Dominance vs Acceptance and Lamekh’s Song

After a soul-replenishing walk the other day, I walked out of the bush onto a path where I saw a little dog ahead. From the dog’s perspective, a strange man was approaching and this was a problem. A few loud barks did not persuade the man to back off  ̶  he continued to approach. This required an escalation: first circling the stranger and barking even more menacingly and then a warning bite! The bite through my clothing didn’t pierce the skin, but the dog had asserted itself!  

Unlike that dog, humans have choices. Situations that at first may feel adversarial can be resolved through conversations that uncover misunderstandings or alternative solutions. I have been working on acceptance of how things are, and letting go of expectations about how others “should” be or behave. We have a choice about how we react to anxiety either by seeking to control others, or by letting go (1), with trust in God and respect for others’ right to choose what they wish to do or give.  

In Genesis, we read about Cain, whose name means “acquisition” (2). When his brother Abel’s offering was favoured by God, while his was rejected (3), Cain failed to “acquire” the approval he craved. His “face fell (4) ”. In his status anxiety, Cain failed to follow God’s guidance to improve himself and manage his drives or impulses (5). Instead, in an outburst of violence, he murdered his brother. The anger he felt was so overwhelming that he thought – in error – that he had no choice in the matter (6) .

Worse than crimes of passion are acts of violence and ways of unethical domination that are not impulsive but premeditated (7). When some people see the ways that intimidating others can allow them to take what they want, they either inflict violence or threaten to do so to get their way (8).

Cain’s descendant Lemekh embraced violence. He had contempt for the “respectable people” of his time, descendants of Adam and Eve’s other son Seth, who shunned the Cainites because of their murderous and condemned ancestor (9). Lemekh tried to revise history, creating myths to recast Cain as a hero. “Our father Cain did not wimpishly relinquish his status as the firstborn son of Adam and Eve. When he was insulted by Abel and God, Cain defended his honour (10)”. In this way, Lemekh thought that Cain had been rehabilitated, and the Cainites had restored their past glory.

Lemekh was wrong. Rather than him changing the past, the past was a strong influence on him and his family. Wicked ways that are deeply embedded in people’s hearts, such as Cain’s embrace of murder, anger and dominance, can be perpetuated in families (11), an example of “visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children… (12)”. Indeed, Tuval Cain, one of Lemekh’s sons, built on his ancestor’s murderous legacy (13) by being the first to create weapons (14).

Tuval Cain’s siblings were all pioneers, one in developing agri-business (15) and the accumulation of wealth (16), another in the arts, the “father” of all musicians (17), and their sister Naama was a talented singer (18). The siblings complemented Lemekh’s repair of the past by creating a glorious future (19).

After the description of Lemekh’s talented family in the Tanach, there is a plot twist. Lemekh tells his wives that he killed a man and a boy (20) in retaliation (21) for some kind of wound and a bruise. Lemekh’s story about these killings is in the form of a song (22), a war song, as Biblical songs tend to be (23). It is a dramatic warning to his wives that he is far tougher than Cain and if they dare defy his wishes, such defiance will be met with violent vengeance and him killing them. This was his way of dominating his wives as if they were slaves, or property, for him to do with as he pleased (24).

      
An alternative interpretation identifies the slain man and boy as Lemekh’s ancestor Cain and his own son Tuval Cain, killed in a series of accidents, rather than acts of vengeance (25). Lemekh’s song is seen as a bitter “last testament of a Cainite seer. (26)” Instead of the pride and joy in his family’s accomplishments, Lemekh sees the symbolism of his killing his ancestor and son as representing the failure of the Cainite approach. “Alas, I have not rehabilitated my ancestor, I killed him! I murdered the youth! And in doing so, I inflicted the deepest wound on myself! We have destroyed the past and the future and gained no present.” Lemekh recognised that he was morally damaged, “bruised and wounded (27) ” by the legacy of anger and murder that he inherited from Cain and that shaped him and his weapons-manufacturing son, Tuval-Cain (28).  Lemekh declared: “Cain-ism must be repudiated!”

Lemekh’s lament is a call for us to reject dominance in favour of humble acceptance of that which we cannot control.  His song is about the ultimate painful cost of coercion and threats that far exceed any short-term benefits.  Inflicting or threatening “punishments” can destroy family ties and friendships (29), often with great harm to the perpetrator. Instead, let us affirm the dignity and rights of all people, with assertiveness, forgiveness, patience, tolerance, curiosity and compassion.   

---

[1]Jeffers, S. (2012), Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway, Revised, Vermilion, London, p. 232-233

[2] Genesis 4:1

[3] Genesis 4:3-5

[4] Genesis 4:5-6

[5] Genesis 4:7

[6] Leiner, J, the son of the Ishbitzer, in Beis Yaakov al Hatora, Bereshit, 70, on Sefaria https://www.sefaria.org/Genesis.4.23?lang=he&with=Beit%20Yaakov%20on%20Torah&lang2=he  

[7] Liebovitz, N, New Studies In Bereshit Genesis, 6, p. 46, I use the term unethical domination to exclude cases where legitimate authority is exercised eg. by the parent of a young child about to cause harm to themselves or others, or a police officer protecting a vulnerable person from someone seeking to harm them.  

[8] Genesis, 6:2, “the sons of the powerful saw the daughters of man, that they were good and they took women from all that they chose”

[9] R Ephrayim, based on a lost midrash, cited in Azulai, C. Y. D. Chidoh, in Torat Hachido, p. 38- 115 

[10] Medan, Y. The Song of Lemekh – The First Song in the Bible, https://etzion.org.il/en/tanakh/torah/sefer-bereishit/parashat-bereishit/bereishit-song-lemekh-%E2%80%93-first-song-bible

[11] Talmud, Berakhot 7a, as interpreted by Medan, Y. following the approach of Ralbag on the Torah, Shemot 20:1:3, and Leiner,

[12] Exodus 34:7

[13] Rashi, on Genesis 4:22

[14] Genesis 4:22

[15] Hirsch, S.R. on Genesis 4:21

[16] Malbim on Genesis 4:21

[17] Genesis 4:21

[18] Me’am Loez

[19] Hirsch, S.R. on Genesis 4:21

[20] Genesis 4:23

[21] Malbim’s commentary to 4:23, C. Y. D. Chidoh, in Torat Hachido, p. 38- 115, Medan, Y.

[22] Hirsch, S.R. on Genesis 4:23

[23] Medan, Y.

[24] Malbim

[25] Midrash Tanchuma

[26] Hirsch

[27] Genesis 4:23

[28] Leiner, Y, 71

[29] Perhaps there is a difference where relationships fail because people cannot bear to be in the presence of someone and continuing to be together will cause distress or emotional harm, and other situations where such differences can likely be tolerated but the effort is not made due to either a sense – perhaps sub-conscious - that the other person deserves to be punished or of righteous indignation.