And Adah bore Jabal he was the father of those who dwell in tents, and [breed] cattle.
Jabal, son of Lamech, stands at the head of everyone who lives in tents and keeps livestock. He belongs to the family of Cain. So why does Scripture record what such a family did for a living?
Readers often skip these names as filler. One writer finds the point of the record in what the names mean:
Sometimes people say, what is the use of recording all these names? Why are Jabal, Jubal, and Tubal-cain mentioned? The reason is that God wants to give us the story of Cain's "way" and Cain's "world." The meaning of Jabal is "moving." He was a true son of Cain, always on the move — always wanting something new. That is the spirit of the world.
Keeping animals was not new — Abel had already been a shepherd. What Jabal introduced was a change of scale and motive:
"Jabal, the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock" — he was the one who brought the commercial spirit into the life of herding flocks. He made a regular business of what before seems to have been more a supply for individual and family needs. He is the typical commercial man, the man of business.
A tent can mean a man owns nothing and is passing through. Here it means the reverse:
Jabal, the son of Lamech, "was the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock." This was not the mark of a pilgrim path. It showed men settling down to a life of prosperity without God.
The same tents can carry the opposite message:
They lived in tents, showing plainly that they were not taking up any settled place in the earth. They surrendered their rights in the world.
Jabal is the first of three brothers. Together they map an entire society:
Jabal was the man who started commerce. Jubal did not care for making money. His name — "playing" — described his character. Jubal said: Jabal, you may get money if you like, but I am going in for pleasure. So Jabal went in for money and Jubal for music. Tubal-cain worked in bronze and iron — in other words, science and art. Take out of the world the man of commerce, the man of pleasure, and the man of science, and you will find the world empty — cleaned out. Money, music, and science formed Cain's world at the start, and by them Satan holds the world in his hand now more than ever.
Nothing in the verse is condemned as wrong in itself. The problem lies elsewhere:
Notice further the capacity man has for making himself happy while estranged from God. Among the family of Cain we find the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock (v. 20). We also find the father of those who play the lyre and pipe (v. 21), and the forger of all instruments of bronze and iron (v. 22). Now there is nothing wrong in working bronze and iron, and there is no harm in sweet sounds — we read in the book of Revelation of harpers in heaven. But what Cain was doing was this: he was making the world pleasant without God.
The order matters. City life came first, and the tent life of verse 20 came after it. That is the reverse of how we picture progress:
The holy wisdom of God took care to inform His people of the true origin of city life, and of nomad life as well — nomad life coming after city life, not before. He showed them where music came from, and its practice on stringed and wind instruments, and the working of copper and iron, and polygamy, and self-absorbed poetry, the first recorded song of man. It is a picture of man's skill and energy, civilisation, letters, and luxury. Scripture shows them to be the inventions of men far from God, who tried in vain to make the earth of their exile a paradise of their own.
If commerce and craft trace back to this family, should a believer abandon them? One writer answers no:
The ordinary rule of Scripture is that a man should stay in the calling he was called in, and stay there with God. The blessed Lord was a carpenter until He was called to His fuller service, and Paul was a tentmaker who at times supplied his own needs. Christianity does not change the order of the world, even where sin has given rise to it. The world is an immense system built up by Satan around fallen man to keep him unaware of his ruin (Gen. 4:20-22). The Lord does not pray that we should be taken out of it, but kept from the evil.
- Named — Jabal's trade is on record because Scripture is telling the story of Cain's way and Cain's world. His name means "moving."
- Settled — his tents mark men settling down to prosperity without God. The same tents elsewhere mark men who give up their rights in the world.
- Threefold — Jabal's commerce, Jubal's music, and Tubal-cain's metalwork frame the whole of society. Take the three away and the world is empty.
- Godless — the livestock and the harps are not the sin. Making the world pleasant without God is.
- Kept — a believer stays in his calling with God, inside a system Satan built to keep man blind to his ruin. The Lord's prayer for him is not that he leave the world, but that he be kept from its evil.
