If Cain was the only person other than Adam and Eve to reside on the planet when he killed Abel where did he find his wife?

There are those who use this question to “prove” that Adam and Eve are not the parents of all mankind.

“Surely you realize that there had to be other humans or humanoids on earth at the time that Cain was born?”

There are even those who want to use this as a way to prove that the serpent was actually the father of Cain – yea! I think they may have watched too many GEICO commercials.

First of all, there is no one alive now that was alive when Cain was born so there probably is no way to “prove” any postulation regarding these very important matters. Secondly, there are no extra Biblical writings to prove them either.

So. how can we determine where Cain found his wife? Why is it important to know where Cain found his wife? The answer to the first question is the Bible, and the answer to the second question is being able to trust the Bible as the only eternally true record of the history of the world.

~ Let’s clear something up right now ~

It takes more faith to believe in evolution than it does in a Creator!

Lets look at the scenario. God creates the heavens and the earth and on the sixth day he creates [makes] mankind out of the dust of the ground. In Chapter four of Genesis we read ~

“Now the man [Adam] had [sexual] relations with his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, “I have gotten a man-child with the help of the LORD” [vs 1].

What does the word ‘now’ indicate? Does the word ‘now’ indicate a chronological time frame in the context of the Fall [Genesis 3]? Or does the word ‘now’ simply indicate a past event which may have happened before the Fall?

Another word to consider is the word “had”. The word ‘had’ obviously denotes a past event. Does ‘had’ speak of a past event from the time Genesis was written or does it speak of a past event from the current events at the time they were happening?

I will give you my opinion and my belief. First, to me this verse proves Adam, not the serpent was Cain’s father. Second, because I believe the Bible to be God’s inerrant record of His plan for mankind I believe that there were no other humans or humanoids on the planet before Adam and Eve.

If this is true, and I believe it is, then I take the position that the words ‘now’ and ‘had’ speak of a time before the Fall.

Another interesting thing to consider is the birth of Abel. “Again, she gave birth to his [Cain’s] brother Abel” [4:2a]. There is no reference to Adam and Eve having sex on a separate occasion where Abel was conceived. This tells me that Cain and Abel were twins. The word ‘again’ denotes a separate birth during the same birth event.

Now, we know that God blessed Adam [mankind] with fertility [“be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth”]. We do not know when they started but I believe it is safe to assume that it was immediately. We do not know how old they were when they were given life or how old they were when they sinned.

After Cain killed Abel we read,

“When Adam had lived one hundred and thirty years, he became the father of a son in his own likeness, according to his image, and named him Seth” [5:3].

Let’s assume Adam and Eve began their life at the age of 30. Let’s assume they began having children immediately and let’s assume they had children every 2 years. If Cain and Abel were twins, and I believe they were, then let’s assume every pregnancy resulted in twins being born. Now, let’s assume that the Fall occurred when Adam and Eve were 100 years old. That is 35 pregnancies with twins being born resulting in an additional 70 people [sons and daughters [5:4]] being born to Adam and Even, prior to the Fall. I used this math because 70 is the number of people who went into Egypt so it is just an arbitrary number.

Now, because there was no sin and people matured very quickly let’s assume their children started marrying and having children around the age of 15 [the possible age of Mary when she gave birth to Jesus]. I am not a mathematician but I can imagine that if this scenario is close to being accurate then there may have been A LOT of people on the planet when Cain got married.

There are other possibilities we could consider, such as Eve was pregnant every 12 months not every 24 months. We know this is possible because today there is a reality show on TLC called 19 KID’S AND COUNTING. This show is about the Duggar family who live in Arkansas. The husband and wife team [the parents of these 19 human beings] are in their mid 40’s. They were married in July 1984. Their oldest child, son Josh is 23 and he and his wife Anna have 2 children.

Josh is 23 which means Jim and Michelle Duggar have had 19 children in 23 years. Oh by the way, Michelle suffered a miscarriage so they could have 20 children in 23 years.

You get the point I hope!

Before the Fall of man in the Garden of Eden there was no pain in childbirth. Pain in childbirth has been reduced to physical pain during the gestation, labor and delivery of the child. I believe it involves so much more than that to include but may not be limited to pain in human relationships [See 1 Chronicles 4:9,10 NKJV].

Before there was pain [conflict] in human relationships and having babies and having a family was as much fun as the sexual encounter that brought them forth it is quite conceivable that the first humans were marrying and having babies at the earliest possible age.

I believe it is quite possible for there to have been at the least hundreds of thousands if not millions of people alive at the time of the Fall. Some have said that there were 2 – 10 billion people alive when the Flood happened. The Flood is said to have occurred 1600+ years after Creation.

In the Bible fish are used as an analogy for people and sea is used as a type of the masses of humanity.

Where did Cain find his wife?

I believe there were a lot of fish in the sea [pun intended]!

For HIS Glory!

Dr. Kevin M. Drury
A Hisstorymaker