Abel's Dying Thoughts

I am dying.

My blood spills out. My life is in my blood.

Lord, what is this? I have seen it surrounding me, both in my flocks and in the weak. I saw my mother cradle in her arms the sister born dead. I remember her cries deep into the bed, my father shaking his head sadly. He told me that night about the curses, as I huddled frightened under his arm, listening to my mother's pain, waiting for the life that was supposed to come from it.

Death.

My father told me about the words spoken between him and God on that day many years ago, though not so many years really, as we reckon it now, though father said the days then were different, that they changed without really changing, the way the grass grew without growing, and the animals existed together without strife. He laughs with a touch of bitterness now when he speaks of the lion and the sheep--How often have I seen them take the sick from my own herd!--but there is no laughter in this, this now, this real death, this death IN ME.

God said if he ate from the tree he would die. He ate, and now comes death. But in this way! It hurts. The stone on my head, an immediate shock of fear, then the pain, and now this strange pulsing in my ears, louder than all the sounds of nature, and my brother's hate filled eyes, mirthless, angry, staring down at me. Soon even that will fade.

Then...what?

I remember when I found the poor ewe savaged on the outskirts of the herd, the predator surprised when I suddenly appeared, yelling with my staff. It was too late to save her. My father came too, and he wept. I asked him why he cried, and he said it was past words, past understanding, but that the world had changed. It was getting worse, he said. There is a promise, but we must wait for it.

The promise is wrapped up in death. I do not understand, but I know that we must wait for it. Cain never liked this. I tended the flocks, according to my father's instructions, but he was always filling my ear with his own thoughts. We can control this creation, he would say. Look at my plants, my fruits. It was work, but I brought it forth! My father's face would darken then. And the story would pour forth again, the lost world, the broken word, his faithlessness, and hovering over all that was the promise. It thrilled my heart to hear about it, but Cain would only scowl.

Death would be overcome. My father said it, and I believed it (for I too have spoken with God, though not quite in the way that my father did). He showed me the old robes God had fashioned for him, his face still full with the shock that had come when for the first time he had seen death, just the death of a few animals, but death nonetheless. The lifeless flesh, the ceasing of animation--even what death is somehow escapes us, pushed away, mysterious, terrifying, and therefore incomprehensible.

But I saw the plan, or at least I saw it from a distance. Life from death, somehow, wrapped up in the offspring of my own mother, one who would crush the head of the serpent, as the phrase went, repeated over and over again by my parents. So, when I brought forth my finest animal to sacrifice, I was surprised to see Cain with his plants, his fruit, offering to God the work of his pride, an offering so far from what God had revealed, what God had shown us. I was not surprised that God rejected it. It spoke nothing about the promises, and father says we are to worship God only through our hope in these promises.

God was pleased.

There is only a short time left. Death comes, and my own brother stands over me, triumphant. Is this what this new world is like? For I am dead now, the offering I gave to God, the offering he was pleased with, what of it? God favored me, rejected Cain, but now Cain stands over me as my life ebbs away? Lord, is this your justice? Is this our world now?

Lord, my blood is spilled out. Let it cry out to you! Will the strong always triumph over the weak, the strong lion over my sick and weak ewe?

Lord, I know you will receive me. The blood I spilled in my sacrifice was a shadow of the blood to come. This is why you were pleased with it, for it is a blood that speaks forgiveness, a blood that speaks of acceptance, a blood that speaks of worship.

But let my blood speak too, this very blood that spills out of me, let it cry out until you have established your justice! Let it cry out until you have had your vengeance on every wicked man that walks the earth, until you have cleansed the world of every injustice. My blood cries out for you to protect your righteous ones! Lord, your name demands it!

My life ends. Sets things to right, O Lord.