The all too often asked question that has such a simple answer yet too many Christians can't answer. And for years skeptics have used Cain's wife to try and discredit the book of Genesis as a true historical record. Such a popular woman and yet we don't even know her name.

Genesis Four tells us that Cain was the first child of Adam and Eve. He and his brothers Abel and Seth were part of the first generation children ever born on this earth. Even though only these three children were mentioned by name, Adam and Eve had other children.

Genesis 5:4

"And the days of Adam after he had fathered Seth were eight hundred years. And he fathered sons and daughters."

This verse does not say when they were born. Many of their children could have been born in the 130 years before Seth was born. Moreover, the Bible doesn't tell us how many children were born to Adam and Eve, however, considering their long life spans, it would seem reasonable to suggest there were many. And lets not forget Genesis 1:28, "…be fruitful and multiply…."

If we now work totally from Scripture, without any personal prejudices or other extra Biblical ideas, then back at the beginning, when there was only the first generation, brothers would have had to marry sisters or we wouldn't be here today.

Many people immediately reject the conclusion that Adam and Eve's sons and daughters married each other by appealing to the law against brother-sister marriage. Keep in mind we are all one race, and inter-related even before we marry because we are all descendants of Adam and Eve and are all of one blood.

Remember that Abraham married his half-sister (Genesis 20:12) and God blessed this union to produce the Hebrew people through Isaac and Jacob. It was not until some 400 years later that God gave Moses laws forbidding inter-marriages (Leviticus 18-20).

Today, brothers and sisters aren't allowed to inter-marry because of the genetic decay that has resulted from the "fall". The first generation didn't have the genetic deformities we see today. By today's standards, the more distantly related parents are, the more likely it will be they have different mistakes in their genes. And just the opposite is true. The closer the parents are related, the more similarities in their genetic defects, which would result in two bad copies of the gene and therefore, serious defects.