Now you are cursed and banished from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.
Parallel translations
- WEB Now you are cursed because of the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.
- KJV And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand;
- NKJV So now you are cursed from the earth, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.
- NASB Now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.
- NLT Now you are cursed and banished from the ground, which has swallowed your brother’s blood.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
God pronounces Cain cursed from the ground that received his brother's blood. It shows the personal judgment that falls on the unrepentant murderer.
Overview
Whereas the ground was cursed for Adam's sake, now Cain himself is cursed in relation to the ground stained by Abel's blood. The judgment fits the crime, alienating Cain from the soil he worked. This intensifying curse shows sin's deepening grip on humanity and the certainty of God's just response to bloodshed.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Gal 3:10All who rely on works of the law are under a curse. For it is written: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.”
- Job 16:18O earth, do not cover my blood; may my cry for help never be laid to rest.
- Deut 28:15–20If, however, you do not obey the LORD your God by carefully following all His commandments and statutes I am giving you today, all these curses will come upon you and overtake you:
- Gen 3:14So the LORD God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and every beast of the field! On your belly will you go, and dust you will eat, all the days of your life.
- Deut 27:16–26‘Cursed is he who dishonors his father or mother.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
- Job 31:38–40if my land cries out against me and its furrows weep together,
- Isa 26:21For behold, the LORD is coming out of His dwelling to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. The earth will reveal her bloodshed and will no longer conceal her slain.
- Deut 29:19–21because when such a person hears the words of this oath, he invokes a blessing on himself, saying, ‘I will have peace, even though I walk in the stubbornness of my own heart.’ This will bring disaster on the watered land as well as the dry.
- Gen 4:14Behold, this day You have driven me from the face of the earth, and from Your face I will be hidden; I will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.”
- Rev 12:16But the earth helped the woman and opened its mouth to swallow up the river that had poured from the dragon’s mouth.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
From the first promise that the seed of the woman would crush the serpent (3:15), through Abraham's blessing to all nations and Judah's coming ruler, Genesis sows every seed that flowers in Christ — the true offspring, the better Adam, the ram caught for Isaac.
How Genesis 4:11 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.