East Of Eden Analysis

East of Eden is a story that is based on the biblical stories of Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel. Like the story of Adam and Eve, East of Eden has characters that embody Adam and Eve to an extent. While the story of Adam and Eve tells about the beginning of man, how we came to be on this earth, and why we have original sin, East of Eden uses Adam Trask and Cathy Ames as the beginning of a complex and conflicting story of good vs. evil. Adam Trask is presumed to be Adam, good natured and goodhearted, while Cathy is presumed to be Eve. Only while Eve was deceived into committing sin, Cathy embraces it wholeheartedly and commits evil simply for its own sake.

Adam was clearly an Abel, good to the core. In contrast, Charles, his jealous brother, was a Cain figure. Adam’s set of twins took on characteristics of good and evil also. Aron, the fair-haired child, was considered the good son throughout most of the novel. He was his father’s favorite and Abra’s true love. The dark Cal, on the other hand, was jealous and mean. He believed throughout most of the novel that he was incapable of goodness and was condemned to the wickedness of his mother. Ironically, by the end of the novel, Cal became a good son and received his father’s blessings. Through the teachings of Lee, the family servant, Cal had learned that he had the freedom to choose goodness over evil.

The biblical story of Cain and Abel can be found in the book of Genesis. Cain and Abel are the spawn's of Adam and Eve. Cain became envious of his brother, and assassinated Abel. When God found out about this unbearable wrongdoing, he became livid. God disciplined Cain.

So although the “C” characters (Charles and Caleb) were the ones who should follow in Cain’s footsteps and thus be by nature evil, they go through a personal development and they try to redeem themselves throughout the story, whereas the “A” characters (Adam, Aron) do not change as much and remain more or less the same throughout the entire book. The “C” characters were Charles and Caleb and both of them were the characters that had a

Because East of Eden is a novel woven together of many people and many stories, it is an especially difficult novel to summarize. It is impossible to draw character sketches without interweaving them with the storyline, thus, I have combined the characters descriptions and plot summary. The book opens by describing the lives of two very different families in very different parts of America. First the Hamiltons, a patriarch built around the wise but impractical Samuel, who emigrated from Ireland in the early 1900's to start a new life in America in the Salinas Valley. He owns a poor farm where he and his wife Liza raise a family of nine children supported by his blacksmithing

Cain grew up as the very first child in the world. He was the son of Adam and Eve, the handcrafted creations of God at the beginning of time. Cain grew up with a younger brother named Abel. He worked as a gardener while Abel was a herdsman. The turning point in Cain’s life was during harvest time when he brought a sacrifice of vegetables to God while his brother brought the best lamb he had. God accepted Abel’s offering but rejected Cain’s. This threw Cain into an uncontrollable rage in which he planned the murder of his brother. Even though God warned Cain to subdue his evil intentions, Cain murdered his brother. This caused God to curse Cain as an endless wonderer. Cain’s sin was infected into all his descendants to the point of God whipping the slate clean in a flood only to save Cain’s brother’s second brother Seth’s descendant – Noah and his family.

Summary- Adam and Eve bear two children, Cain and Able. Cain is in charge of tilling the ground and Abel is in charge of herding the sheep. They both sacrifice part of their work to God; Cain presenting God the fruit of the ground and Abel the fat sheep of his herd. The Lord favored Abel's offering over Cain and as a result of that, Cain grew very contemptuous and resentful of his brother. Cain murders Abel and the Lord punishes him by banishing him, condemning him to a life of wandering, and the inability to harvest crops.

Cain and Abel were in a situation much more unique than Esau and Jacob, and Joseph and his brothers faced, for the society they lived in was extremely small, and they each had a direct relationship with God. As the book of Genesis tells us, Cain was the first born son of Adam and Eve. Their next son was a boy whom they named Abel. As Cain and Abel grew up both took responsibilities for making a living. Abel

The story Garden of Eden introduces the first man and woman that God created. He put the two of them in a garden where they did not have to provide for themselves. God said everything that was in that garden they could use to their abilities except the tree of good and evil. Everything was perfect until Eve let the Devil bribe her into eating from the tree. Once God found out, he came to the garden looking for them. When they heard his voice they hid. Here is where the alienation comes in. God had everything set up for them that they did not know they were naked. Once they bit into the apple they realized they were naked and clothed their selves with leaves. God had asked them if they had eaten from the tree. Eve and Adam explained

Hundreds of Arawaks arrive from the New World in violation of Queen Isabella’s order forbidding Indian slavery. Aspiring knight Vasco Núñez de Balboa guards the Arawaks en route to the capital. After some Arawaks escape, one escapee impales herself on Balboa's sword to prevent recapture. Columbus' agents report Columbus found "The Garden of Eden". The bad news is the colonists are in rebellion and the Arawak "prisoners of war" are legally enslaved.

A problem that many couples in America face today is infertility. Infertility is the inability to conceive children. More than 6.1 million Americans are currently declared infertile this account for 10% of Americans in the child bearing age (Cooper-Hilbert). This is not only a problem in our world today, but also in the book One Foot in Eden by Ron Rash this is a problem that affects many of the charters. In the book it discusses the backgrounds of each character and talks about what problems they face, and infertility is one of them that shows up more than once. In the book the Sheriff and his wife are affected by infertility because their marriage will never be the same. Also, the main charters Amy and Billy are affected by infertility because of the way other people will view Billy and Billy will now see Amy differently.

In the Biblical story of Cain and Abel from the book Genesis, there is no doubt that Cain was the central character. It was Cain, who got so angry, when God preferred Abel’s gift over Cain’s, it was also him, who had a conversation with God about the role of sin in man’s life and at the end, it was him who killed his own brother, but on the other hand lived a long life full of children. This story is mainly about Cain, so is Steinbeck’s East of Eden.

The painting has been called “a more domestic sort of Eden” because the painter was able to recognize and appreciate God’s creation for everyone to see.

Rape of Dinah- Genesis 34:1-34 The rape of Dinah occurs when Dinah went out to the town of Shechem to go meet another young woman. When she arrives, she is raped by a man named Shechem, who is son of the town’s chief, Hamor. Shechem then decides that he wants to marry Dinah. Dinah’s brothers tell Shechem that in order to marry Dinah, all of the men in the city must be circumcised. Dinah’s brothers, Simeon and Levi, then go into the city and murder Shechem and Hamor, and rescue Dinah.

Particularly with this questioning on man’s fate, we are asked whether we should live life alongside others or not. We come to realize that this same exact theme has been portrayed in another work, and in this case, the Bible. The question we see in Of Mice and Men simply reflects upon the way Cain asked the Lord, “am I my brother’s keeper?” While looking at East of Eden, we come to realize that this is a story in which the story of Cain and Abel (two brothers) is regurgitated in which Steinbeck has the characters of the novel read parts of the Biblical story aloud and enter deep discussions about the story. “Of Mice and Men is an early Steinbeck variation on this symbol story of the human soul. The implications of the Cain-and-Abel drama are everywhere apparent in the fable of George and Lennie and provide us its mythic vehicle.” (Goldhurst 126)