The Holy Quran did not mention the names of these two sons of Hazrat Adam, leaving them as mere names, but in the Torah, their names are mentioned as mentioned in the title. Regarding their incident, Hafiz Hadith Imaduddin bin Kathir has narrated a tradition with a chain of transmission from the 1st century in his history, which is narrated from Hazrat Abdullah bin Masood (may Allah be pleased with him) and some other companions. Its content is as follows: Hazrat Adam had a custom to increase the number of people in the world that he would marry a boy and a girl born from the air with all the children born from other wombs. According to this custom, the marriage of Qabil and Abel was in question. Qabil was older in age and his sister was more beautiful and handsome than Abel’s sister.
Therefore, Qabil was very unhappy that according to the custom, he should marry Abel’s sister. In order to end the matter with Abel’s sister, Hazrat Adam (peace be upon him) decided that both of them should offer their sacrifices to God Almighty. The one whose sacrifice is accepted is the one who deserves to fulfill his desire. As is known from the Torah, in those times, there was this divine law for the acceptance of sacrifice: the offering and the object of sacrifice were placed on a high place and fire appeared from the sky and burned it. According to this law, Abel offered God one of his best brains from his river and Cain from his cultivated cabbage. The good and bad intentions of both were judged by this act.
Therefore, according to the law, fire burned Abel’s offering and thus the honor of acceptance came to him. Qabil could not bear this insult and in a fit of rage he said to Abel, “I will not leave you without killing you so that you cannot achieve your goal.” Abel replied, “I will not raise my hand on you in any way. Whatever you wish, I am doing the sacrifice. Therefore, only good intentions can be accepted in the sight of God. There, neither threats of evil intentions can work, nor unreasonable anger and grief. This advice had the opposite effect on Qabil and he, in a fit of rage, killed his brother Abel.”
