the days are near of the last judgment of the first creation. The time has come when the Church and world are both Lamech, that is "poor," with small difference to be seen anywhere. And yet under this, some misuse grace to sin, and some by grace look for a Deliverer; while a remnant escapes who see not death, and another is saved even through the judgment.
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I add but a word on the dispensational fulfilment of this. In this view the two seeds, the elder and the younger, are the Jew and the Christian Church. That was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural. First came the fleshly dispensation, and then the spiritual. The Jew seeking to improve the earth; Christ and the Church giving a life to God. The Jew slaying the righteous seed, which yet is raised up; the Church dying in hope of resurrection. Both of these are Adam’s sons; both acknowledge the same one God, though in very different life and worship; the one, departing to be with Christ; the other, going out "from the presence of the Lord," as "fugitives and vagabonds in the earth" (Genesis 4:16); finding no ease or rest for the sole of their feet, and fearing, where no fear is, that every one that findeth them shall slay them (Compare Genesis 4:14 and Deuteronomy 28:65-66); but, like Cain, providentially preserved, for the Jew has a mark set upon him, lest he be slain. The Lord yet preserves him wondrously. But to the end his portion is of this earth, in the first, not in the new, creation. (Note: Augustine, Contr. Faust. Man. l. xii. c. 9, and 13, goes very fully into the dispensational application of all this history, dwelling particularly on the fact that the Jew, like Cain, was preserved, and had a mark set on him. So, too, Ambrose, De Cain et Abel, l. i. c. 2. See John 8:44.) So the last shall be first, and the first last. The dead shall live, and earthly life shall pass away. And the souls under the altar shall be at rest, for they have washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb.