Cain and Abel Series: The Rise of Secret Combinations — Satan’s Counterfeit Kingdom (Episode Five)

Cain Rejected Priesthood and Turned to Priestcraft

From the moment Cain’s offering was rejected, ambition smoldered where faith once burned. Episode Four traced how the counterfeit priesthood replaced stewardship with ambition. Now, in Episode Five, that rebellion matures. Cain’s personal defiance becomes organized deception—the first secret combination, Satan’s imitation of heaven’s order.

He who had sought divine authority without submission now sought dominion without God. The counterfeit priesthood became a counterfeit kingdom.

The Covenant with Satan

Scripture records the chilling transaction:

“And Satan commanded Cain that he should know him. And Cain said: Truly I am Mahan, the master of this great secret, that I may murder and get gain.” (Moses 5:29–31)

In that moment, Cain became the archetype of apostate priesthood—the first mortal to enter a binding pact with Lucifer. He exchanged divine stewardship for worldly gain, covenantal blessing for forbidden knowledge.

Satan’s imitation of celestial order required allegiance through secrecy. Where God’s covenants bring light, Satan’s demanded darkness. Where divine ordinances seal families eternally, the adversary’s counterfeit chained followers by fear.

Cain’s oath was not merely personal corruption; it was organizational apostasy. What began as rebellion became ritual, and ritual became a system—a hierarchy of deceit promising power to those who would lie, kill, or conceal truth for advantage.

Birth of a Counterfeit Kingdom

The scripture says: “From that time forth [Cain] became the father of secret works of darkness.” (Moses 5:51). In God’s kingdom, fatherhood signifies creation and stewardship; in Satan’s, it signifies corruption and control.

Cain taught his followers the pattern he had received from Lucifer—oaths of loyalty, hidden tokens, and threats of death to preserve secrecy. What God intended for covenant unity, Satan perverted into conspiratorial bondage.

The lineage of rebellion spread quickly among Adam’s children who “loved Satan more than God.” (Moses 5:13). Thus, the first counterfeit society was born—a mirror of heaven inverted in purpose.

President Spencer W. Kimball warned that every generation must guard against worshiping the false gods of convenience and power, for idolatry ever seeks new forms. [1] His caution echoes the moral decay of Cain’s society—when comfort replaced covenant, and worship turned from the Creator to creation.

The Catalog of Corruption

As revised and restored to your approved format.

“Now behold, those secret oaths and covenants … were put into the heart … by that same being who did entice our first parents to partake of the forbidden fruit—yea, that same being who did plot with Cain, that if he would murder his brother Abel it should not be known unto the world.” (Helaman 6:26–27)

These are the things Satan introduced to humanity—the building blocks of his counterfeit kingdom:

Lying

“Because he had fallen from heaven, and had become miserable forever, he sought also the misery of all mankind … that old serpent, who is the devil, who is the father of all lies.” (2 Nephi 2:18)

Lying is the first tool of dominion by deception—language weaponized against truth.

Murder

“And he did plot with Cain … that if he would murder his brother Abel it should not be known unto the world.” (Helaman 6:27)

Murder is the second covenant of corruption—violence sanctified by secrecy.

Acts of Violence

“But, O my people, beware lest there shall arise contentions among you, and ye list to obey the evil spirit.” (Mosiah 2:32)

Contention, the seed of violence, became the daily language of Cain’s society—power maintained through fear.

Secret Oaths

“Those secret oaths and covenants … were put into the heart … who spread the works of darkness and abominations over all the face of the land.” (Helaman 6:26–31)

Here began the principle of oath-bound loyalty—a structure that mimics the sealing power but binds souls to Satan’s dominion.

Blood Oaths

“And behold, it is he who is the author of all sin … and he doth hand down their plots, and their oaths, and their covenants, and their plans of awful wickedness, from generation to generation.” (Helaman 6:30)

Blood became the counterfeit sacrament of Satan’s kingdom—a mark of supposed commitment that desecrates the life God sanctified.

All Kinds of Wicked Oaths

“And thus we see … that the devil … carries on his works of darkness and secret murder … from the beginning of man even down to this time.” (Helaman 6:26–31)

Every secret order that exalts power over service, secrecy over truth, or fear over faith descends from this original corruption.

The Legacy of the Lie

Moses wrote that after Abel’s death, the Lord declared: “The voice of thy brother’s blood crieth unto me from the ground.” (Genesis 4:10). That cry has echoed through every age of human history. Each generation repeats the same deception—believing gain can be separated from godliness, dominion from devotion.

The counterfeit kingdom thrives wherever truth is bartered for influence, and worship becomes transaction rather than transformation. In ancient days, Cain built a city and named it after his son (Moses 5:42), seeking permanence through posterity instead of repentance. But every city founded on blood eventually becomes its own tomb.

Secret combinations are not ancient curiosities; they are recurring consequences of spiritual amnesia. When humanity forgets its divine origin, it reconstructs Cain’s altar in new forms—political, economic, or even religious. The names change; the oaths remain.

The Continuing Line of Perdition

Cain’s descendants perpetuated his rebellion until the Flood cleansed the earth. Yet scripture teaches that the same spirit reappears “from generation to generation according as [Satan] can get hold upon the hearts of the children of men.” (Helaman 6:30).

Prophets from Enoch to Moroni warned that the final dispensation would again face these combinations. Their power lies not in their secrecy but in their subtlety—justifying evil as progress and redefining sin as strategy.

The Book of Mormon’s recurring pattern shows how nations fall when corruption is institutionalized and how they rise again only through covenant renewal. Cain’s lineage serves as the perpetual cautionary mirror to Adam’s faithful posterity.

Conclusion — The Counterfeit Still Breathes

The covenant of Cain was the adversary’s first counterfeit—a parody of priesthood hierarchy, revelation, and brotherhood. Every later corruption, from Babel to Babylon, echoes its structure.

But the gospel restores what Cain abandoned: covenant without coercion, priesthood without pride, brotherhood without blood. As the Lord declared, “My kingdom is not of this world.” (John 18:36). The rise of secret combinations thus warns every believer that no lie can outlast light.

The counterfeit kingdom may whisper its oaths in shadow, but truth will yet speak from the dust.

1 Spencer W. Kimball, The False Gods We Worship, Ensign, June 1976.