For few verses in the Bible is the relationship between scripture and the artistic imagination more intriguing than for the conclusion of Genesis 4:15: And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, that whosoever found him should not kill him. What was the mark of Cain? The answers set before us in this sensitive study by art historian Ruth Mellinkoff are sometimes poignant, frequently surprising. An early summary of rabbinic answers, for examples runs as follows: R. Judah said: He caused the orb of the sun to shine on his account. ...
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For few verses in the Bible is the relationship between scripture and the artistic imagination more intriguing than for the conclusion of Genesis 4:15: And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, that whosoever found him should not kill him. What was the mark of Cain? The answers set before us in this sensitive study by art historian Ruth Mellinkoff are sometimes poignant, frequently surprising. An early summary of rabbinic answers, for examples runs as follows: R. Judah said: He caused the orb of the sun to shine on his account. Said R. Nehemiah to him: For that wretch He would cause the orb of the sun to shine! Rather, he caused leprosy to break out on him.... Rab said: He gave him a dog. Abba Jose said: He made a horn grow out of him. Rab said: He made him an example to murderers. R. Hanin said: He made him an example to penitents. R. Levi said in the name of R. Simeon b. Lakish: He suspended judgment until the flood came and swept him away. After a review of such early Jewish and Christian exegesis, Mellinkoff divides physical interpretations on the mark into three groups: A Mark on Cain's Body, A Movement of Cain's Body, and A Blemish Associated with Cain's Body. Her discussion of these groups is the heart of her study and offers its richest examples of interplay among medieval art and imaginative literature, on the one hand, and biblical exegesis, on the other. Thus in one remarkable tour de force, she shows us how a poetic misprision of Genesis 4:24 - Sevenfold vengeance will be taken for Cain: but for Lamech seventy times sevenfold - made Lamech the murderer of Cain; how there then grew up the legend that Lamech, a hunter, had killed Cain when he mistook him for an animal; how from that, the notion that the mark of Cain was a horn or horns on Cain's head arose (in the poignant formulation of the Tanhuma Midrash: Oh father, you have killed something that resembles a man except it has a horn on its forehead!); and how from that, in the maturity of the legend, there flowered Cornish drama, Irish saga, and stunning reliefs of a dying, antlered Cain in the cathedrals of Vezelay and Autun. Like Genesis 4:15 itself, 'The Mark of Cain' is suggestive rather than comprehensive. Concluding chapters on Intentionally Distorted Interpretations of Cain's Mark and Cain's Mark and the Jews bring the history down to our own day, but Mellinkoff does not claim to have said the last word on the subject. Her achievement is neither documentary nor exegetical but rather demonstrative: she shows us with brilliant economy how the artistic imagination functioned in a world whose intellectual definition was a closed canonical text.
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Add this copy of The Mark of Cain: an Art Quantum (Volume 20) to cart. $12.00, very good condition, Sold by Chaparral Books rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Portland, OR, UNITED STATES, published 1981 by University of California Press.
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Very Good in Very Good jacket. Size: 8x5x0; Minor shelf wear to binding. Light wear & soiling on edges of text block. Tanning on pastedowns & endpapers. Text and images unmarked. Dj lightly shelf worn with scuffs, creases & small tears. Dust jacket in a mylar cover.
Add this copy of The Mark of Cain: an Art Quantum to cart. $15.00, very good condition, Sold by Jero Books and Templet Co. rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Santa Monica, CA, UNITED STATES, published 1981 by University of California Press.
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Very Good in Very Good jacket. Hardcover. 8vo. Signed 1ST EDITION, HARDCOVER WITH DUST JACKET. 8VO WITH 151 PGS. SIGNED ON FRONT FREE ENDPAPER "TO ORA AND ARNOLD...RUTH 24 JANUARY 1981" THE BOOK AND DUST JACKET ARE IN VERY GOOD CONDITION WITH SLIGHT SHELFWEAR/BUMPING TO EDGES. THE INTERIOR IS CLEAN AND TIGHT. THE SPINE IS WHITE WITH BLACK TEXT.
Add this copy of The Mark of Cain to cart. $16.00, like new condition, Sold by Structure, Verses, Agency Book rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Spray, OR, UNITED STATES, published 1981 by University of California Press.
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Fine in Fine jacket. Size: 16mo 6"-7" tall; Sterling condition hardcover copy, with unbruised tips, tight binding, and clean internals, showing only very slight shelf-and edge-wear; not ex-library, with neither underlining nor highlighting anywhere. Bright and shiny dust jacket, illustrated, showing only very minor wear, not price-clipped. A short, informed, accessible study "meant to be read in an evening." 21 illustrations in black-and-white. Volume contains scholarly apparatus in the form of, e.g., notes, index, and bibliography. Noted art historian Ruth Mellinkoff offers three different interpretations of the Mark of Cain motif in Christian and Jewish theology and imagery. xiii [2], 2-151 pp. Member, I.O.B.A., C.B.A., and adherent to the highest ethical standards. Additional postage may be required for oversize or especially heavy volumes, and for sets.
Add this copy of The Mark of Cain to cart. $16.00, very good condition, Sold by Common Crow Books rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Pittsburgh, PA, UNITED STATES, published 1981 by University of California Press.
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Very Good in very good jacket. Octavo, red cloth boards in dust jacket, inscribed by the author, book and jacket are in very good condition, jacket shows edgewear, book has wear to boards and toning to the text block, 151pp+ plates.
Add this copy of The Mark of Cain to cart. $24.00, new condition, Sold by Windows Booksellers rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Eugene, OR, UNITED STATES, published 2003 by Wipf and Stock.
Add this copy of The Mark of Cain: an Art Quantum (Volume 20) to cart. $36.29, good condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 1981 by University of California Press.
Add this copy of The Mark of Cain to cart. $47.87, good condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 2003 by Wipf and Stock.
Add this copy of The Mark of Cain to cart. $80.03, new condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 2003 by Wipf and Stock.
