Tsillah · conjunction + proper noun, a woman's name
bare
יָֽלְדָה֙yal.Dah
H3205
to bear young · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person feminine singular
Tubal-cain
תּ֣וּבַלTu.val
H8423
Tubal-Kajin · proper noun, a man's name
instructer
לֹטֵ֕שׁlo.Tesh
H3913
properly · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular construct
artificer
חֹרֵשׁchôrêsh
H2794
a fabricator or mechanic
brass
נְחֹ֖שֶׁתne.Cho.shet
H5178
copper · noun, common feminine singular absolute
iron
וּבַרְזֶ֑לu.var.Zel
H1270
iron (as cutting) · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular absolute
sister
וַֽאֲח֥וֹתva.'a.Chot
H269
a sister (used very widely (like brother) · conjunction + noun, common feminine singular construct
Tubal-cain
קַ֔יִןKa.yin
H8423
Tubal-Kajin · proper noun, a man's name
Naamah
נַֽעֲמָֽהNa.'a.Mah
H5279
Naamah · proper noun, a woman's name
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Exodus 25:3 And this is the offering which ye shall take of them; gold, and silver, and brass,
Numbers 31:22 Only the gold, and the silver, the brass, the iron, the tin, and the lead,
Deuteronomy 8:9 A land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack any thing in it; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose…
Deuteronomy 33:25 Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy strength be.
2 Chronicles 2:7 Send me now therefore a man cunning to work in gold, and in silver, and in brass, and in iron, and in purple, and crimson, and blue, and tha…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Genesis 4:19-22
We have here some particulars concerning Lamech, the seventh from Adam in the line of Cain. Observe,
I. His marrying two wives. It was one of the degenerate race of Cain who first transgressed that original law of marriage that two only should be one flesh. Hitherto one man had but one wife at a time; but Lamech took two. From the beginning it was not so. Mal 2:15; Mat 19:5. See here, 1. Those who desert God's church and ordinances lay themselves open to all manner of temptation. 2. When a bad custom is begun by bad men sometimes men of better characters are, through unwariness, drawn in to follow them. Jacob, David, and many others, who were otherwise good men, were afterwards ensnared in t…
Lamech took unto him two wives--This is the first transgression of the law of marriage on record, and the practice of polygamy, like all other breaches of God's institutions, has been a fruitful source of corruption and misery.
Adam Clarke on Genesis 4:22
Tubal-cain - The first smith on record, who taught how to make warlike instruments and domestic utensils out of brass and iron.
Agricultural instruments must have been in use long before, for Cain was a tiller of the ground, and so was Adam, and they could not have cultivated the ground without spades, hooks, etc. Some of these arts were useless to man while innocent and upright, but after his fall they became necessary. Thus is the saying verified: God made man upright, but they have sought out many inventions. As the power to get wealth is from God, so also is the invention of useful arts.
M. De Lavaur, in his Conference de la Fable avec l'Histoire Sainte, supposes that the Greeks and Roma…
And Zillah, she also bare Tubalcain,.... Thought by many to be the same with Vulcan, his name and business agreeing; for the names are near in sound, Tubalcain may easily pass into Vulcan; and who, with the Heathens, was the god of the smiths, and the maker of Jupiter's thunderbolts, as this was an artificer in iron and brass, as follows: his name is compounded of two words, the latter of which was no doubt put into his name in memory of Cain his great ancestor; the former Josephus (u) reads Thobel, and says of him, that he exceeded all in strength, and had great skill in military affairs:
an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron; he taught men the way of melting metals, and of ma…
The Church Fathers
The sister of Tubalcain is Noema. Noema is interpreted as Pleasure. Well, the lineage of Cain fittingly ends with the birth of a woman; and the same woman is named Pleasure: because the entire intention of the wicked in the world serves allurements, and they desire to end their life in the fulfillment of carnal pleasures. Indeed, after this woman was born, not long after, the entire cursed progeny was finished by the flood: because when they submit the neck of their mind to the delights of the world, when they say peace and security, then sudden destruction will come upon them. It should be noted, however, that delight or pleasure can be understood in two ways, that is, in both good and evil: in good, namely, when it is said, "But the meek shall inherit the earth, and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace" (Psalm 37:11). And again: "They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house; and thou shalt make them drink of the river of thy pleasures" (Psalm 36:8). From which pleasure paradise is also named, because surely man was placed in it to enjoy perpetually the most blessed and holy delights of the flesh and soul in the presence of his Maker. But pleasure is understood in an evil sense when certain lovers of pleasures more than of God are noted by the Apostle. The name Noema is fittingly applied to them, in whose generation at first the world's age, except for a few, was destroyed. Therefore, the human race had departed from Eden, that is, from the delights of internal goods; and, having abandoned heavenly things, was cultivating the earth, and had come to the birth of a woman, who would be named Noema, that is, Pleasure: and not long after, everything perished in the cataclysm: so that indeed it might be indicated, both by the birth of such offspring and by the outcome of the ensuing disaster, that those who neglect spiritual things and subjugate themselves to the pleasures of the flesh rightly hasten toward destruction. And indeed Noema was born in the seventh generation from Cain. But if you wish to count the generations from Adam and also number all the sons of Lamech, you will find Noema in the eleventh place. For Lamech is the seventh from Adam, and when you add his four children, you indeed fulfill the number eleven. The number eleven, which exceeds ten, is often used to designate sin, which is committed by the…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Architecture — The book of (Genesis 4:17,20,22) appears to divide mankind into two great characteristic sections, viz., the “dwellers in tents” and the “dwellers in cities.” To the race of Shem is attributed…
Artificer — A person engaged in any kind of manual occupation (Gen. 4:22; Isa. 3:3).
