Genesis: Chapter 3: Additional Notes & Discussion

Adam & Eve:  Past the Hype

This article is divided into three parts:
1) Notes and Discussion on Language
2) “The Fall of Eve?” or “The Fall of Adam and Eve?”
3) The Bible Uses Figurative Language: Follow Your Heart

1) Notes and Discussion on Language:
Many people underestimate both the challenge of understanding the translation process and the rich amount of learning that can be gained by thoroughly understanding that same process.  I shall set forth the many proposals put forth, and allow the reader to absorb what they will. 

Adam:
-It could be ultimately derived from Hebrew meaning “to be red”, referring to the ruddy colour of human, or from Akkadian “adamu” meaning “to make.” 
-With Adam, God is portrayed as a potter molding man's body out of the clay.  This is a play on the how the words sound in Hebrew.  The Hebrew "Adam" is "man" and "adama" is "ground".  Adam is literally simply named “man”.
-“Adham” is Hebrew for “of the ground” or “taken out of the red earth.”  

Eve:
-From the Hebrew name “Chawwah”, which was derived from the Hebrew word “chawah”, “to breath” or the related word “chayah,” “to live.” 
-With Eve, the name is also descriptive.  The Hebrew name “hawwa” (Eve) is related to the Hebrew word “Hay” (living).  This implies that she is not only the mother of all the living, but also the mother of promised Seed who would give life to the human race now subjected to death. 
-The name given to the first woman by the first man (Gen. 3:20).  The Bible interprets this name to mean “the mother of all living,” both because Eve is, through her sons, the female ancestor of the entire human race and because the name sounds similar to the Hebrew word for “living being.”  The wordplay is probably etymologically incorrect, and later rabbinic tradition proposed a connection with the Aramaic word “serpent.”  The actual linguistic derivation of the name remains uncertain. (Oxford)

2) “The Fall of Eve?”  or “The Fall of Adam and Eve?”
Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, professor at Princeton Theological Seminary, has dedicated her life to understand the Bible and sharing that knowledge with others.  I am going to quote her directly out of my great respect for her learning…..my paraphrasing would be insult to her concise and well-reasoned arguments.  I went back and double-checked the Bible verses myself.  She’s right…the Bible specifically states that they WERE together when the serpent spoke to them; God DID create them as equal; and they were BOTH cursed/punished, not just Eve.  Anyway, in her own words:

“According to the the account in Genesis 2-3, the woman is created to be a companion corresponding to (not originally subordinate to) the man.  Because the two of them eat the forbidden fruit, the man is destined to toil as a farmer in fields of thorns and thistles, and the woman is destined to suffer pain in childbearing.  It is in the aftermath of these divine pronouncements that the man names the woman as he had earlier named the animals, thus indicating dominion over her. 
   
Both Jewish tradition and the New Testament offer a very negative view of Eve, presenting her as representative of the alleged weaknesses of women.  Paul feared that the Corinthian Christians would be led astray from Christ as Eve was deceived by the serpent (2 Cor 11.2).  In 1 Timonthy 2.13-15, Eve’s deception by the serpent and also her creation subsequent to the man are cited as reasons that women must keep silent in church (cf 1 Cor 14.34-35) and hold no authority over men.  Early Christian theologians contrasted Eve’s sinfulness with the perfection of the “new Eve,” Mary,  the mother of Jesus.

This traditional emphasis on the gullibility of Eve and her tendency toward sin is one possible interpretation of the Genesis narrative itself.  Genesis 3 gives no indication why the serpent addressed the woman and even indicates that the man and woman were together when the serpent spoke.  It has been suggested that the serpent might have addressed the woman as provider of food or as theological thinker, not as the more gullible of the couple, and that the woman’s addition to the divine prohibition about the fruit (“we may not touch it”) represents not a lie, but a desirable exaggeration meant to make sure that the basic command would not be broken.  The man and woman together discover their nakedness, together make fig leaf garments, and together hide from the deity.  Both are destined to a life of pain (neither is cursed) because of their actions, and together they are expelled from the garden.  Thus, once the reader sets aside the portrait of Eve based on later tradition, the great skill of the Genesis narrator in presenting a character open to diverse interpretation becomes apparent.”


3) The Bible Uses Figurative Language: Follow Your Heart
This current insistence on refusing to accept that the Bible uses various literary techniques and that every single word is a literal fact, not to be interpreted in any way, is simply foolish.  I’m sorry, but it’s true.  The Catholic Church, the most conservative of believers, maintains the position that we as human being must INTERPRET the Bible, that God can have placed more than one meaning in each story, and that our understanding can be wrong. 
It also specifically, and in multiple places states, that the various events in Genesis are used to illustrate an eternal truth, that God is behind the existence of all, NOT that every event in Genesis took place during a literal 24-hour day, that the world began only 10,000 years ago, or that evolution is completely false.   The following article explain these concepts at further length: http://www.catholic.com/tracts/adam-eve-and-evolution 
As with all, use your mind.  Pray to God for guidance.  And follow your heart.