What Broken Souls Teach Us

There's always a choice

If you were starting a book, a document that was meant to serve as a great instruction for your people, with what would you begin? Moments of elation and uplift? A set of clear rules and guidelines with which to build your life? Or, a messy narrative involving a convoluted creation narrative, interspecies foibles, and inter/intrapersonal strife that almost screws the whole thing up?

In case you haven’t been paying attention, it’s the latter that kicks off the beginning of the Torah once more. Although the setting is idyllic in the Garden of Eden, the stories that take place there result in humanity’s banishment. Adam and Even struggle with the enticement of the duplicitous serpent. Then, their progeny, the next generation offer us a cautionary tale on how we might relate to one another. As painful as it is to reread these stories, it’s the latter one of Cain and Abel that I think is immensely important.

In a span of 6 verses in chapter 4 of Genesis, we read:

In the course of time, Cain brought an offering to יהוה from the fruit of the soil;

and Abel, for his part, brought the choicest of the firstlings of his flock. יהוה paid heed to Abel and his offering,

but to Cain and his offering [God] paid no heed. Cain was much distressed and his face fell.

And יהוה said to Cain,
“Why are you distressed,
And why is your face fallen?

Surely, if you do right,
There is uplift.
But if you do not do right
Sin couches at the door;
Its urge is toward you,
Yet you can be its master.”

Cain said to his brother Abel … and when they were in the field, Cain set upon his brother Abel and killed him.

There is a lot there. Why did Cain decide to bring sacrifices in the first place? Why did they offer two different sacrifices? What did Cain even say to his brother before his sudden violent act?

I would like to focus on Cain and Abel’s reaction to God’s choice and God’s words back to Cain. The Torah seems to imply that Cain had two reactions: he is distressed and his face falls. Interestingly, we don’t get an explicit reaction from his brother Abel, but more on that in a moment. Finally, we hear God ask Cain why he responds like that and offer what appears to be a piece of advice that he does not take.

First, the reaction of Cain and Abel. One piece from Rav J.B. Solovetchik¹ offers the following:

He was distressed that his offering wasn’t accepted. Distress comes from a place of elevation as in his own eyes, he offered something pure and acceptable. After it wasn’t, his face fell, the opposite of haughtiness as it comes from a place of shame, an awareness of a lacking, and despair. This is why God’s response to Cain is ‘why are you distressed and why did your face fall?’ You don’t have to do both of those things! Your hope is still in your hands to better your situation! But if you wallow and remain in despair at things not going your way, your unbridled anger will be your downfall.

Distinguishing between those two emotions, Rav Soloveitchik insightfully highlights two relatable human experiences. When we feel an authentic sense of accomplishment over something and have it rejected, we feel dejection. That is normal and helpful. When faced with that dejection, we might get angry. That is normal and helpful. When we let that anger fester, it turns into something self destructive, and that is not helpful.

I can’t tell you how often I fight this battle within myself and engage in similar conversations with others. Our lives are constantly filled with rejection, sometimes for perfectly legitimate reasons. To be human is to put yourself out there. This is an act of vulnerability and bravery because it doesn’t always work out.

Taking Rav Soloveitchik’s reminder here, ‘your hope is still in your hands.’ From the earliest parts of our narrative, we are reminded of the antidote to nihilism in the world’s creation. We always have power, maybe not omnipotence but enough power to salvage something. We don’t need to simply accept that things have soured to the point where all that’s left is violent rage. That turns us into the noxious class of people who troll our world hoping to bring others down into their hate-filled worldviews.

Another antidote to the human default to negativity is also embedded in this story, albeit in a more hidden fashion. When Cain’s response is delineated in the Torah, the English tells us ‘his face fell,’ but the Hebrew is slightly different:

וַֽיִּפְּל֖וּ פָּנָֽיו-vayiplu pah’nahv

Classically, in Hebrew, the word for face is plural-panim. If the text had wanted to say their faces fell, it would’ve said vayiplu pene’hem, but one commentator wants to read that in here. The Be’er Mayim Chayim, Reb Chaim of Chernovotiz, offers this very chasidic² reread:

God forbid Abel celebrated at the downfall of his dear brother for not having his sacrifice accepted. On the contrary, he too was distressed for he felt deep sadness at seeing the pain and shame of his brother. This is why it says ‘their faces fell.’ Although Cain’s face ‘fell’ more, the pain was shared by both of them.

Again, this is not a true grammatical read of this moment but I find the emotional resonance insightful. We don’t hear much from Abel in his brief moments in the Torah. He’s a quiet shepherd who offers his most valuable products to God only to be met with an inglorious act of fratricide. But here, Rav Chaim offers him a lasting legacy. When faced with a seething brother who seems hellbent on causing him harm, he finds empathy.

What might it look like to walk through the world with this view?

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We are all faced with what the kids today call ‘opps.’ These are the types of people who are trying to bring you down, who celebrate your mistakes, and try to find fault in your elevations. Here, Abel tries to find a path of connection with his ‘opp’s’ shame. Taken together, I think these two pieces speak powerfully to a larger cultural moment.

We live in a world of rage-bating, where little seeds of anger are planted within us through all that we consume, primarily in the digital sphere. Companies write their algorithms to reward rage inducing content. Lately, I have become more inspired by friends and family who have cut or diminished their link to social media as a way of responding to this.

As always, I think our faith tradition (and probably others!) offers timeless wisdom. Because after all, this problem is ancient. We’re hardwired to feel this rage because it releases dopamine which activates our brain’s reward system. But as we learned from our earliest texts, we have built in reminders on how to allay this calcification.

This is why the Torah starts as it does, not with a polyannish view of the human experience but of the authentically messy and anxiety ridden one that has a built in path out of it. Take note of your anger. Remind yourself that you’re not stuck in it forever. Nudge yourself, ever so lovingly, to feel more empathy than antipathy. We don’t always have to be Cain. Instead, extend Abel’s legacy through your own.

Shabbat Shalom and Happy Weekend!

1. Beit Ha’Levi 4:5

2. In the sense that he’s clearly playing with language in a way that biblical philologists might roll their eyes at but to the modern reader, it reads as penetrating.