Sin at the Door: How The Bible Defines Sin

The Bible as Psychological Drama

The whole of the Bible is psychological drama, and the early chapters of Genesis are not primitive myth but carefully coded metaphysics. Every verse plants a seed of symbolic truth. When we reach Genesis 4:7, the word sin makes its first appearance—not as a list of taboos, but as something far more subtle and internal:

"If you do well, will you not be honoured? and if you do wrong, sin is waiting at the door, desiring to get control over you: but you are to get the better of it."
(Genesis 4:7, BBE)

This is not a scolding from a distant deity. It is a revelation of divine law. A message from awareness itself to the outer man—Cain. And it is here that the true nature of sin is quietly defined: not as wickedness, but as misalignment. As missing the mark.

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Sin as Missing the Mark

The Hebrew word translated sin is chatta’th, from the verb chata’—to miss the goal, to fall short, to err. In this light, sin is not moral failure but imaginative error. To sin, in Neville Goddard’s terms, is to assume wrongly: to dwell in the state you do not wish to manifest.

Every time you imagine the worst, or assume defeat, or act from envy as Cain does — you miss the mark. You sin.

But look again at the verse:

"If you do well, will you not be honoured?"

In other words, if you assume well — if you align with the feeling of the wish fulfilled — your offering (your state) is accepted. The outer world reflects your inner state.

This is not punishment. It is principle.

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The Inner Cain and Abel

Neville Goddard describes Cain and Abel as two aspects of your own being. Cain is the outer man—your conscious reasoning mind, tied to appearances. Abel is the inner prototype—your imaginal activity, the state unseen but real.

• Cain, the outer man, brings an offering of the ground—what he has already cultivated in the visible world.

• Abel brings the lamb—something more interior and symbolic: the assumption of already being.

"But in Cain and his offering he had no pleasure. And Cain was angry and his face became sad." — Genesis 4:5

God “had pleasure in” Abel’s offering, not because of its content, but because it aligns with the principle of creation.

Here, the word pleasure resonates deeply with the Hebrew meaning behind the Garden of Eden itself—a state of perfect harmony and alignment within. This pleasure signifies the inner condition of being in tune with creation’s divine order, the very state lost when outer consciousness separates from imagination. Cain’s offering fails to evoke this pleasure because it reflects the outer man’s focus on visible, cultivated things rather than the imaginal assumption of the wished-for state.

Thus, pleasure here symbolises the Edenic harmony of imagination and reality unified—the foundational state necessary for manifestation and spiritual fulfilment.

Cain’s anger, then, is not just emotional—it’s symbolic of how the outer man resents the unseen nature of imagination. Cain refuses to believe that the inner world governs the outer. But here comes the warning:

"Sin is waiting at the door, desiring to get control over you: but you are to get the better of it."

This “sin” is at the threshold of consciousness. It crouches at the edge of assumption. It desires to be expressed — but you may rule over it.

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You May Rule Over It

Here is the heart of the matter: You are not the victim of sin — you are its master. Imagination is not a wild force to be feared. It is your servant.

Sin lies at the door when you forget who you are. When you allow yourself to assume weakness, lack, or jealousy. But you may choose differently. You may rule over the inner narrative. You may assume, and persist in assuming, the state you desire.

And if you “do well”—if you embody the feeling of the wish fulfilled—will you not be honoured? Will not your world reflect it?

This is the Law of Assumption, hidden in the very soil of Genesis.

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Genesis 4:7, then, is not just a story about ancient brothers. It is the first utterance of spiritual law: the principle of assumption governing manifestation. The real sin is not moral impurity, but misdirected imagination. The warning is kind, not cruel: be mindful of what you dwell on. Desire will follow you — but you may choose which state it follows.

Rule over the assumption, and the world will yield.