Where did Cain get his Wife?

I receive many questions from readers of the web site and the "Light Unto My Path" newsletter.  This one is very common.

I am new to the teaches of the Bible and I am trying to make sense of it all.  I would like to ask you a few questions:

1 - If God created Adam and Eve (and they were the first and only humans on earth) and they in turn gave birth to Cain and Able - where did Cain find his wife and who created her?

2- If God sent Cain out into the land of Nod, were their other people there?  If so, how did they get there.

I know these are very basic questions but I am honestly confused. Any insight you might be able to provide would be much appreciated.

Thank you very much for your questions.  I can assure you, that these questions have been asked many, many times by "searchers" in the scriptures.  In order to answer them, I would like for you to get your Bible (King James Version is the one I use) and let's work this out together.

Your questions stem from the first book in the Bible, which is considered the foundation of the Word of God.  From Genesis we have all sorts of firsts.  The beginning or creation of the lights in the sky (Sun, moon and stars), earth, plants, animals, and the creation of man, sin.

The scripture passage you are asking about is found in the fourth chapter of Genesis.

“And 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 bare Enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city, after the name of his son, Enoch.”  (Genesis 4:16-17)

We know that Adam and Eve were the first human creations and that there were no other people anywhere on the earth because we have the story so clearly defined in Genesis 2.

There have been many books and articles written concerning this  question.  I have chosen to include two scholar’s answers.  I have only selected them for the work that each has done.  The first, Dr. Morris for his scholarly approach and Mr. McDowell because he has answered this question so many times on campuses across the world.

Dr. Henry Miller is the president of the Institute for Creation Research.  He received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota and for twenty-eight years served on faculties of major universities, including thirteen years as chairman of the civil engineering department at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

“We know that before the Flood, people lived long, long lives.  The genetic system and its bloodstream, with so few accumulated mutant genes, together with the primeval absence of disease-producing organisms served to maintain life through great age-spans.

Since, according to the record in Genesis 5, each named patriarch lived many hundreds of years and “begat sons and daughters,” it is reasonable and very conservative to assume that each family had, on the average, at least six children – three sons and three daughters.  If it is further assumed that, on average, these children grew to maturity, married, and began to have children of their own by the time their parents were eighty years old, and that the parents lived through an average of five such “generations,” or four hundred years, then it can easily be calculated that the earth had acquired within its first eight hundred years (presumably approximately the lifetime of Cain, as a minimum) a population of at least one hundred and twenty thousand.  It is probable that the figure was much more than this, since people lived to greater ages.

In order to get this process of multiplication started, of course, at least one of Adam’s sons had to marry one of Adam’s daughters.  Probably, in that first generation, all marriages were brother-sister marriages.  In that time there was no mutant genes in the genetic systems of any of these children, so that no genetic harm could have resulted from close marriages.  Many, many generations later, during the time of Moses, such mutations had accumulated to the point where such unions were genetically dangerous, so that incest was thenceforth prohibited in the Mosaic Law.

Long before Cain died, there was a large population in the earth.  By the time of Noah’s flood, around 1656 years after the Creation by the Ussher chronology, even using the above conservative assumptions, the world population would have been at least seven billion people.” [1]

Another author that has made apologetics (branch of Theology, defense of the Bible) is Josh McDowell.  He has led a one man Herculean effort to work on high school and college campuses of the Word of God.

I have included his answer to “Where did Cain get his wife.”

“One theory that has been put forth to explain the existence of sufficient numbers of people is directly contradictory to Scripture and posits a “pre-Adamic” race dwelling in the neighborhood of the Garden of Eden from which Cain could take a wife.

This is not a tenable solution, however, for the Scriptures clearly teach that Adam was the first man, ”And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.” (1 Corinthians 15:45) and that his wife, Eve, was “the mother of all living” (Genesis 3:20)

Genesis 5:4 instructs that Adam had sons and daughters.  At first, sons and daughters of Adam and Eve had to marry each other to populate the earth.  Cain probably married a sister, or niece or grandniece.

Moreover, the Scriptures nowhere indicate at what points in the life of Cain he murdered his brother, married his wife or built his city.  Even a few hundred years might have passed before all of the events took place, allowing for a sizable population with which to build a city.”[2]

So there you have the scholar’s answers.  My answer is the same.  God’s plan, I believe, was for Adam and Eve to “be fruitful and replenish the earth.”  That was in his plan.  When the population got to a point where it was no longer necessary, God then forbid marriage between a man and the “flesh of his flesh.”[3]

 May God richly bless you on your studies of the Bible.

footnotes

1] The Genesis Record, Henry M. Morris, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids MI, pg 142-144

2]  Answers to Tough Questions, Josh McDowell and Don Stewart, Campus Crusade for Christ, Here’s Life Publishers, inc., San Bernardino, California, pg 98-99

3] Leviticus 18:6-18