Verses 1 – 7: I hate to break it to you but talking snakes are mythology. That being said, snakes make a great analogy for twisted desire. This twisted desire manifests due in part to the prohibition of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This knowledge we desire leads us to want to be like God—leads us to believe we can be gods. Like Jesus would later say, the serpent is a “liar and murderer” from the start.[1] The lie was that we could know “good and evil” and yes, this would eventually lead to a murder (I will cover this in my notes on Genesis 4). This knowledge we think we have creates the “us over them” mentality we as a species still struggle with.
Verse 8: Many Christians take the stance that God gets offended by our sin. In fact, many believe this offense plays a direct role in why Jesus had to die (see Anselm’s Substitutionary Atonement Theory). But notice that it is humanity that becomes offended. Adam and Eve notice their nakedness (v. 7) but God seeks them out. Surely, an omniscient God knew they sinned and yet searched the sinners out anyway.
Verse 12: From a Girardian perspective, things start to get really interesting. Notice how Adam scapegoats both God and Eve. “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.”
Verse 13: Then, just as predictably, Eve scapegoats the serpent: “The serpent tricked me, and I ate.”
Verse 14: God curses one of his creatures. This would later be contrasted by Jesus in Matthew 5:45, which reads: “He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” Further evidence that God doesn’t cause cursing is in Galatians 3:13. In this verse, Paul is quoting Deuteronomy 21:23b, which reads, “anyone hung on a tree is under God’s curse.” However, in Galatians 3:13, it reads: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.” It is the law, not God that curses.
Verse 16: Piggybacking off the patriarchal slant from Genesis 2, man is to rule over woman. A woman’s job was to give birth and because of the pain childbirth brings, surely it was a curse from God.
Verses 17 – 19: These are obviously traditionally male roles here. The man’s main concern was to work the land and provide for the woman and it was not always easy. Thus, this must also be seen as a curse from God.
Verse 22: “man has become like one of us . . .” There is ample evidence that the early Hebrew belief was that there were a council of gods. Thus, the plural use here. See, also Gen. 1:26.
[1] John 8:4
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In