Cormon, Fernand - Cain flying before Jehovah's Curse

The Land of Nod (

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

: – ''ʾereṣ-Nōḏ'') is a place mentioned in the

Book of Genesis The Book of Genesis (from Greek ; Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית ''Bəreʾšīt'', "In hebeginning") is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its first word, ( "In the beginning" ...

of the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Eden" (''qiḏmaṯ-ʿḖḏen''), where

Cain Cain ''Káïn''; ar, قابيل/قايين, Qābīl/Qāyīn is a Biblical figure in the Book of Genesis within Abrahamic religions. He is the elder brother of Abel, and the firstborn son of Adam and Eve, the first couple within the Bible. He ...

was exiled by God after Cain had murdered his brother

Abel Abel ''Hábel''; ar, هابيل, Hābīl is a Biblical figure in the Book of Genesis within Abrahamic religions. He was the younger brother of Cain, and the younger son of Adam and Eve, the first couple in Biblical history. He was a shepherd ...

. According to Genesis 4:16: Genesis 4:17 relates that after arriving in the Land of Nod, Cain's wife bore him a son,

Enoch Enoch () ''Henṓkh''; ar, أَخْنُوخ ', Qur'ān.html"_;"title="ommonly_in_Qur'ān">ommonly_in_Qur'ānic_literature__'_is_a_biblical_figure_and_Patriarchs_(Bible).html" "title="Qur'ānic_literature.html" ;"title="Qur'ān.html" ;"title="o ...

, in whose name he built the first city.

Name

"Nod" () is the

root of the verb "to wander" (). Therefore, to dwell in the land of Nod can mean to live a wandering life. Gesenius defines () as follows:

TO BE MOVED, TO BE AGITATED (Arab. Med. Waw id.), used of a reed shaken by the wind, 1Ki.14:15; hence ''to wander, to be a fugitive'', Jer. 4:1; Gen. 4:12, 14; Ps.56:9; ''to flee'', Ps. 11:1; Jer. 49:30. Figuratively, Isa. 17:11, "the harvest has fled" but see ," which some take in this place as the subst.

Much as Cain's name is connected to the verb meaning "to get" in Genesis 4:1, the name "Nod" closely resembles the word "nad" (), usually translated as "vagabond", in Genesis 4:12. (In the

Septuagint The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond t ...

's rendering of th
same verse
God curses Cain to τρέμων, "trembling".) A Greek version of Nod written as appearing in the '' Onomastica Vaticana'' possibly derives from the plural , which relates to resting and sleeping. This derivation, coincidentally or not, connects with the English pun on "nod".Howard Jacobson,
The Land of Nod
, ''Journal of Theological Studies'', New Series, 41(1), April 1990. "Since the early part of the eighteenth century (according to the ''OED'') the phrase 'Land of Nod' has been used to mean 'sleep'. Scholars seem in agreement that this is a play on the Biblical place-name grounded in the use of the verb 'nod' in the sense 'sleep' (first in the early seventeenth century, according to the ''OED''). But we have now seen that 'Land of Nod' as 'Land of the sleepers' goes back centuries and more, and to Graeco-Hebrew etymologies. What are we to think? is this nothing more than utterly remarkable coincidence? Or has our Onomastic etymology influenced the English usage? I leave the question to students of the history of the English language."

Interpretation

Josephus Flavius Josephus (; grc-gre, Ἰώσηπος, ; 37 – 100) was a first-century Romano-Jewish historian and military leader, best known for '' The Jewish War'', who was born in Jerusalem—then part of Roman Judea—to a father of priestly ...

wrote in ''

Antiquities of the Jews ''Antiquities of the Jews'' ( la, Antiquitates Iudaicae; el, Ἰουδαϊκὴ ἀρχαιολογία, ''Ioudaikē archaiologia'') is a 20-volume historiographical work, written in Greek, by historian Flavius Josephus in the 13th year of the ...

'' (c. AD 93) that Cain continued his wickedness in Nod: resorting to violence and robbery; establishing

weights and measures A unit of measurement is a definite magnitude of a quantity, defined and adopted by convention or by law, that is used as a standard for measurement of the same kind of quantity. Any other quantity of that kind can be expressed as a multip ...

