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Section A18 JANUARY 2012

Adams Mythical Diary 5

We have named it Cain. Shecaught it while I was up countrytrapping...It resembles us in someways...The dierence in size war-rants the conclusion that it is a di-

erent and new kind o animalafsh, perhaps, though when I put itin the water to see, it sank, and she

plunged in and snatched it out be-ore there was opportunity or theexperiment to determine the matter...The coming o thecreature seems to have changed her whole nature andmade her unreasonable about experiments...She carriesthe fsh in her arms hal the night when it complainsand wants to get to the water...She pats the fsh on theback and makes sot sounds with her mouth to soothe it.

Mark Twain announced hetranslated Extracts from Adams Diary (1904) rom Adamsoriginal hieroglyphics. The extractsare humorous but oten deviaterom Scripture. This months ex-cerpts begin with Adams bewilder-ment at newborn Cains arrival.

It isnt a fsh. I cannot quite makeout what it is...It merely lies around,and mostly on its back, with its eetup. I have not seen any other animal dothat beore. I said I believed it was anenigma; but she only admired the wordwithout understanding it...I it dies, I

will take it apart and see what its ar-rangements are.

Twains account o Adams per-plexity over Cain is amusing but in-accurate. Adam and Eve knew Cain

was human rom the beginning, orEve called him man at birth (Gen-esis 4:1).

THREE MONTHS LATER It has ceased rom lying around, and goes about on its our legs now...Theshort ront legs and long hind ones indi-cate that it is o the kangaroo amily...It must have beena young one when it came, or it has grown exceedinglysince. It must be fve times as big, now, as it was then,and when discontented it is able to make rom twenty-

two to thirty-eight times the noise it made at frst. Co-ercion does not modiy this, but has the contrary eect...Iwas not at home when it frst came, and she told me she

ound it in the woods. THREE MONTHS LATERThe Kangaroo

still continues to grow...I am like to lose my mind over

the capricious and harassing developments othis unclassifable zoological reak...I pity the

poor noisy little animal, but there is nothingI can do to make it happy. I I could tameitbut that is out o the question...I wantedto let it go, but she wouldnt hear o it.

Adam was smarter than Twain de-picts. Anyone that can name thousands odierent animals in one day would recog-nize a miniature human immediately.

FIVE MONTHS LATER It is nota kangaroo...It is probably some kind o bear...I shall not be satisfed to have this one

prowling about the place much longer with-out a muzzle.

A FORTNIGHT LATER I exam-ined its mouth. There is no danger yet: ithas only one tooth...It makes more noise now

than it ever did beoreandmainly at night...I it gets amouthul o teeth it will betime or it to go.

In these and other ex-cerpts (not quoted here),

Twains Adam proposed various possibilities orthe identity o the newCain creature as it devel-oped: sh, snake, rog, bird,kangaroo, bear. All are o

course ridiculous, and thereal Adam would never haveentertained such oolishness.

In 1868 German zoolo-

gist Ernst Haeckel abricat-ed inaccurate diagrams ohumans in the womb. Hesought to illustrate imag-ined development o em-bryos through speculatedevolutionary ancestry. Haeckelclaimed, Ontogeny recapitulates phy-logeny, meaning embryonic develop-ment reiterates evolutionary develop-ment o ancestors.

Colleagues soon completely dis-credited Haeckels theory by showing he had orgedhis drawings. Nevertheless, Haeckels deceptivetheory continues to be taught in many textbooksand classrooms. It still appears as evidence or

evolution in some museums and news articles.Haeckels diagrams, despite having been dis-

credited, were common in Twains day and mayhave inspired his humor. Perhaps Twain used sat-ire to unmask Haeckels idea as absurd. For i theunborn child progressed through supposed evolu-

tionary stages, theres no reason to thinkthe progression would stop at birth. Why

wouldnt it continue through early child-hood development as Twain suggests?

FOUR MONTHS LATERThebear has learned to paddle around all by it-sel on its hind legs, and says poppa andmomma....I will go o on a ar expeditionamong the orests o the north and make an

exhaustive search [or another one]...I willmuzzle this one frst. THREE MONTHS LATERIt

has been a weary, weary hunt, yet I havehad no success. In the mean time, with-out stirring rom the home estate, she hascaught another one!

NEXT DAY I have been comparingthe new one with the old one, and it is per-

ectly plain that they are o the same breed.I was going to stu one o them or my col-lection, but she is prejudiced against it orsome reason or other...The old one is tamerthan it was and can laugh and talk like a

parrot...I shall be astonished i it turns outto be a new kind o parrot; and yet I ought

not to be astonished, or it has already beeneverything else it could think o since thosefrst days when it was a fsh. The new one isas ugly as the old one...She calls it Abel.

According to Adams Diary, Eve was

at least 6 months pregnant when Adam salliedorth. She wasnt pregnant when he returned. Thereal Adam wouldnt have missed such enormousclues to Abels origin.

TEN YEARS LATERThey are BOYS; weound it out long ago. It was their coming in that smallimmature shape that puzzled us...There are some girlsnow. Abel is a good boy, but i Cain had stayed a bear itwould have improved him.

Adams evaluation o Cain per the Diary refects

the Bibles report o Cains anger. Adams sin boreruit in Cain when he murdered Abel.

Genesis names only three children o Adam andEve. Cain and Abel were probably the rst two.Seth was born when Adam and Eve were 130, so itis likely there were a number o sons and daughtersborn beore Seth. Genesis 5:4 explicitly says thatAdam had other sons and daughters without sayinghow many.

Adam could have had hundreds o children inhis 930-year lietime. Beore sins consequencescompounded, Eves ertility and vigor would havebeen prodigious. Gods rst command to Adam andEve, Be ruitul and multiply, and fll the earth, ne-cessitated many children.

Many o the sons (probably including Cain)married sisters. Others (possibly Seth) may havemarried nieces. In the early days o the human racebeore genetic deterioration had accumulated, it wasperectly legitimate to marry c lose relatives. In act,there was no one else to marry.

Adam married a closer relative than anyone elsehas ever married someone made rom his own rib!Ever since people have always married relatives, de-scendants o Adam.

Mark Twain was a highly original and enter-taining writer. When evaluating any writer, Scrip-ture is the ultimate act-checking reerence. Soli

Deo Gloria.

E-mail Dr. Pelletier at BibleScienceGuy@

woodsidenews.org. Read the Bible-Science Guy blog athttp://BibleScienceGuy.wordpress.com. Follow him athttp://twitter.com/BibleScienceGuy. See May 2010,

Aug. 2010, Jan. 2011 and Sept. 2011 columns orpreceding extracts and commentary.

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tHE bIbLE AND sCIENCE by WilliaM T. PelleTier, Ph.d. [woodside news COLUMNIST]

William T. Pelletier2012