1Now the serpent was more crafty than any wild animal which Adonai, God, had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You are not to eat from any tree in the garden’?” 2The woman answered the serpent, “We may eat from the fruit of the trees of the garden, 3but about the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden God said, ‘You are neither to eat from it nor touch it, or you will die.’” 4The serpent said to the woman, “It is not true that you will surely die; 5because God knows that on the day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it had a pleasing appearance and that the tree was desirable for making one wise, she took some of its fruit and ate. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her; and he ate. 7Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked. So they sewed fig leaves together to make themselves loincloths.
8They heard the voice of Adonai, God, walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, so the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of Adonai, God, among the trees in the garden. 9Adonai, God, called to the man, “Where are you?” 10He answered, “I heard your voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself.” 11He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree from which I ordered you not to eat?” 12The man replied, “The woman you gave to be with me — she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.” 13Adonai, God, said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman answered, “The serpent tricked me, so I ate.”
14Adonai, God, said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, you are cursed more than all livestock and wild animals. You will crawl on your belly and eat dust as long as you live. 15I will put animosity between you and the woman, and between your descendant and her descendant; he will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel.”
16To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pain in childbirth. You will bring forth children in pain. Your desire will be toward your husband, but he will rule over you.”
17To Adam he said, “Because you listened to what your wife said and ate from the tree about which I gave you the order, ‘You are not to eat from it,’ the ground is cursed on your account; you will work hard to eat from it as long as you live. 18It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat field plants. 19You will eat bread by the sweat of your forehead till you return to the ground — for you were taken out of it: you are dust, and you will return to dust.”
20The man called his wife Havah [life], because she was the mother of all living.
21Adonai, God, made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.
(A: v, S: iv) 22Adonai, God, said, “See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. Now, to prevent his putting out his hand and taking also from the tree of life, eating, and living forever — ” 23therefore Adonai, God, sent him out of the garden of ‘Eden to cultivate the ground from which he was taken. 24So he drove the man out, and he placed at the east of the garden of ‘Eden the k’ruvim and a flaming sword which turned in every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.
Takeaways:
Genesis 3 makes me automatically think of the book "Narnia: The Magician's Nephew" when Jadis tells the boy to try the fruit from a tree to solve his problems. If you haven't read the book, then I don't want to spoil it but basically what we can see at the beginning of the chapter is the woman communicating with the serpent and he's convincing her to try the fruit from a tree that God forbid them to not eat from. Initially, when reading this, it didn't pop out to me that there was a talking animal because you definitely don't see that in reality, but you see how cunning this serpent is. God then punishes the serpent and says that he is more cursed than any other animal which would imply that all animals are cursed in a sense. When mankind was created by God, He did give us dominion over animals and throughout the bible you see animals being used as sacrifices. I don't know if that's what is meant by cursed but we do see these things. Just because Adam and Eve (Havah) had physical punishment for their actions does not mean they didn't make it to heaven. I remember someone telling me that if it wasn't Adam and Eve that committed this sin then someone would have eventually, and it makes sense.
We do see that as a result of Adam and Eve's punishment they are condemned to live out their lives and die which is meant by returning to "dust". Also, why you hear so many people saying we are made of dirt, and you can't argue it. We are told that we as people will labor for bread which is true even to this day because we have to labor to eat food. Most of us are not farmers but we do have physical jobs and have to work to earn the food we eat. Although it is sad to read that they were kicked out of the garden of Eden, this does jumpstart the plan of salvation because as you continue to read the rest of the bible, everything builds up for the coming of Christ.
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