Letter to Seth (Gen 4 & 5)

Dear Seth

A short letter to you and to be honest most of it is going to be a bundle of thoughts and questions.

The first one is what was time to you? I am guessing it must have been very different to what it means to me. After all I am sure you didn’t really live for over 900 years. That would be like someone who was born just after William the Conqueror still being alive today and I just don’t think that could be the case. It's why todays image is Big Ben, the key time piece we have in the UK. Time seems such a big part of this passage.

And how did it feel being the replacement son? After all Gen 4:25 says you were born to replace Abel.  Did you feel some kind of responsibility to live up to a set of unreal expectations as a result of all that? And what was said about Cain, obviously he had gone away but was he still cherished or did the rest of the family hate him. It's sad but I am guessing that violence was much more a part of everyday life then from the way Cain says in Gen 4:14 that he is likely to be killed by whoever he meets and God needing to put a mark on him so he wasn't killed.

I love the idea you were one of the early members of humankind. I’ve only just discovered Gen 5: v 1&2 reiterates what was in Gen 1 about male and female being created in the likeness of God.

To me it tells me that there was a divide even back then between cultures which were more and less patriarchal. As I read these chapters the divides become more pronounced than I had previously realised by focusing on these aspects of language. Was that what you experienced? Was there a divide and where did you and your people come in, because you seem to be a bridge between the narratives.

The genealogy thing is interesting because it seems that some of you were marked out for mention amongst many other brothers and sisters. Did you have record keepers who traced your blood lines through or were you the names which elders passed down orally and who kept in the collective memory?

Gen 5: 3 is interesting when it talks about you having a son in your likeness. I guess that reiterates that we are the children of God because we are made in his likeness.

Finally, just to let you know your name is one which has been passed down the generations and is still in use today. You seem to have captured the imagination of people somehow…either that or it is a good biblical name which is easy to spell and so people have stuck with it.