Avoiding Cain’s Reasoning
Bereshit, 5784
The first murderer felt like he had no choice. Cain had been embarrassed: his brother’s sacrifice was accepted and his was not. But was he was more than embarrassed: וַיִּפְּלוּ פָּנָיו, he fell on his face. The Or HaChayim explains that Cain felt inferior than his brother, angry at his brother, that his brother was the reason that his own sacrifice was not accepted. He had to take action. He had to make things right. After the terrible deed is done, and God confronts Cain with his guilt, he protests to God גָּדוֹל עֲונִי מִנְּשֹׂא. “My avon is too great to bear.”
עֲונִי can mean “my sin” or “my punishment.” The peshat, or literary meaning, of the verse is as Ibn Ezra describes: that upon hearing that he must wander the earth for the rest of his days, Cain cries out “My punishment is too great to bear!” But there is another reading of עֲונִי, preferred by the rabbis of Bereshit Rabbah, where the word means “my sin”. In this instance, the Midrash imagines Cain complaining to God “You bear the upper and lower worlds, but my sin is too great to bear?” Traditionally, this interpretation is taken as a confession of guilt, with Cain admitting wrongdoing and asking God for mercy. But it can also be read as defiance. “You, God, think that my sin is too much? You judge me? When my hand was forced, my sacrifice rejected, I took steps to remove the obstacle in my path keeping me from you. I killed my brother because of my sacrifices to you. And you think that my sin is too great to bear?” Cain then continues, and accuses God of setting up the same sin: וְהָיָה כל־מֹצְאִי יַהַרְגֵנִי “Anyone who meets me now [having been banished by your command] may kill me!”
But God responds that anyone who kills Cain will be punished severely. The famous mark of Cain is placed on him not as punishment but as protection. God intends to stop the cycle of violence. Cain does not have to die as Abel did. God chooses to end the death. As God told Cain personally
חַטָּאת רֹבֵץ וְאֵלֶיךָ תְּשׁוּקָתוֹ וְאַתָּה תִּמְשׁל־בּוֹ
Sin crouches at the door/Its urge is toward you/But you can master it
We always have a choice in how we respond, even to the worst acts. Claiming that we do not, that we were forced to murder, maim, violate, mutilate, is the language of the first murderer.
I have seen, since the heinous terrible attacks that began on Shemini Atzeret that plunged Israel into this latest war, a distressing amount of academics, pundits, political advocacy groups, and everyday people claiming that Hamas’ actions were entirely the fault of Israel. They had no choice, they tell us. We cannot tell the oppressed how to fight back. Israel forced their hand. Let us entertain the notion, even just for the sake of argument, that every complaint these organizations have against Israel is true. Let us not even quibble over the truth of those complaints. Let us even admit that there is a grain of truth in them—truth that the Israeli government has oppressed Palestinians, and has not seriously attempted to grant them a degree of national sovereignty like Jews have in the Holy Land. But for the sake of argument, let us take Israel as its worst image. Even in that, there is no justification for the targeted killing of innocent civilians, babies, and Holocaust survivors. Israel did not force Hamas to kill those people. They chose. They made that decision themselves, and carried it out themselves. To say that Hamas’ hand was forced is to use the language of Cain. “Is my sin too much to bear? In the name of resistance, is it not appropriate?”
We should not, for one second, give these claims any serious consideration. They are made in anger and shame and hate. They are not justified. They lead only to death and violence.
In the aftermath of these acts of terror, and these disgusting attempts to justify them, I have been alarmed to see something similar happening on the other side, on the pro-Israel side. I have seen politicians, friends, and family calling for all of Gaza to be levelled as a punishment for the terror attacks. I have seen people referring to Palestinians as “vicious beasts.” Not Hamas, but all Palestinians. I have seen people saying that Israel must kill as many Palestinians as possible, if it means eradicating Hamas. And I have seen all these people justifying it under the claim “We have no choice. Hamas has forced our hand.”
This is the rationale of Cain. This is the language of our enemies. It must not become our language. Yes, our friends and family are in danger. Yes, Israel is at war. I am not naïve. I know that people die during war. But we must not revel in war, and we must not encourage wanton death and destruction. All Palestinians are not members of Hamas. All Muslims are not members of Hamas. All Arabs are not members of Hamas. The vast majority of all of these groups have nothing to do with Hamas. There are innocent people and children right now in Gaza, multitudes of them, suffering under the rule of Hamas, and our attitude should be that of sympathy and compassion, not of cruel anger and vengeance. We should hope, and call on Israel, to do everything in its power to spare those innocents, not call for them to be wiped out, and claim that our hands were forced because of Hamas. Those calls for vengeance do not become us. They are our worst instincts. They are the legacy of the first murderer.
Here in America, it may feel that we are powerless. Powerless to help our friends and loved ones in Israel, powerless to do anything to stop the destruction. There are so many things we do not have control over. But we do have control over how we speak. In the words we use to describe the horrors of the ongoing war. In how we refer to Palestinians. I hope that when we speak, we will talk of peace, of quick and decisive victory, of no more innocent Israeli or Palestinian lives lost. I pray that we will resist the temptation to revel in destruction, to wipe our hands clean of responsibility, to say “they had it coming.” We can, we must, maintain our humanity even in these darkest moments. We must forge a way forward with love, not hate. We must not divert responsibility, but claim it ourselves.
And I know that it is hard, especially now. I know that it easy to sort ourselves into groups, to rally ourselves against our enemies, to justify everything that our group is going to do. I feel that temptation too. I felt it strongly when I first heard the news coming out of Israel last Saturday morning, and I still feel it. But we must resist it. We must rise above it. We must be better than our murderous ancestor.
חַטָּאת רֹבֵץ וְאֵלֶיךָ תְּשׁוּקָתוֹ וְאַתָּה תִּמְשׁל־בּוֹ
Sin crouches at the door/Its urge is toward you/But you can master it
God does not lie. Cain could have mastered his sin, been all the greater for it. His anger was understandable, his frustration relatable. It did not have to end in death.
Too many people in this world have already chosen Cain’s philosophy. Let us reject it, master our sin, and join together in our shared humanity.