Brass — Which is an alloy of copper and zinc, was not known till the thirteenth century. What is designated by this word in Scripture is properly copper (Deut. 8:9). It was used for fetters (Judg. 16:21; 2…
Cain — A possession; a spear. (1.) The first-born son of Adam and Eve (Gen. 4). He became a tiller of the ground, as his brother Abel followed the pursuits of pastoral life. He was “a sullen, self-willed,…
Copper — Derived from the Greek kupros (the island of Cyprus), called “Cyprian brass,” occurs only in the Authorized Version in Ezra 8:27. Elsewhere the Hebrew word (nehosheth) is improperly rendered “brass,”…
Deep — Used to denote (1) the grave or the abyss (Rom. 10:7; Luke 8:31); (2) the deepest part of the sea (Ps. 69:15); (3) the chaos mentioned in Gen. 1:2; (4) the bottomless pit, hell (Rev. 9:1, 2; 11:7;…
Handicraft — (Acts 18:3; 19:25; Revelation 18:22) A trade was taught to ail the Jewish boys as a necessary part of their education. Even the greatest rabbis maintained themselves by trades (Delitzsch). Says Rabbi…
Iron — Tubal-Cain is the first-mentioned worker in iron (Gen. 4:22). The Egyptians wrought it at Sinai before the Exodus. David prepared it in great abundance for the temple (1 Chr. 22:3: 29:7). The…
Lamech — The strikerdown; the wild man. (1.) The fifth in descent from Cain. He was the first to violate the primeval ordinance of marriage (Gen. 4:18-24). His address to his two wives, Adah and Zillah (4:23,…
Naamah — The beautiful. (1.) The daughter of Lamech and Zillah (Gen. 4: 22). (2.) The daughter of the king of Ammon, one of the wives of Solomon, the only one who appears to have borne him a son, viz.,…
Jabal ; he was the father of such as dwell in tents. Moses now relates that, with the evils which proceeded from the family of Cain, some good had been blended. For the invention of arts, and of other things which serve to the common use and convenience of life, is a gift of God by no means to be despised, and a faculty worthy of commendation. It is truly wonderful, that this race, which had most deeply fallen from integrity, should have excelled the rest of the posterity of Adam in rare endowments. [251] I, however, understand Moses to have spoken expressly concerning these arts, as having been invented in the family of Cain, for the purpose of showing that he was not so accursed by the Lor…
The family of the Cainites. - Gen 4:16. The geographical situation of the land of Nod, in the front of Eden (קדמת, see Gen 2:14), where Cain settled after his departure from the place or the land of the revealed presence of God (cf. Jon 1:3), cannot be determined. The name Nod denotes a land of flight and banishment, in contrast with Eden, the land of delight, where Jehovah walked with men. There Cain knew his wife. The text assumes it as self-evident that she accompanied him in his exile; also, that she was a daughter of Adam, and consequently a sister of Cain. The marriage of brothers and sisters was inevitable in the case of the children of the first men, if the human race was actually to…
Technological advancement masks increasing self-assertion and distance from God (see study note on 4:17–5:32).
Rashi on Genesis 4:22
תובל קין TUBAL-CAIN — He refined Cain’s handicraft. The word תובל is connected in meaning with תבלין (spices which give a refined and improved taste to food); he refined and improved the work of Cain by providing weapons for murderers (Genesis Rabbah 23:3).
לטש כל חרש נחשת וברזל THE FORGER OF EVERY CUTTING INSTRUMENT OF BRASS AND IRON — He sharpened tools used in brass and iron work; לוטש has the some meaning as (Job 16:9) ילטוש “He sharpeneth his eye upon me.” The word חרש is not of the form פעל (a noun like אֹכֶל, אֹהֶל etc.), but of the form פועל (a participle), for it has the vowel קמץ קטן (what we term צירה) and its accent is on the last syllabic (whereas the noun form has the accent o…
Tubal-cain — The son of Lamech and Zillah, “an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron” (Gen. 4:22; R.V., “the forger of every cutting instrument of brass and iron”).
Tubalcain — the son of Lamech the Cainite by his wife Zillah, (Genesis 4:22) (B.C. about 3000.) He is called “a furbisher of every cutting instrument of copper and iron.”
Zillah — Shadow, one of the wives of Lamech, of the line of Cain, and mother of Tubal-cain (Gen. 4:19, 22).
Brass, Or Copper · Antiquity of working in — Antiquity of working in
Brazier · 1. An artificer in brass and copper — 1. An artificer in brass and copper
Genealogy · From Adam to Noah — From Adam to Noah
Invention · The use of metals — The use of metals
Iron · 1. First recor — 1. First recor
Lamech · 1. Father of Jabal, Jubal, and Tubal- — 1. Father of Jabal, Jubal, and Tubal-
Master Workman · .Tubal- — .Tubal-
Mechanic · .Tubal- — .Tubal-
Naamah · 1. Sister of Tubal- — 1. Sister of Tubal-
Smith · Tubal- — Tubal-
Tubal-Cain · The inventor of edge tools — The inventor of edge tools
Zillah · Wife of Lamech — Wife of Lamech
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