And his brother's name was Jubal he was the father of those who handle the harp and pipe.
The verse names Jubal, a son in Cain's family line, and credits him with the first music. Why does the Bible place the birth of the arts here, in the family of a murderer who had lost God?
Older translations read "harp and organ" where the ESV has "lyre and pipe." Either way the pair covers two whole families of instrument, and "father of" points to an inventor.
Jubal, the son, was "the father of all who play the harp and the organ (or flute)," that is, the inventor of stringed and wind instruments. Jubal is the father of the fine arts, the man of culture.
Music does not begin in Eden. It begins in the city Cain's family built after they had lost God.
It would seem as if Cain's family, having lost God, would now get the utmost out of the present world. The city of Enoch soon rang with music and with the busy hammering of the metalworker. Comforts and accomplishments gave it its character. It became, as men would say, the centre of light and learning, and the great trading hub of the human family. But God had no place there; it was a city of which He was not the builder and maker.
That record is deliberate. God had a reason for telling His people where these things began.
The Holy Spirit shows what rose up in Cain's line. It was not a new language or a separate nation, as we in our ignorance might have expected, but science and art, and even the fine arts. God's holy wisdom took care to tell His people where these things truly began: city life, music played on stringed and wind instruments, the working of copper and iron, polygamy, and self-absorbed verse — the first recorded song of man. It is a picture of man's skill and energy, civilisation, letters, and luxury.
Jubal is not listed alone. His name matches what he chose, and his two brothers chose differently.
Jabal was "the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle." He started commerce. Jubal did not care for making money. His name — "playing" — describes his character, and he says, I will go in for pleasure... Tubal-cain taught "every worker in brass and iron" — in other words, science and art. That is, I am sure, the scientific world. Take out of the world the man of commerce, the man of pleasure, and the man of science, and you will find the world empty — cleaned out. Money, music, and science formed Cain's world at the start, and by them Satan holds the world in his hand now more than ever.
The fault is not in the instrument or in the sound. It lies in what people do with it.
And notice further the ability man has to make himself happy while cut off from God. In Cain's family we find the father of those who live in tents and keep cattle, the father of those who play the harp and the organ, and the teacher of every worker in brass and iron. Now there is nothing wrong in working brass and iron; neither is there any harm in sweet sounds — we read in the book of Revelation of harpers in heaven — but what Cain was doing was this: he was making the world pleasant without God.
Jubal's harp sounded in a city built by a man who had killed his brother. What that music did then, other sounds do now.
In Cain's day the pleasant sounds of "the harp and organ" no doubt drowned out, to man's ear, the cry of Abel's blood. It is the same now. Man's ear is full of other sounds than those that come from Calvary, and his eye full of other sights than a crucified Christ.
The line of Jubal is not the last word on music. Grace has been at work on it.
Music has been the highest expression of the feelings of the heart of man. The fall silenced its note of triumph. Sadly, the sons of Jubal have dragged music down into a servant of the passions, feeding the desires of fallen man. But even here the sweet note of divine grace, in a quiet undertone, has been gaining clearness, fullness and freedom. Now, in the age of the Holy Spirit, it is the leading theme that controls the whole harmony. That harmony will one day burst out in a new and eternal song, with no discord to spoil it.
- Origin. Music enters the Bible in Cain's city. Men who had lost God invented it, to get the most out of a world without Him.
- Gift. The instruments are not the problem. There is no harm in sweet sounds, and there are harpers in heaven. The harm lay in using them to make the world pleasant without God.
- Reach. Jubal is pleasure, standing between Jabal's commerce and Tubal-cain's science. Take those three away and the world is empty.
- Result. The harp drowned out the cry of Abel's blood. Such sounds still fill the ear of a world that will not look at a crucified Christ.
- Recovery. What the sons of Jubal degraded, grace is reclaiming, until it breaks out in a new and eternal song with no discord in it.
