Abel

A dog stands over a body in an open field and will not let the birds come down. It is a sheepdog, and until that morning its work was the flock. Now it keeps the wild animals and the birds of the air away from its master while two people sit in the grass nearby, weeping, with no idea what to do next. Nobody has ever buried anyone. Nobody has ever needed to.

That is how the rabbinic collection Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer pictures the aftermath of the first death in the world. The dead man is Abel, the second son of Adam and Eve, and the story that put him there is one of the shortest in the Bible. Genesis 4 gives him a handful of verses. His older brother Cain works the soil; Abel keeps sheep. Each brings God an offering: Cain some fruit of the ground, Abel the choicest of the firstborn of his flock. God looks with favour on Abel and his gift and not on Cain’s. Cain’s face falls. God warns him that sin is crouching at the door and that he can master it. Then Cain speaks to his brother, the brothers are in the field, and Cain kills him.

In Genesis, Abel never says a word.

The Hebrew text even swallows what Cain said. The verse breaks off after “Cain said to his brother Abel”, and the ancient translations fill the gap with an invitation: let us go out into the field. What follows is the first question God asks a murderer, “Where is your brother Abel?”, and the first shrug in literature, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” The answer comes from the ground. Abel’s blood is crying out from the soil, which opened its mouth to drink it, and Cain is cursed to wander. Later in the chapter Eve bears Seth, naming him as a son given in place of Abel.

The silence was too much for the rabbis, and they filled it. The midrash Genesis Rabbah asks what the brothers were quarrelling about and offers three answers side by side. They had divided the world, one taking the land and the other everything movable, until one said the ground you stand on is mine and the other said the clothes you wear are mine. Or they both wanted the Temple built on their own share. Or a twin sister had been born with Abel, and each brother claimed her, Cain because he was the firstborn and Abel because she was born with him. Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer puts the offering on the eve of Passover, with Cain bringing leftover roasted grain and flax seed and Abel bringing unshorn firstling lambs. God, the text adds, would never let the two gifts mix again, which is why wool and linen may not be woven together.

The same sources refuse to make Abel weak. Rabbi Yohanan says Abel was the stronger brother and had Cain pinned beneath him, until Cain asked what Abel would tell their father if he killed the only other man in the world. Abel was filled with pity and let him up. Cain rose and killed him. The rabbis drew a sour little proverb from it: do no favours for a wicked man and no harm will reach you. On the weapon they disagree, a stick or a stone, and Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer says Cain drove the stone into Abel’s forehead. Cain then hid the body in the field, not yet understanding that nothing is hidden from God.

The burial is a scene of its own. In Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer, Adam and Eve sit mourning beside the body, unaccustomed to burial, until a raven arrives with a dead companion, scratches a hollow in the earth and buries it in front of them. Adam copies the bird and lays his son in the ground, and ravens are rewarded ever after. Genesis Rabbah says instead that the birds of the air and the clean animals buried him. The Qur’an tells the same moment from the murderer’s side. In Sura 5 the two sons of Adam are never named, but when one threatens to kill the other, the victim answers that God accepts only from the righteous and that he will not raise his hand in return. After the killing God sends a crow scratching at the ground to show the killer how to hide his brother’s body, and the killer cries out that he could not even manage what a crow could. The Muslim historians called the brothers Qabil and Habil and told of twin sisters, a fairer one born in paradise and a plainer one born outside it, and of fire falling from heaven to consume only Abel’s offering. The fire from heaven belongs to Christian commentators as well, and a late midrash knows it too.

Abel’s power is the power of blood that will not stay quiet. The Mishnah notices that God says “bloods” in the plural and reads it as Abel’s blood together with the blood of all the descendants who would never be born, and so warns witnesses in capital trials that a false word destroys a whole world. The Qur’an draws the same lesson immediately after the crow: whoever kills a soul, it is as if he had slain mankind entirely. In 1 Enoch, Abel’s spirit is the leading voice among the martyred souls in Sheol, still calling on God for vengeance until Cain’s line is wiped from the earth. Other traditions let the earth refuse his blood, or leave the killing ground bare of plants forever.

The Christian tradition kept him as a pattern. The Gospel of Matthew makes “righteous Abel” the first name in a line of innocent blood running down to the murder of Zechariah, and the Epistle to the Hebrews counts his offering as an act of faith and says that, being dead, he still speaks. The Syriac Cave of Treasures and the Ethiopic Book of Adam and Eve say his body was laid in a cave where the family prayed, and that Seth and his descendants adjured their children, by the blood of Abel the Just, not to mingle with the line of the unrighteous.

His strangest afterlife is in the Testament of Abraham. There Abraham, touring the world beyond, sees a man of fearful majesty on a throne, judging every soul, with Enoch at his side writing down each person’s sins and righteous deeds. This is Abel. God has given him the task so that humans are judged by a human, a son of the first man, until a later, final judgement.

What he cannot do is save himself. Every telling hands the story to other people: his brother’s jealousy, his parents’ grief, a dog, a raven, a crow, a court warning its witnesses. Even his name is uncertain, and one old suggestion links it to an Assyrian word for son. In Genesis the man at the centre of the first murder has no speech, no children, and no grave until a bird shows his father how to dig one.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who was Abel in the Bible?

Abel was the second son of Adam and Eve and the younger brother of Cain. He was a shepherd, and when both brothers brought offerings, God favoured Abel’s gift of the choicest firstborn of his flock. Cain killed him in a field, making Abel the victim of the first murder in Genesis 4.

Why did Cain kill Abel?

Genesis says only that God accepted Abel’s offering and not Cain’s, and that Cain was angry. The rabbinic midrash Genesis Rabbah gives three possible quarrels: over dividing the world, over where the Temple would stand, or over a twin sister born with Abel. Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer combines jealousy over the offering with Cain’s desire for Abel’s beautiful twin sister.

How was Abel buried?

In Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer, Adam and Eve did not know how to bury the dead until a raven buried a dead companion in front of them, and Adam did the same for Abel. Abel’s sheepdog guarded the body from animals and birds until then. In the Qur’an, God sends a crow to show the killer how to hide his brother’s body.

Is Abel in the Qur’an?

Yes, though not by name. Sura 5 tells the story of Adam’s two sons, one of whom refuses to raise his hand against his brother and is killed. Muslim historians later called him Habil and his brother Qabil.

What does Abel do in the Testament of Abraham?

In the Testament of Abraham, Abel sits on a throne in the world beyond and judges every human soul, with Enoch beside him recording each person’s sins and righteous deeds. The text explains that God wanted humans to be judged by a human, the son of the first man, until a final judgement comes later.

Related Entries

Adam, Eve, Samael, Sheol, Metatron, Lilith, Noah, Jesus, Romulus, Remus, Set, Osiris