Illuminations

042

Eve And Adam

Touching the forbidden fruit

In our June issue, we published a story by Pamela Milne entitled “Eve and Adam—Is a Feminist Reading Possible?” Milne analyzed the Eve and Adam story in terms of its attitude toward Eve as woman. In this issue we pursue another aspect of this endlessly fascinating story so rich in interpretive possibilities. Pinchas Lapide explores another curious, but related aspect of the story: God tells Adam he may not eat of the fruit. But in Eve’s report to the serpent, she says that God forbade touching as well as eating the fruit. How did Eve get this idea? And what implications does this have for man, woman and their relationship?

“Now the serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild beasts that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say: ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?” The woman replied to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the other trees of the garden. It is only about fruit of the tree in the middle of garden that God said: ‘You shall not eat of it or touch it, lest you die’ ” (Genesis 3:1–3).

There is a problem here. Eve tells the serpent that God had proscribed touching the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. We know what God said. We’ve already been told what God said. He said nothing about not touching the fruit of the tree.

This is what God said: “And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, ‘Of every tree of the garden you are free to eat; but as for the tree of knowledge of good and evil, you must not eat of it; for as soon as you eat of it, you shall die’ ” (Genesis 2:16–17).

Note that God had communicated this prohibition to Adam, not to Eve. At that time, Eve hadn’t even been created. (That occurs in the second half of chapter 2.) Eve must have learned from her husband about the prohibition against eating the fruit. The question is: Did Adam add the bit about not touching the fruit when he told Eve of the prohibition? Or did Eve add it herself when she told the snake about the prohibition?

Traditional exegetes are divided on the question. One group says that Eve added it herself, that she tended to exaggerate, that she was simply too garrulous. Another group argues that Adam quoted God incorrectly when he told Eve about the tree; as a safety measure, Adam added on his own initiative the prohibition on touching. This view is disputed by the interpreters of the first school, who cannot believe that Adam had such a vivid imagination.

In any event, the addition of the prohibition against touching proves fatal, for it provides the opening for the snake—leading Eve to believe that God had not really meant what he said about punishing a transgression of the proscription. Actually, the snake appears to have been looking for a way to suck Eve into his nefarious plot (he is the craftiest animal in the garden—Genesis 3:1). The bit about touching gives him the opportunity. The snake opens the conversation with a provocative question: “Did God really say: “You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?” (Genesis 3:1). we have already quoted Eve’s reply, which includes the prohibition against touching as well as eating. The passage ends with her questioning God’s threat of death as the punishment for transgression: “You shall not eat of it or touch it, lest you die” 043(Genesis 3:3).

The snake then says to Eve: “You are not going to die” (Genesis 3:4).

The text is silent on the matter, but there are those who believe that the snake demonstrates that she would not die for violating the prohibition by having her touch the fruit. Because nothing happens when she touches the fruit, she supposes she can also eat it with impunity. In this way, the snake is able to entice her.

Just think, if Eve hadn’t added the prohibition about not touching, we might all still be living in paradise.

“You will be as God, knowing good and evil,” the snake promises (Genesis 3:5). Adam and Eve had all they needed to live a carefree life in harmony with God and his creation. But Eve aspired to higher things. Was her thirst for knowledge, her yearning for self-development, part of the basic of humanity?

Eve understands the snake’s words as a promise of greater achievement, more knowledge, a more intense life, equality with her own prototype, God. As bearer of God’s image she is, in fact, already like God. But to be equal to God—that is worth some careful consideration! None of this, however, does she discuss with Adam. Although their common fate is involved, she does not ask his counsel. By deciding in favor of going it alone, Eve reveals herself as the first theologian. She explains God’s will to the snake, but she also knows the consequences of transgressing the prohibition. “Then you will die,” God had said. On the other hand, there stands the prospect of omniscience—a promise that attracts only the clever Eve, apparently leaving Adam cold.

Adam, in fact, reveals himself to be rather reserved, taciturn and, to put it mildly, not terribly energetic. During the entire story he plays a miserable walk-on role, which the Bible refuses to embellish one iota.

While Eve acts independently and takes responsibility on herself, Adam sits idly somewhere off by himself. There is not a single word to suggest that he hesitates, weighs his options or even reminds his wife of God’s omnipotence. The Fall reaches its dramatic peak in a short laconic sentence, which is, in its very terseness, suggestive: “And she took of the fruit and ate and gave her husband of it as well, and he ate” (Genesis 3:6). Adam neither participates in the debate with the snake nor makes slightest attempt to influence his wife. He follows his wife blindly, without question. Idle, taciturn and passive—Adam is portrayed as a silent fellow-eater.

The fruit of the tree in this passage has for almost 2,000 years been painted, sculpted and described as an apple. But the text speaks only of an undefined “fruit.” How did we get to the apple, of all things, which was unknown in the Near East until a century ago? In Jerome’s fifth-century Latin translation of the Bible, known as the Vulgate, the word for “evil,” with which the snake’s speech ends (Genesis 3:5), is malum. Malum can also mean apple, and so this false apple was projected back three lines, to end up ultimately in Eve’s hands, where it never was in the first place.

But this is not the end of the story. God takes a walk in the garden; Adam tries to hide in the undergrowth. God asks him, “Where are you?” (Genesis 3:9). Adam replies, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid” (Genesis 3:10).

God replies, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat of the tree from which I had forbidden you to eat?” (Genesis 3:11).

Note Adam’s reply: “The woman You put at my side—she gave me of the tree, and I ate” (Genesis 3:12).

This answer should be enough to make any man blush with shame. Although Adam neither impressed God’s prohibition on Eve nor made the slightest attempt to steer her from her purpose, when it comes to settling accounts, he pushes his guilt aside in an instant, looks for scapegoats to hang his own responsibility on, and immediately, with no difficulty, finds two. First the woman: She led me astray, he tells God. Still more. “The woman You gave me,” he adds in the same breath, intimating: You pushed her on me. Eve bears the blame, he protests, and attempts to make God himself an accessory, while Adam is a pure innocent lamb.

Rabbinic tradition deduces from this that Adam was a coward liable for four offenses: (1) eating the forbidden fruit, (2) defaulting in not having stopped Eve, (3) fleeing into threadbare excuses that convince no one, and, not least, (4) lacking insight and repentance.

This article was translated for Bible Review by Arlene Swidler and was called to our attention by Professor Leonard Swidler, professor of Catholic thought and interreligious dialogue at Temple University, Philadelphia.

Eve And Adam