John Gill Commentary Genesis 4:10

John Gill Commentary

Genesis 4:10

1697–1771
Reformed Baptist
John Gill
John Gill

John Gill Commentary

Genesis 4:10

1697–1771
Reformed Baptist
SCRIPTURE

"And he said, What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother`s blood crieth unto me from the ground." — Genesis 4:10 (ASV)

And he said
Not Cain, the last speaker, but the Lord God, what have you done?
what an heinous crime have you committed! how aggravated is it! I know what you have done; you have slain your brother, your own, your only brother, a holy, righteous, and good man, who never gave you any offence, or any just occasion of shedding his innocent blood: this he said as knowing what he had done, and to impress your mind with a sense of the evil, and to bring him to a confession of it, before the sentence was passed, that it might appear to all to be just, and of which there was full proof and evidence, as follows:

the voice of your brother's blood cries unto me from the ground;
where it was split, and in which it was covered and hid, and where perhaps Cain had buried his body, that it might not be seen, and the murder not discovered; but God saw what was done, and the voice of innocent blood came into his ears, and cried for vengeance at your hands: it is in the original, "the voice of your brother's bloods" F19, in the plural; which the Jews generally understood of the posterity that would have descended from Abel, had he not been murdered: the Targum of Onkelos is, ``the voice of the blood of the seeds or generations that should come from your brother;'' see (2 Kings 9:26) or it may respect the blood of the seed of the woman, of all the righteous ones that should be slain in like manner. The Jerusalem Targum is, ``the voice of the bloods of the multitude of the righteous that shall spring from Abel your brother,'' or succeed him; see (Matthew 23:35) . Jarchi thinks it has reference to the many wounds which Cain gave him, from whence blood sprung; and every wound and every drop of blood, as it were, cried for vengeance on the murderer.


FOOTNOTES:

  • F19: (ymd lwq) "vox Sanguinum", Pagninus, Montanus