Do you really believe that God would endorse killing and meat-eating shortly after saying the exact opposite? God does not change, if He designed us to live in peace and harmony and nonviolence… Why assume that all the sudden he did a complete turnaround?
First of all, it was an offering or gift, not quite the same thing as the animal sacrifices you have mind.
Secondly, the word that you are hinging your entire argument on, the word translated as "fat", does not automatically mean what you (and many others who grew up eating meat) assume it means. I'm going to post an excerpt from an article on this passage, and I will bold some of the pertinent parts.
However,
some early Christians such as the Montanists apparently thought Abel offered the dairy products of his flock:
In the second century the African Montanists were sometimes called the "Artotyrites" because they added cheese, instead of wine, to the bread in the Eucharist on the ground that the Aquarii, and first men offered the fruits both of the earth and of their flocks (Gen. iv. 3, 4).
http://www.wpl.lib.oh.us/AntiSaloon/print/wine.html
Josephus says Abel offered milk:
They had resolved to sacrifice to God. Now Cain brought the fruits of the earth, and of his husbandry; but Abel brought milk, and the first-fruits of his flocks: but God was more delighted with the latter oblation,
http://www.interhack.net/projects/li...jews/b1c2.html
There's even some memory of the tradition that Abel offered milk in the mideaval Golden Legend of Jacobus de Voragine.
The Hebrew of the Old Testament was originally without vowels. The vowel marks were added at a later time. The particular word render "fat" in the account of Cain and Abel (there are a number of different Hebrew words that mean "fat") is spelled the same as the word for milk and curds. Only the vowels are different. The present Hebrew vowel system didn't come into use until about the ninth or tenth century AD. In fact, it seems likely that when Genesis was written that there was no difference between khay'-leb and kheh'-leb (both of which are spelled cheth - lamed - beth). Both clearly evolved from the same word, and Genesis being one of the oldest Hebrew works, it may be that there was no difference in pronunciation at that time.
One way the passage on Cain and Abel may be rendered is:
And she gives birth to his brother, even Abel. And Abel is feeding a flock, and Cain was a worker of the earth. And it comes to pass at the end of the season that Cain brings from the fruit of the earth a present to the Lord; and Abel, he has brought, he also, from the female firstlings of his flock,
namely from their milk (or possibly curds or milkings); and the Lord looks unto Abel and unto his present. Gen. 4:2-4
The Hebrew word rendered "and" in many translations here most likely means "namely" (This is an example of "hendiadys"). The Septuagint, in the form that it's come down to us, has it that Abel offered from his "fat ones". The point being that Abel offered from his best, while Cain from the worst part of his crop. This is especially clear since we also read in the Septuagint that the Lord said
"Hast thou not sinned if thou hast brought it rightly, but not rightly divided it? be still, to thee shall be his submission, and thou shalt rule over him." Gen. 4:7 LXX.
Again, we need to trust that God does not change. And God is, and always has been, love, mercy, selflessness… Do those things go along with exploitation, brutal violence, and slaughter for the sake of our fleshly desires? No.
There is no need to assume that Abel offered God a dead lamb. That goes against the very character of God – as loving and merciful, the Good shepherd who lays his life down for his sheep… Not the other way around.
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