CAIN by José Saramago

3 Stars

"Blessed are those who choose sedition because theirs is the kingdom of Earth."

CAIN is to the Old Testament as DECAMERON is to 14th century (Catholic) Church.

One could argue, quite easily that it is blasphemous. Cain is the protagonist in this time traveling jaunt through the highlights of 'What was God thinking?' in the Old Testament.

This is small taste as Cain witnesses a discussion between Abraham and Isaac:

"Father, I don't understand this religion, But you have to, my son you have no choice, and now I must make a request, a humble request, What is it, Let us forget what happened here, Well, I am not sure I can, father, I can still see myself bound, lying on top of the pyre, and your arm raised, the blade of the knife glinting, That wasn't me, I would never do such a thing in my right mind, Do you mean that the lord makes people mad, asked isaac, Yes, he often does, almost always, replied abraham, Even if that were true, you were still the one with the knife in your hand, [...]

I transcribed this exactly as presented in my ebook copy, including lack of full stops which is a little tricky with the dialogue shifts since the only clue is first letter capitalization. The lack of proper name capitalization was less disconcerting. That said, the formatting made this more difficult. I don't know if the print version has a different layout so it resemble verse instead of prose, but as this is, my eyes had a hard time tracking and skipped lines which necessitated rereading. It was least favorite part of the book.

This book is basically a humorous version of the thoughts that go through my mind when faced with the Bible.

"The road to self-deception is narrow to begin with, but there is always someone to broaden it out, for as the proverb says, self-deception is like eating or scratching, it's all a matter of beginning."

And for any persons feeling the need to tell me I'm going to hell, don't bother.

I feel like I've made progress. Usually when I take these quizzes, I end up in level 7 with the warmongers and suicidals drowning in a river of boiling blood.

Buzzfeed Quiz:  Which Circle of Hell are You Going to?

Favorite quote: 

According to the ancients, the devil's wiles would never prevail over the will of god, but I'm not sure now that things are that simple, it seems likely that satan is just another instrument of lord, the one who does the dirty work to which god prefers not to put his name.