God’s Word for You

Genesis 4:25 as a substitute

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Tuesday, October 13, 2026

25 Adam was intimate with his wife again, and she bore a son and named him Seth, for she said, “God has granted me another child in place of Abel, since Cain killed him.”

Here Moses turns away from the line of Cain and shows what was happening among the godly descendants of Adam and Eve. In fact, he goes so far as to tell us what happened to our first parents in the years following that first murder. This will continue in a more formal way in chapter 5, when Moses will walk us through each of the ancient patriarchs, from each father to each son who was directly in line with Noah, and therefore the line of the Savior (Luke 3:37). Here the concern is with what Eve said at this time.

The time when Adam and Eve had Seth was many years after they were driven from the Garden. Some ancient and Medieval commentators speculated that Adam and Eve stopped having any more children for a while, after Abel’s murder, until the birth of this child when they were 130 years old (this number comes from Genesis 5:3). The text does not say that. Leupold: “We are hardly justified in supposing that the author is trying to say that sexual communion was interrupted for a time because of Abel’s death but was now again resumed. The fact is, a son was born.”

If they continued to have children at a conservative pace of one every other year, then by this time they could have had sixty or so children. And we should say that the text does not say that, either.

So whether they went on having many babies (for God had commanded them to be fruitful, to multiply, and to fill the earth), or whether for a time they stopped, they certainly had this son. In some way the Lord let her know that it would be Seth who would carry on the line of the Savior, the gospel promised more than a century before in the Garden along with the curse (Genesis 3:15).

She gives the baby the name Seth, from the Hebrew word Shiyth, “he has placed” or “he has made firm.” The foundation of the promise of the Savior was now secure. Eve does not mince words about the murder of Abel. She and her husband knew what had happened. It was cross, a terrible burden, for her to bear, that one of her dear and beloved children had killed another, and she did not try to protect Cain from God’s punishment and curse. She did not try to excuse Cain’s sin, or to minimize it. Notice that she does not say, “I have another son in the place of Cain,” but “I have another son in the place of Abel, since Cain killed him.” Cain was her firstborn; he had the special right as the first son. But he had given up all of that when he killed his brother. So now his mother says that this new child is “placed” or “made firm” in Abel’s place, and will be the father of the line that will bring forth the promised Savior.

We see something else here. Seth was given to Eve “in place of Abel.” This is the word tachat, “instead of, in exchange for.” Abel had died; Seth was given in his place, to carry out the promise. The giving of Seth is a kind of type or foreshadowing of the giving of the Savior. Christ is our substitute who takes our place (tachat). He removed our guilt, shame, and death and rescued us from the clutches of the devil. In Christ, we are restored forever to fellowship with God as his children and we have the promise of the resurrection to everlasting life. In heaven we will be reunited with our Christian mothers who await us there. They will receive us once again because Christ was given in our place. All of us who put our faith in him are restored and will live with him forever in joy.

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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