And Zillah, she also bore Tubal-Cain, the forger of every kind of tool of brass and iron. And the sister of Tubal-Cain was Naamah.
The line of Cain closes with a metalworker and his sister. Why does a chapter about murder and exile stop to name the world's first inventors?
The phrase "forger of all instruments of bronze and iron" carries two senses. A Bible dictionary gives both:
Son of Lamech and Zillah. He was an instructor of every skilled worker in bronze and iron, or a forger of every kind of bronze and iron tool.
One writer notices which metal comes first in the Bible, and where each one appears:
Copper appears very early in the Scriptures. In Genesis 4:22 Tubal-cain instructs those who worked in bronze — copper, as we will call it from here on. It is suggestive that gold comes first, and before the fall: "the gold of that land is good" (Genesis 2:11-12). God's glory comes first. It may also be suggestive that copper turns up in connection with the family of Cain. It is quite striking that copper seems to have been the earlier and more widely used metal, compared with iron. The Bronze Age came, we are told, before the Iron Age.
Tubal-cain is the last of three brothers. Together they cover what people build a life around:
Jabal was the man who started commerce. He was the founder of the commercial world. Jubal did not care about making money. His name — "playing" — described his character, and he said, I will go in for pleasure... while Tubal-cain "was the forger of all instruments of bronze and iron" — in other words, science and art. Take out of the world the man of commerce, the man of pleasure, and the man of science, and you will find the world empty — cleaned out. Money, music, and science formed Cain's world at the start.
The verse ends by naming a woman, which is unusual enough that commentators stop on it:
Naamah, Lamech's daughter, is the first woman the record names after Eve. We judge this is because her name means Pleasure or Charming. Add pleasure, and the chase after it, to the features we have just noticed, and you have the foundation principles of man's world.
Scripture does not condemn the craft itself. The problem lies elsewhere:
Notice further how able man is to make himself happy while he lives cut off from God. Now there is nothing wrong in working bronze and iron. There is no harm in sweet sounds either — the book of Revelation shows harpists in heaven. But what Cain was doing was this: he was making the world pleasant without God.
Later, God gives skill to two craftsmen, Bezaleel and Aholiab, to build His sanctuary. One writer sets the two skills side by side:
There is a lesson worth learning in comparing this chapter with Genesis 4. Tubal-cain "was the forger of all instruments of bronze and iron." Cain's descendants received unholy skill. They used it to make a cursed and groaning earth a delightful place, without the presence of God. Bezaleel and Aholiab, by contrast, received divine skill to beautify a sanctuary — a place the presence and glory of the God of Israel would make holy and bless.
One writer traces these crafts back to the city Cain built, and reads the family's end as a verdict on all it achieved:
Cain built a city in defiance of his sentence of wandering — a city which his sons decorate with arts and inventions... Adam wove his belt out of fig leaves; Cain's sons weave all nature into a web of self-deception, to hide from themselves the shame of their nakedness. They are pioneers of progress. For all its mighty results in the ages since, that progress has never been enough to lift the curse off the earth. It has never taken the sting out of death, or satisfied the craving heart of man, or delivered anyone from the corruption in the world through lust. It has built up luxury. It has added burdens to people already burdened. It has kindled wars, which come from the desires that war within us. The last of Cain's family is only Tubal-Cain — "Cain's offspring."
- Craft. Tubal-cain forged tools of bronze and iron, and he taught the trade to others. Copper, the older metal, first enters the Bible with his family.
- Comfort. His metalwork completes Cain's world. Jabal brought money, Jubal music, Tubal-cain science — and Naamah, the first woman named after Eve, adds pleasure.
- Cause. The sin is not the forge. There is nothing wrong with working bronze and iron. The wrong is making the world pleasant without God.
- Contrast. God gave Bezaleel skill to beautify a sanctuary His presence would make holy. Cain's line used the same skill to decorate an earth under the curse.
- Close. Progress never lifted the curse, removed death's sting, or satisfied the human heart. Cain's line ends where it began — in another Cain.