Cainites

As Kindred is called the followers of a Gnostic sect of the 2nd and 3rd centuries.

The Cainites worshiped the Old Testament sinners, like Cain, Esau, Korah, and the Sodomites, they believed that they had against Abel, Enoch, Abraham, and Moses possessed the perfect knowledge. Unlike in the New Testament gospels they also saw in Judas Iscariot not the despised traitor, but those disciples who have realized the only truth (see: Gospel of Judas ).

The most important tradition of the sect of Cainites is the Panarion ( Refutation of All Heresies ) of Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis († 403). Irenaeus mentions it in his work Against Heresies ( Against Heresies ). Tertullian continues in his work De baptismo ( From the baptism) with its rejection of Christian baptism apart.

Mentioned it in the literature, for example in Hermann Hesse's Demian. The opinion of the Cainites on the story of Cain and Abel are described there in the second chapter.