Genesis 3:8-15

8 They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, "Where are you?" 10 He said, "I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself." 11 He said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?" 12 The man said, "The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate." 13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this that you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent tricked me, and I ate." 14 The LORD God said to the serpent,

"Because you have done this,

cursed are you among all animals

and among all wild creatures;

upon your belly you shall go,

and dust you shall eat

all the days of your life.

15 I will put enmity between you and the woman,

and between your offspring and hers;

he will strike your head,

and you will strike his heel." (Genesis 3:8-15, NRSV)

On the first Sunday after Epiphany (January 8, 2006), Daily Office Old Testament readings will begin in Genesis, chapter 1, and over the following six weeks, continue through Genesis, chapter 35. But today’s reading, neither in a daily sequence based on Genesis, nor in a Sunday-to-Sunday Daily Office sequence, perhaps anticipates the later sequence. The story–the LORD God confronting Adam and Eve about their disobedience, and the curse upon the serpent–raises one of the central issues of the entire biblical narrative, the problem of sin and its consequences. When Adam is confronted, “Where are you?” (Gen. 3:8), he cannot hide his new-found knowledge of sin, since he has eaten “of the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (2:17). He was afraid to face God “because I was naked” (3:10). The true part of the serpent’s “half-truth,” “you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (3:5), had come true. (The false part of the serpent’s “half-truth” was, of course, “You will not die” (3:4). But God’s interrogation reveals the truth. “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” (3:11). Adam, of course, “passed the buck.” He blamed Eve. “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate” (v. 12). He was apparently “with her” at the time (v. 6), and could have protested. But “later interpreters of the story have shown a similar tendency to blame the woman” (David M. Carr, NOAB, 3^rd ed., on Gen. 3:8-13). She in turn blamed the serpent. “The serpent tricked me, and I ate” (v. 13).

The serpent is not interrogated, but simply “cursed” (v. 14, cf. vv. 14-15), a term not used of the woman (v. 16), nor of the man (vv. 17-19), though it is used of the ground, “cursed is the ground because of you” (v. 17). Neither the pain of childbirth nor the man’s ruling over the woman should be understood as punishments for the woman, nor as God’s prescription for the “order” of human society. They are nothing more than simple predictions as God foresees the tragic breakdown of harmony within human society. David M. Carr agrees, at least with respect to the “order” issue. The man’s “ruling,” far from representing the divine order of human society, is “a tragic reflection” of it’s “disintegration”:

Though this [i.e. v. 16] is often understood as a “curse” of the woman to pain in childbirth, the word “curse” is not used in these verses. Others have suggested that this text sentences the woman to endless “toil” (not pain) of reproduction, much as the man is condemned in vv. 17-19 to endless toil in food production. The man’s rule over the woman here is a tragic reflection of the disintegration of original connectedness between them. (Carr, on vv. 16-19)

None of the verbs in these words to the woman or the man in verses 16 to 19 is a “weak verb” that would clearly distinguish the jussive, or “command” form from the ordinary imperfect (i.e. future) tense form which ordinarily states a fact about the future. God simply foresees tragic consequences within the human family, which is no more pleasing to him than to the human subjects.

Revelation 12:1-10

The Woman and the Dragon

12:1 A great portent appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. 2 She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pangs, in the agony of giving birth. 3 Then another portent appeared in heaven: a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads. 4 His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. Then the dragon stood before the woman who was about to bear a child, so that he might devour her child as soon as it was born. 5 And she gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. But her child was snatched away and taken to God and to his throne; 6 and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, so that there she can be nourished for one thousand two hundred sixty days.

Michael Defeats the Dragon

7 And war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, 8 but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. 9 The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world-he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

10 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, proclaiming,

"Now have come the salvation and the power

and the kingdom of our God

and the authority of his Messiah,

for the accuser of our comrades has been thrown down,

who accuses them day and night before our God. (Revelation 12:1-10, NRSV)

The following is repeated here from Sunday, June 5, 2005:

“The vision of the woman, the child, and the dragon portrays the conflict between Christ and Satan” (Bruce M. Metzger, NOAB, 2^nd ed.). He adds that “the woman appears to be the heavenly representative of God’s people, first as Israel (from whom Jesus the Messiah was born, v. 5), then as the Christian Church (which is persecuted by the dragon, v. 13). Jean Pierre Ruiz refers to symbolism and “mythological traditions” found in many ancient religions “as well as in the Hebrew Bible,” but notes the same symbolic references here (NOAB, 3^rd ed.). War breaks out in heaven and “the dragon and his angels fought back [against Michael], but they were defeated” (vv. 7-8). The victory is celebrated by “the voice in heaven” (v. 10) which proclaims the poetry of verses 10-12.

The following is repeated here from Wednesday, November 2, 2005:

John sees the vision of a woman, “the heavenly representative of God's people, first as Israel...then as the Christian Church” (B.M. Metzger, NOAB, 2^nd ed.), the dragon (the Devil, or Satan) and the child, “who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron” (Rev. 12:5; vision, vv. 1-17). So war breaks out in heaven, and Satan is thrown down to the earth (v. 9). Conflict continues on earth (chaps. 12-13), but encouragement is provided by the vision of the Lamb with those “redeemed from humankind” (14:4), the announcement that “Babylon” is fallen” (14:8), the blessing on “the dead who . . . . die in the Lord” (v. 13) and demonstration of God's power, the God “who lives forever and ever” (15:7).

John 3:16-21

16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

17 "Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18 Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. 19 And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. 20 For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21 But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God." (John 3:16-21, NRSV)

The following is repeated here from Thursday, February 17, 2005:

John 3:16, the “Gospel in a nutshell,” has a paragraph of its own in the New Revised Standard Version. Raymond E. Brown, sees connections backward–“the theme of Jesus’ death” (vv. 14-15)--and forward: “If 16 assures us that the purpose of the Father’s giving the Son in Incarnation and death was eternal life for the believer, 17 paraphrases this in terms of salvation for the world” (John, Anchor Bible 29, 147). Brown also notes similarities in “the dualistic vocabulary of vss. 19-21 (light/darkness; practicing wickedness/doing truth)” to the dualism of Qumran texts (i.e. Dead Sea Scrolls): “According as man’s inheritance is in truth and righteousness, so he hates evil; but insofar as his heritage is in the portion of perversity, so he abominates truth” (1QS iv 24, cited by Brown, p. 148).

If there is a twofold reaction to Jesus in John, we must emphasize that the reaction is very much dependent on man’s own choice, a choice that is influenced by his way of life, by whether his deeds are wicked or are done in God (vss. 20-21). There is a consistency in the two sides of the dualism: evildoers are disbelievers, while good works and faith go together. Thus, there is no determinism in John as there seems to be in some passages of the Qumran scrolls. . . . the idea is that Jesus brings out what a man really is and the real nature of his life. Jesus is a penetrating light that provokes judgment by making it apparent what a man is. The one who turns away is not an occasional sinner but one who “practices wickedness”; it is not that he cannot see the light, but that he hates the light. (Brown, pp. 148-149)

We need not find ourselves in that last group. “But these [signs/this book] are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name” (Jn. 20:31).

Ronald D. Worden, Ph.D.

rdworden@hgst.edu

rworden@houston.rr.com