; transforming human culture from innocence into craftiness and deceit; establishing property lines; and building a fortified

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...

. Nod is said to be outside of the presence or face of God.

Origen Origen of Alexandria, ''Ōrigénēs''; Origen's Greek name ''Ōrigénēs'' () probably means "child of Horus" (from , "Horus", and , "born"). ( 185 – 253), also known as Origen Adamantius, was an early Christian scholar, ascetic, and the ...

defined Nod as the land of trembling and wrote that it symbolized the condition of all who forsake God. Early commentators treated it as the opposite of Eden (worse still than the land of exile for the rest of humanity). In the English tradition Nod was sometimes described as a desert inhabited only by ferocious beasts or monsters. Others interpreted Nod as dark or even underground—away from the face of God.Oliver F. Emerson,
Legends of Cain, Especially in Old and Middle English
, ''Publications of the Modern Language Association of America'' 21(4), 1906; po. 865, 871.

Augustine Augustine of Hippo ( , ; la, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Afr ...

described unconverted Jews as dwellers in the land of Nod, which he defined as commotion and "carnal disquietude".

Places named "Land of Nod"

Land of Nod is the name of a

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...

in the

East Riding of Yorkshire The East Riding of Yorkshire, or simply East Riding or East Yorkshire, is a ceremonial county and unitary authority area in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It borders North Yorkshire to the north and west, South Yorkshire t ...

, England. It is located at the far end of a two-mile-long (3.2 km) road, which joins the A614 road at Holme-on-Spalding-Moor (). The name "Land of Nod" was accorded locally to the northerly 3,000 acres (1,214.1 hectares) of the Great Plot lying north of Woburn,

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...

, at its foundation in 1640–42, "the name being probably suggested by a comparison of its forlorn condition — so far remote from church ordinances — with the Nod to which Cain wandered when he went 'from the presence of the Lord'." Its Native American name was ''Nena Saawaattawattocks''. Land of Nod Road is the name of a residential road in Windham,

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and nor ...

, US (), and a private road in Headley Down,

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in western South East England on the coast of the English Channel. Home to two major English cities on its south coast, Southampton and Portsmouth, Hampshire ...

, UK ().

In popular culture

The Land of Nod can refer to the mythical land of sleep, a pun on ''Land of Nod'' (Gen. 4:16). To "go off to the land of Nod" plays with the phrase to "nod off", meaning to go to sleep. The first recorded use of the phrase to mean "sleep" comes from

Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whigs, then for the Tories), poet, and Anglican cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Du ...

in his ''Complete Collection of Genteel and Ingenious Conversation'' (1737) and ''

Gulliver's Travels ''Gulliver's Travels'', or ''Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships'' is a 1726 prose satire by the Anglo-Irish writer and clergyman Jonathan ...

''. A later instance of this usage appears in the poem "The Land of Nod" by

Robert Louis Stevenson Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as '' Treasure Island'', ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll ...

from the '' A Child's Garden of Verses'' (1885) collection. In the '' Arc of a Scythe'' series by Neal Shusterman, the Land of Nod is mythologized as containing a mythical fail-safe against the Scythedom and becomes critically important to the plot of the third book.Shusterman, Neal. Scythe. Simon & Schuster, 2017. In Fevre Dream by George R. R. Martin, the Land of Nod is suggested as a place where

vampires A vampire is a mythical creature that subsists by feeding on the vital essence (generally in the form of blood) of the living. In European folklore, vampires are undead creatures that often visited loved ones and caused mischief or dea ...

originated.

References

Sources

* Byron, John. Cain and Abel in text and tradition : Jewish and Christian interpretations of the first sibling rivalry. Leiden: Brill, 2011. * Delaney, David Kevin. ''The Sevenfold Vengeance of Cain: Genesis 4 in Early Jewish and Christian Interpretation''. PhD dissertation accepted at University of Virginia, May 1996.

External links

Genesis 4:16 at BibleGateway.com
* Matthew Kempf,
The wandering Cainidae, or, The ancient nomads : a lecture delivered to the Medical Society of Dubois County, and to the citizens of Huntingburgh, Indiana, April 22, 1879
' {{DEFAULTSORT:Land Of Nod Book of Genesis Torah places Cain and Abel