Isaiah prophesies in order to make people understand
not to live only earthly, not to live in a consumerist way
, to live
godly and vigorously. The description is in images (iconic), as is often
the case with prophets.
God will be glorified in righteousness
has many meanings, but among
others they specifically mean that the madness of a purely consumerist
life
will be obvious to people with an unclouded mind and an open
heart.
Today’s reading is about Cain’s sin of fratricide and God’s punishment.
God gave human a conscience, listening to which human can do good. But human’s conscience was not enough in the general case, so the Lord revealed many more of His gifts, in particular Revelation. Through them and the conscience, a person can fulfill God’s will, even though he / she has a sin-damaged nature after the Fall.
How could Cain stoop to such a low as fratricide? He did not listen to God or his conscience. In his words, we can see real audacity both before the fall, treachery in sin, and audacity and impenitence even after sin and God’s judgment.
Why does God not punish Cain with death? After all, even Cain’s conscience tells him, that his sin is very significant. First of all, because of God’s mercy. Even in sin, human remains God’s creation.
Furthermore, God does not want to multiply
death.
Third, Cain partially realized his sin, although he did not show a desire to be truly forgiven. Here we are faced with the fact that people gradually discovered the possibility of repentance, and the Lord patiently and constantly led them to it. Awareness of sin enables a person to accept its consequences at least to some (albeit very insufficient) extent.
Repent, for the Kingdom of God is near!
.
Another reason is that God providentially knew that the descendants
of Cain would do a lot in the field of social development (although it
is quite possible that they all died later in the waters of the flood),
that is, God wants to manifest, show a certain potential (in the case of
Cain, it was later realized in reality, which will be read tomorrow)
significance
even of seemingly completely dead and missing
people.
If you imagine that Cain would not have this meaning, then even then he would be similar to the evil spirits, who, as we know, were good angels before the fall and are God’s creations. God did not destroy them, first of all out of respect for the dignity which, in the case of human beings, is part of God’s image in them.
Here and further we encounter the question of the existence of other people, besides those mentioned by name in the first chapters of the book of Genesis.
This is a difficult and unclear question (about the existence and
certain necessity of which I wrote when I started commenting on the Old
Testament, see:
27022023.html
)
I will not dwell in detail now (oh, God grant me to consider it in more detail soon).
Chapter V is devoted to the topic of fidelity in marriage (and in general, more generally, fidelity in relationships between men and women, boys and girls). It is based on the exposure of a promiscuous woman (since the book was written by Solomon, a man, for his son, the choice of gender is quite understandable, but a man can be equally promiscuous, that is, the thoughts are actually generalized, so forgive, women and girls, please).
The main argument here is the real possibility that she will give
your work to strangers and merciless
– a very meaningful metaphor that
has both direct and indirect meanings.
Direct – such a woman can really have relationships with many men, and to form a stable union with her, a strong lasting relationship in its richness and depth, with all its advantages and achievements, will be difficult, mainly the relationship will lack trust.
And the indirect meaning is that under merciless
can be sly evil
spirits, demons. That is, it is about the possibility of becoming
possessed and obsessed by sin, and in some cases by demons themselves.
Obsession is when a person does not belong
to himself, does not
control his / her actions, but is completely guided by sinful desires,
passions and addictions.
In these verses, Solomon does not mention God’s judgment regarding
unfaithfulness, impurity, etc., but speaks only of earthly
things,
even though they are directly related to spirituality.
There are good works about fidelity and faithfullness at the
following links:
https://oleksandr-zhabenko.github.io/en/Adultery-briefly.html
(short version)
https://oleksandr-zhabenko.github.io/uk/%D0%9F%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B5%D0%BB%D1%8E%D0%B1-%D0%BF%D0%
Glory be to Thee, our God, glory be to Thee!