Week 2: Genesis 3:1-24

Week 2: Genesis 3:1-24

At A Glance:

Author: Moses or "J"

Form: Ancient Origin Story

Themes: Disobedience, disintegration of original unions, curses instead of blessings, contrasts with chapter 2.

Summary:  The first two chapters relate the first covenant and perfect state of holiness of creation, if only chapter two ended with “and they lived happily ever after”.  Instead chapter 3 opens with an adversary who convinces the woman and the man to question and ultimately disobey God.  By disobeying God they put themselves in opposition to God and broke God’s familial covenant.  The curses that follow are a reversal of the covenant blessings in chapter 2.  The story ends with banishment but a small glimmer of hope.     

Commentary

3:1 – There is a play on words here between the “naked” (Hebrew: “’arum-mim”) of 2:25 and “cunning” (Hebrew “’arum).  This word play shows the contrast between the innocent state of holiness of the humans and the foul intentions of the serpent.  Wis 2:24, Rv 12:3, 9, among other verses, attest to the true identity of the serpent as the Satan (in Hebrew literally “accuser”).  This is the one day and night accusing us before God (Rv 12:10). 

3:1-3 – Both the serpent’s question and the woman’s answer are inaccurate interpretations of the original covenant condition in 2:16-17.  God commanded that “You are free to eat from any of the trees of the garden except the tree of knowledge of good and evil. From that tree you shall not eat; when you eat from it you shall die.”  God invited eating of all trees in the garden less one, and did not prohibit touching the fruit of the forbidden tree.  This reminds me of one of the reasons why I want to dive into scripture so exhaustively.  The serpent knew the word of God and twisted it (like he will do again in Matthew and Luke’s Gospels), and the woman knew God’s word, but apparently not very accurately.  To avoid falling into the snares of the devil I need to know God’s word.  By “knowing God’s Word” I mean the words of God in Scripture but most importantly its fullest meaning as the singular and eternal divine Utterance of God: Jesus.

3:5 – The serpent’s attack began with questioning the condition of God’s covenant-bond, and now with an attractive twisting of the truth.  By telling the woman that she shall not die and that she will be like God “knowing” good and evil he instills doubt about God’s goodness.  It sounds like a good thing to live knowing good and evil, but as I mentioned in the reflection on chapter 2 “to know” in Hebrew is experiential.  It is not simply an awareness of what is good and evil, it is what many scholars call a “moral autonomy” in which we have the right to decide what is good and what is evil.  Immediately placing us in competition to our creator who has already declared what is good (1:31).  Ultimate moral autonomy is not a “freedom” that we gain but rather chains that enslave us and prevent us from recognizing true Good and true evil.  If it is ultimately true that something is good, our calling it evil does not change its nature, it changes ours.  Likewise if something is ultimately evil, our calling it good does not change its nature, it changes ours. 

The serpent also claims that the woman shall not die if she eats of the fruit.  Like the twisting of the truth mentioned above, the serpent only relays part of the truth.  It is true that once she eats of it she does not die physically, but physical death is not the only kind of death we can experience. 

3:6 – After questioning God’s covenant and instilling doubt by twisting God’s words the woman opens her eyes to the fruit and experiences the ultimate threefold temptation.  Seeing that the fruit is “good for food” she is tempted by the pleasures of the flesh, seeing fruit as “pleasing to the eyes” is the temptation of possession, and finally “desirable for gaining wisdom” is the temptation of pretentiousness.  This threefold category of sin is sometimes called the threefold lust of the flesh and is found again succinctly in 1 Jn 2:16: “For all that is in the world, sensual lust, enticement for the eyes, and a pretentious life, is not from the Father but is from the world.”  Although the woman falls to this threefold temptation, Jesus will later conquer all three when he faces the devil at the end of his 40 days in the desert.

