Am I my brother's keeper?

Last updated

"Am I my brother's keeper?" is a saying from the Bible. It comes from the story of Cain and Abel. [1] After Cain murdered his brother Abel, God asked him where his brother was, and Cain answered: "I know not; am I my brother's keeper?" [2] This quote entered the English language through William Tyndale and his translation of the Bible into English. [3]

Contents

The phrase and story is used in Judaism and Christianity. [lower-alpha 1] It shows not only Cain's wrongness in not looking after his brother's well-being, but his hiding of the crime of fratricide. [5]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Although the story of Cain and Abel appears in the Quran, the phrase "am I my brother's keeper?" is not used in the Quranic telling of the story [4] (see: Cain and Abel in Islam)

References

  1. ↑ Genesis 4:1–18
  2. ↑ Vermès, Géza (1975). Post-Biblical Jewish Studies. Brill Archive. ISBN   978-90-04-04160-8.
  3. ↑ Teems, David (2 January 2012). Tyndale: The Man Who Gave God an English Voice. Thomas Nelson. p. 209. ISBN   978-1-59555-414-7.
  4. ↑ Bowker, John (10 April 1975). Problems of Suffering in Religions of the World. Cambridge University Press. p. 120. ISBN   978-0-521-09903-5.
  5. ↑ Hirsch, Eric; Rowland, William G.; Stanford, Michael (2004). The New First Dictionary of Cultural Literacy: what your child needs to know. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. p. 77. ISBN   978-0-618-40853-5.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.