Genesis 4:23

23. Lamech said This father of skilful inventors was himself a genius, and the author of this oldest fragment of poetical composition, of which the following is a literal translation:

Adah and Zillah, hear my voice,

O wives of Lamech, listen to my saying;

For a man have I slain for my wound,

And a child for my bruise .

For sevenfold avenged should Cain be,

And Lamech seventy and seven .

It is not strange that this mere fragment of antediluvian song is obscure and difficult of explanation. The common version conveys the idea that Lamech was smitten with remorse over the murder of a young man, and this is the explanation of some of the older expositors. But the language of Genesis 4:24 illy accords with such a view, and the entire passage breathes the spirit of violence and confident boasting rather than of remorse.

A better interpretation is, that which supposes Lamech to have slain a man in self-defence. The words “for my wound” and “for my bruise” would then be equivalent to “for wounding me,” “for bruising me,” and the song is Lamech’s attempt to comfort his wives in view of the manslaughter, and assure them that no one would dare avenge the deed.

Others make the poem a sort of triumphant exultation over Tubal-cain’s invention of brass and iron weapons, and translate the past tense of the verb slay as future, or else as present, expressing confident assurance: “I will slay the man who wounds me, and the youth who presumes to harm me.” Genesis 4:24 is understood to express the boast that he could now avenge his own wrongs ten times more completely than God would avenge the slaying of Cain. This interpretation accords with the context, and brings out the spirit of the passage, but has against it the perfect tense of the verb I have slain, הרגתי .

May we not blend the two last mentioned views, and, retaining the strict sense of the words, as translated above, explain that Lamech, by the use of weapons of his son’s invention, had in some duel or personal conflict slain a young man, possibly one of his own children, ילד ; and yet, so far from feeling remorse or penitence over the deed, exultingly sang to his wives this song of his prowess, and boastingly declared that any one who should attempt to take vengeance on him for the deed would suffer more than ten times the vengeance pronounced against the murderer of Cain. “By the citation of the case of his ancestor Cain he shows,” says Lange, “that the dark history of the bad man had become transformed into a proud remembrance for his race.” According to this view, we discern in this old Cainite song that spirit of violence and lust which waxed worse and worse until it brought upon the wicked world the judgment of the flood. For a full synopsis of the various expositions of this passage, see M’CLINTOCK and STRONG, Cyclopedia, art. Lamech.