Cain and Abel are the first and second sons of Adam and Eve, born after the Fall of Man, whose story is told in the Hebrew Bible at Genesis 4 and in the Qur'an at 5:27-32. In both versions Cain commits the first murder by killing his brother after God rejects his sacrifice but accepts Abel's. Genesis puts some emphasis on the occupations of the brothers; Abel tends flocks while Cain is a farmer.

Names

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Cain and Abel are English renderings of the Hebrew names קַיִן / קָיִן and הֶבֶל / הָבֶל, respectively, from the Bible. In the modern Standard Hebrew transliteration, these are rendered Qáyin and Hével / Hável, whereas in Tiberian Hebrew they are rendered Qáyin / Qāyin and Héḇel / Hāḇel. In the Qur'an, Abel is named as Hābīl (هابيل), which is Arabic for Abel, but Cain is not named, though Islamic tradition records his name as Qābīl (قابيل), which is Arabic for Cain. Cain is called Qayen (ቃየን) in the Ethiopian version of Genesis, although in several other places such as Jude 1:11, he is called by the variant Qayel (ቃየል), by which name he is more usually referred to in sermons.

A once common English folk etymology held that Abel was composed from ab and el, effectively meaning source of God. However, this is a fallacy, as the original Hebrew only contains the three letters HVL (הָבֶל), which is quite different from ABEL (אבאל). Biblically, the word Hevel (Abel) appears in Ecclesiastes in a context implying it should be translated "pointless" (the King James Version translates it as "vanity", which at the time of translation had the same English meaning, but does no longer), and also appears, in the masoretic text, at 1 Samuel (at 6:18) apparently with the meaning "lamentation". Both biblical uses are traditionally taken to imply that Abel's name is a pun, in reference to Abel's brief life.

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