First Be Reconciled to Thy Brother: Cain's Gift and Jacob's Altar
Old Testament: Genesis 4:3, 5, 8
And it came to pass after many days, that Cain offered, of the fruits of the earth, gifts to the Lord. ... But to Cain and his offerings he had no respect: and Cain was exceedingly angry, and his countenance fell. ... And Cain said to Abel his brother: Let us go forth abroad. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and slew him.
Old Testament, also: Genesis 33:4; Genesis 35:1
Then Esau ran to meet his brother, and embraced him: and clasping him fast about the neck, and kissing him, wept. ... In the meantime God said to Jacob: Arise, and go up to Bethel, and dwell there, and make there an altar to God, who appeared to thee when thou didst flee from Esau thy brother.
New Testament: Matthew 5:22-24
But I say to you, that whosoever is angry with his brother, shall be in danger of the judgment. And whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council. And whosoever shall say, Thou Fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. If therefore thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there thou remember that thy brother hath any thing against thee; Leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother: and then coming thou shalt offer thy gift.
The connection
Cain brought his gift to the Lord with his heart set against his brother. God had no respect to it, "and Cain was exceedingly angry, and his countenance fell" (Genesis 4:5). God warned him that sin was at the door, and he went out to the field and killed Abel (4:7-8). The gift came first, and the brother was never made right. St John holds him up as the warning: "Not as Cain, who was of the wicked one, and killed his brother" (1 John 3:12). Jacob, who had wronged his brother and fled from him, did it in the other order: he sent his gifts ahead to Esau, not to the altar, and "Esau ran to meet his brother, and embraced him: and clasping him fast about the neck, and kissing him, wept" (Genesis 33:4). Jacob said, "I have seen thy face, as if I should have seen the countenance of God" (33:10). Only then did God say, "Arise, and go up to Bethel ... and make there an altar to God, who appeared to thee when thou didst flee from Esau thy brother" (35:1). Cain's face fell before he killed his brother; Jacob saw the face of God in his. Christ gives the rule in the same order as the story. He begins with "Thou shalt not kill" and anger against a brother, and comes to the altar: "Leave there thy offering before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to thy brother: and then coming thou shalt offer thy gift" (Matthew 5:21-24). St Cyprian joins the command to Cain: Christ "calls back from the altar one who comes to the sacrifice in strife ... for God had not respect unto Cain's offerings; for he could not have God at peace with him, who through envious discord had not peace with his brother." The Catechism counts reconciliation with one's brother before the offering among the first things Jesus asks of those who pray (CCC 2608).
Moral sense
Christ traces the murder back into the heart. It began with anger and a fallen face, and so "whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer" (1 John 3:15). The gift at the altar cannot cover a quarrel left standing; it has to wait. The Church keeps the order at every Mass, where the peace is given before Communion. And the quarrel is to be settled quickly: "Be at agreement with thy adversary betimes, whilst thou art in the way with him" (Matthew 5:25). Jacob had wrestled all night with God before he met Esau, and the brother he feared met him with a kiss.
Anagogical sense
Every life ends with a gift brought to the altar, the soul itself. The way to the judge is short, and Christ's counsel is to be reconciled "betimes, whilst thou art in the way". At the last, brothers who were made right on earth stand together before the altar of God, and the one gift that is always received is the one He offered: Christ, who was not ashamed to call us brethren.
The Fathers
St Cyprian, On the Unity of the Church 13: "And He calls back from the altar one who comes to the sacrifice in strife, and bids him first agree with his brother, and then return with peace and offer his gift to God: for God had not respect unto Cain's offerings; for he could not have God at peace with him, who through envious discord had not peace with his brother."
Warrant
Patristic because St Cyprian joins Christ's command at Matthew 5:23-24 to Cain's rejected offering (On the Unity of the Church 13), and St John makes Cain the example of hatred for a brother (1 John 3:12, 15). The Jacob half, reconciliation with Esau before the altar at Bethel, is the entry's own and was found by Dunk; no Father in the site's corpora joins Genesis 33 to Matthew 5, though the order and the words are there. Checked in the Greek: doron, gift, is the word for Abel's gifts at Genesis 4:4 in the Septuagint, for Jacob's presents to Esau at Genesis 33:10, and for the gift left at the altar in Matthew 5:23-24; thysiasterion, altar, stands at Genesis 35:1 and Matthew 5:23-24; and at Genesis 33:10 Jacob says he has seen Esau's face as one sees the prosopon theou, the face of God. "Not ashamed to call them brethren" is Hebrews 2:11. Abel's blood and its fulfilment belong to the entry on the blood that speaketh better.
Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 2608.
The verses
Genesis 4:3 · Genesis 4:5 · Genesis 4:8 · Genesis 33:4 · Genesis 35:1 · Matthew 5:22 · Matthew 5:23 · Matthew 5:24
