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Bible Study | March 29, 2024 | |
The Continuing Story of Adam and Eve |
The story of Adam and Eve is not about two people that we have nothing in common with. We have inherited common natures and therefore common weaknesses that cause us to make the same mistakes.
Therefore the story of Adam and Eve is the story of us.
In this study we will see what the Bible shows us about the nature of Eve that caused her to fail in the way she did. Her failings are not the same as Adam's failing, so we'll also see what the Bible tells us about his nature.
Satan has been watching Adam and Eve, studying their weaknesses. His meeting with Eve is not a coincidence. He has found an attack vector that he is sure will work.
For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. (Genesis 3:5)
His main target in Eve is her perception of her position. She isn't thrilled with the idea that she is the 3rd and bottom rung of the ladder. First there is God, then Adam, then her. She is Adam's helper. It would be wrong to say she is unhappy about that. More correctly, she is aware of it. She probably wonders why it has to be that way and why it will always be that way.
Her perception is the problem. She thinks that, because she has a boss, that makes her of less value. Worse, because her boss has a boss, she is of even less value. She doesn't see that everyone has a boss, except God. She doesn't see that, for people to work together, there must be bosses and bosses of bosses.
Satan, through the snake, is offering her an opportunity to change that. She can move up the ladder. Not only can she move up to Adam's level and be equal to him, she can move all the way up to God - leaving Adam at the bottom.
This appeals to her. If she was content with her life, she would have dismissed Satan's suggestion.
Satan pushes the point by saying this situation didn't just happen, "God knows". It is a conspiracy against her, to keep her down. He is implying she must act to protect herself.
This also appeals to her because she is too eager to hear a conspiracy theory. She doesn't check it with Adam or God. Perhaps her nature isn't capable of countering a conspiracy theory with other evidence. If she did try to check it, she wouldn't know who to believe. So there is no point in checking it.
It also appeals to an instinct I can't name. Is it an instinct for self-preservation that rears its head or is it a fear of being fooled and looking foolish?
All three of these call to weaknesses within her:
Eve has two other weaknesses that have already been gnawing at her for sometime:
These were not part of Satan's appeal but Eve finds them for herself as reasons to go along with the snake.
The Bible doesn't detail Adam's failings to the same extent as Eve's failings. We have to fill in the blanks and that requires some reasoning and perhaps a little guessing. The text only gives us this:
so she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. (Genesis 3:6)
I've covered the likely sequence of events in another study and won't dive into why they are the most likely. Along with that the meaning of the "with her" clause.
The careful reader will see a repetition here of the same nature that Satan played on.
Now that she has changed, Satan's work is done. Eve takes up that role. She doesn't have the skill or knowledge to lie as well as Satan but she quickly figures out how to be a trickster.
Adam's failing, and God shows this later, is that he isn't acting in his role as the boss over a helper.
Paul makes a point here that is critical to understand.
And Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and violated the commandment (1 Timothy 2:14)
While they both failed, their sins were not equal. Eve's sin was intentional and therefore more serious. Therefore Adam was given the lead role in the family.
Paul's point also includes the idea that the line of Adam still has that role, even in New Testament times.
God returns and questions them about what they have done.
And the man said, "The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave to me from the tree, and I ate." (Genesis 3:12)
Most people see this only as Adam trying to deflect the blame away from himself and onto Eve. That isn't the whole story. Adam sees himself as the aggrieved party. He sees himself as having done nothing wrong, as though he was walking along and Eve kicked out her foot to trip him.
He sees God as having given him a defective person, one who isn't trustworthy.
He is wrong about that. He was given the commandment not to eat from the tree and was responsible to make sure he didn't. He has unconsciously tried to delegate that responsibility by trusting Eve too much, thinking that she has his interests at heart. She did have his interests at heart … until she changed.
Then Yahweh God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" And the woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate." (Genesis 3:13)
Eve is doing something different than Adam in her response. She is refusing to be accountable for eating the fruit and she doesn't even address Adam's allegation that she tricked him. Dealing with her wrong-doing this way is also part of her nature.
She says "The serpent deceived me" but that isn't the truth. Deception doesn't work that way. No one can be deceived by someone else. Deception works by people lying to us and we deceive ourselves into believing the lies. Eve loved the lies the snake was telling her.
Look at the verse from 1 Timothy above. Paul says she was deceived, not that she was deceived by the snake.
Men have different natures than women. That was true with Adam and Eve and it's true now. Adam's nature has come down to the men of today. In lesser or greater degrees, we fail in the same way that he did, shirking responsibility, and not acting in our role.
In the same way, the Eves of our day refuse to be accountable when they do wrong. They love gossipy stories and conspiracies. They see themselves as put-upon by men (and by God if they believe in God). They are strongly attracted to what they view as pretty and to experiences.