3:7 – It appears that the serpent is right and upon eating of the fruit of the tree they did not die and their eyes were opened.   It is clear that they did not experience a physical death, but there was an immediate change and it is linked to their experience of their nakedness when their eyes are opened.  Their original nakedness without shame (2:25) is lost, now they hide their nakedness in their shame.  They have fallen from their state of original holiness and can no longer perfectly love one another.  They do not see each other as they once did, beautiful, perfect, and good, these things opened them up to be free, total, faithful, and fruitful gifts to one another.  Their moral autonomy makes them question the goodness of the other putting a barrier (in this case fig leaves) between their ability to make a perfect self-gift to one another. 

3:8-10 – God reenters the scene at the “breezy time of the day” the man and woman hide, but their sin is not hidden from God.  The 2^nd chapter of Genesis reads with a certain joy but this chapter that joyful union with God is gone and now the man expresses that he is “afraid”. 

3:11-13 – God does not question his children because he is unaware of their actions, but rather he questions his children to invoke the opportunity to repent and beg forgiveness for the offense made.  Instead Adam blames the woman (and indirectly God), and the woman blames the serpent.  We are so often incapable of confessing our sin, it is humiliating for us.  It reminds us that we are not what we want to be so we try to find others to blame. I believe this is why Jesus established the sacrament of reconciliation in John 20 as the normal means of absolution from sin, so that we can name our faults and failings, be humbled, and become what we are made to be. 

3:14-19 – The curses begin with the serpent and met their climax with Adam.  The original state of holiness and justice is disintegrated; the covenant-bond has been broken.  Adam and the woman have ended their relationship with God and God delineates what life will be like without him.

3:15 – This is one of three subtle but significant gestures showing that separation from God will not be the last word.  This verse is sometimes called the “protoevangelium”.  God speaks of the offspring of both the serpent and the woman, declaring that although the serpent will strike the offspring of the woman will ultimately triumph.  The verse point to Jesus, the seed par excellence of the woman, who will ultimate destroy the seed of the serpent which is the devil. 

3:16 – What is meant to be the joy of the woman – namely childbearing – now will only come through great suffering.   The original union as partner with her husband has been disintegrated as well; because of sin he will now lord over her.  

3:17-19 – The man’s punishment is the climax of this scene.  He is the one with whom the covenant was made and the breaking of it is ultimately his failure.  His work of cultivation and care in the Temple Garden as high priest is gone, now he toils and sweats among thorns and thistles.  Man is cursed to live a hard life on ground apart from God until he returns to the ground with which he was made.

3:20-21 – Here are the last two subtle but significant gestures that indicate that separation from God will not be the end of the story.  Adam names his wife “Eve” (“Hawwa” in Hebrew) which is related to the Hebrew word for “living” (“hay” in Hebrew) indicating that this separation will not alter God’s original plan to make them fruitful.  Secondly God makes them more proper clothing for the hard lives which they will live out.  This gesture serves as a reminder of where they came from and that although they are separated from their union with God he still loves them. 

3:22-24 – The banishment from Eden is the close of this very sad scene.  God, not willing that they sin further by eating of the Tree of Life while in their current fallen state and being forever separated from him, banished them from the Garden.  It is in this separated fallen state in which the rest of humanity will be born, a state called by the Church “original sin”. 

Final Thoughts

            It is hard to read this chapter and not think of my own faults and failures.  The first two chapters of Genesis reveal that I was made for perfect union with God, with my neighbors, and with God’s creation, but this chapter reminds me how I’ve failed in each one of these areas.  We are all culpable of the sin of Adam and Eve, both individually and communally.  We sin against God, one another, and his creation in our private lives, as well as through the communal systems we put in place to govern us: “How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?” (Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium 53). 

            I also have a sense of hope, because I know that sin does not have the last word.  There will be another threefold temptation, and another Garden where a new Adam will accept God’s will over human desire.  Where Adam and Eve ate and did not die a physical death but a spiritual one, the new Adam will drink of the cup of suffering, die a physical death but never a spiritual one.  His perfect obedience and love for God, and for who he calls his brothers and sisters, and for all of creation will conquer death and he will rise to give us new life in him.  We will no longer yearn for the Garden which has passed away, but rather for the Kingdom which is given to us through a person so perfectly so “that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Rm 8:38-39)

This is only the beginning of sin.  The rest of the Sacred Scriptures will be a roller sin and covenantal communion until a perfect covenant is made.