THE DELUGE OF NOAH 133 



compound Jahveh-Elohim, but immediately after the 

 fall Eve is represented as attributing to, or identifying 

 with, Jahveh alone the birth of her eldest son ' I 

 have produced a man, the Jahveh,' and which may 

 mean that she supposed Cain to be the promised 

 manifestation of God as the Redeemer. Accordingly 

 Cain and Abel are represented as offering sacrifice to 

 Jahveh, and yet it is said in a verse which must be a 

 part of the same document, that it was not till the 

 time of Enos, a grandson of Adam, that men began 

 to invoke the name of Jahveh. It would seem also 

 that this invocation of Jahveh was peculiar to the 

 Sethites, and that the Cainites were still worshippers 

 of Elohim, the God of nature and creation, a fact 

 which perhaps has relation to the so-called physical 

 religion of some ancient peoples. Hence their title 

 of Beni ha Elohim. Thus the division between the 

 Cainite and Sethite races early became accentuated 

 by a sectarian distinction as well. We may imagine 

 that the Cainites, worshipping God as Creator, and 

 ignoring that doctrine of a Redeemer which seemed 

 confined to the rival race of Seth, were the deists of 

 their time, and held a position which might, accord- 

 ing to culture and circumstances, degenerate into a 

 polytheistic nature-worship, or harden into an absolute 

 materialism. On the other hand, the Sethites, recog- 

 nised by the author of Genesis as the orthodox de- 

 scendants of Adam, and invoking Jahveh, held to the 

 promise of a coming Saviour, and to a deliverance from 

 the effects of the Fall to be achieved by His means. 



