De Posteritate Caini

Now Moses speaks thus in the case of Abraham: "And Abraham and Nachor took unto themselves wives; the name of Abraham’s wife was Sarai." [*](Genesis xi. 29. ) And in the case of Jacob he says, "Rise up and go into Mesopotamia, to the house of Bethuel, thy mother’s father, and take unto thyself a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother’s brother." [*](Genesis xxviii. 2. ) In the case of Aaron he says, and Aaron took Elizabeth, the daughter of Aminadab, the sister of Naassom, unto him to be his wife." [*](Exodus vi. 23. )

Isaac too and Moses take unto themselves wives, but they do not take them of their own act entirely; but Isaac, "When he went into the house of his mother," [*]( Genesis xxiv. 67. ) is said to have taken a wife; and to Moses, "The man with whom he lodged gave his daughter Zipporah to be his wife." [*]( Exodus ii. 21. )

Now it is not without a purpose that the differences between these persons are recorded by the lawgiver. For in the case of those who practise virtue and improve, and become better, their deliberate choice of the good bears testimony that their labour shall not be dismissed without its reward; but in the case of those who are endued with self-taught and naturally implanted wisdom, it follows that reason is betrothed to them not by their own act, but by God, and that they take unto themselves knowledge, the fitting companion through life of the wise.

But he who is wholly devoted to the things of ordinary men, the lowly and grovelling-minded Lamech, first of all takes for his wife Adah, which name being interpreted, means "witness," having been his own manager of this marriage. For he thinks that Leah, which means the motion and passage out of the mind according to easy perceptions, without anything interfering to hinder its easy comprehension of all things, is the first good for man.

"For what," says he, "could be better than that one’s thoughts, one’s contemplations, one’s conjectures, one’s suspicions, in a word, all one’s ideas, should, as I may say, proceed on well-set feet, so as to arrive at their desired goal without stumbling, the mind being borne witness to in everything that [*](Genesis xi. 29. ) [*](Genesis xxviii. 2. ) [*](Exodus vi. 23. ) [*]( Genesis xxiv. 67. ) [*]( Exodus ii. 21. )