God’s Word for You

Genesis 4:17-18 Cain’s wife, son, and city

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Friday, October 9, 2026

17 Cain was intimate with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Cain was building a city, and he named the city after his son, Enoch. 18 To Enoch was born Irad, and Irad fathered Mehujael, and Mehujael fathered Methushael, and Methushael fathered Lamech.

There is no doubt that Cain took one of his sisters as his wife. As we noted before, this meant that Adam and Eve did not lose one child when Cain killed Abel, but three. For Abel died, Cain was driven into wandering exile, and he took with him one of their daughters; his sister.

This continues to shock readers today. Most people are horrified the first time that they encounter this fact, but the truth of course is that the laws forbidding marriage to close relations did not come until the giving of the Law at Mount Sinai (Leviticus 20). As we will see, Abraham’s wife Sarah was his half-sister; they shared the same father, but not the same mother (Genesis 20:12). But after some thought and meditation, the reader will realize that at this early stage, there was no other choice for a mate. Adam and Eve were the parents of all.

There are ancient legends among the Rabbis that Cain’s wife was actually his twin sister, and they name her Calmana. But this is just a fiction. In teaching my students I often make up a name just to give them something to think about, but I always tell them that the name (Becky, Dierdre, Karen, or what have you) is not her real name.

Enoch may have been their first son, or perhaps simply the son they had while Cain was trying to build a city; this detail isn’t specified. What Moses is careful to say, however, is that Cain “was building” a city, with a participle (boneh). The participle is not a finite verb; it does not indicate a finished or completed act. To do that, we might expect to see a phrase like the one in Joshua 19:50, where Joshua “built (or built up) the town.” Here, we could say that Cain “was starting to build a city” or even that he “was trying to build a city.” But there is no evidence in the text that he finished it. God had cursed him to be a vagabond and a wanderer, and even though he tried to circumvent the curse by making a city for himself, we have no evidence that he was successful.

The word for city here may tell its own story. It is ‘ir ( עִיר ), which often means a fortress or walled city (Leviticus 25:29; 2 Samuel 5:9). Now, Cain would not have used bricks or stone blocks for this protection, but he might have constructed a high fence or palisade. Was he building a wall or fence? If so, why? One reason might be that he did not want his animals to be carried off by predators, or that he didn’t want his animals (if he had any) to escape on their own while he and his sons slept. But it is also possible that he put up some kind of defensive barrier out of fear—fear, perhaps, of predators, or fear of his distant family, whom he had turned away from. Such men begin to have strange ideas in their heads, and embark on a path toward destruction that simple repentance would so gently bring to a happy end.

In Martin Luther’s time, the very man who presented Luther with his doctorate, Andreas Karlstadt, left the path of the Reformation and the Lutheran church with his own ideas that led to his downfall. Luther wrote:
“Through us, Christ has long resisted Karlstadt; yet that man will not stop, but continues to speed his own destruction. I am afraid that, by compelling us even to pray against him, he will finally earn the permission to do the damage necessary for his perdition. May Christ prevent this by his grace, Amen. An untamed desire for glory and fame is consuming this man. Please pray for him, too!”

May God spare his true church from such men who rush ahead on their own and then turn on God’s good people in rage and other dark emotions. Often in such cases the wife of the rebel is the one who suffers the most. Karlstadt’s wife suffered greatly and with true terror after her husband died, although Luther welcomed her when she visited Wittenberg a few months later.

Consider Cain’s wife. If they married before the murder, then she is to be commended for joining her husband in his exile. Was she afraid for her life, too? Did she beg her father to let her remain at home and effectively make the first divorce? But she went, in the end. Or, if they married after the murder, how greatly she loved her parents to obey them in such a way, to have exile as her dowry, to carry her husband’s shame as her own paraphernalia, and to raise their children without the help of her mother Eve.

But God blessed this woman, and through her, Cain too, with many descendants. And perhaps through her faith and gentle instruction, some of their children came to faith and were saved as well. Paul writes, “How do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband?” (1 Corinthians 7:16). And her life of faith would not be lost on all of their children. For while the proverb says “Keep your father’s commands,” it also says, “do not forsake your mother’s teaching” (Proverbs 6:20). Commands are excellent rules to live by, but the teaching of the gospel is a light for one’s path (Psalm 119:105). When a woman struggles in her marriage or her family with the pain of unbelief or heresy among people she loves, she will be lifted up by the gospel. She can look to the cross of Christ and the promise of the forgiveness of sins, and she will find strength and hope. “You are a shield around me, O LORD; you bestow glory on me and lift up my head” (Psalm 3:3).

Cain’s account comes to a close here. Their descendants are listed, down to their great-great-great grandson, Lamech. It is about him that we will hear next.

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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