PART 2 OF 7
The Story of Life
The story of Eve begins in the Garden of Eden, when God said unto Adam to name all the animals1. That was more than a simple exercise of naming animals. It was an advanced exercise of taxonomy, through which Adam observed and distinguished the living creatures. It was meant to show Adam that among all the living animals, each species presented as a pair. The conclusion reached after Adam gave them names was that for him there was not found an help meet.
Today, the definition of the woman is absent or tangled in circular reasoning. However, the Bible defines not just what a woman is. But what their role and purpose in creation is. And it stands unique and reserved for what God designed it to be.
The description of how the woman was created in the Garden of Eden is one of exquisite colours. First, it brought nuance to Adam’s solitude, which God declared was not good for the man2. It is for the first time that God declares something not to be good in the whole creation process. The Genesis creation account is full of declarative speech performed by God. The Universe, therefore, is the product of God’s Divine Speech. Later on, John opens his gospel3 account with a similar declarative speech, pointing at Christ. Defining him as preceding the beginning and the cause of it, hence the whole creation.
One other fundamental aspect is the process of creating man and woman. The Bible does not provide all the intricate details. Nonetheless, it says enough to understand God, his character, and the value of humanity. In Genesis chapter one, we find that when God created the human, he made them distinct: man and woman4. In Genesis chapter two, the story is retold, and here the details matter. First, when Adam is created, God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life5. So becoming a living soul. However, when Eve was created out of Adam’s rib, we are not told that God breathed into her nostrils the breath of life6. This should challenge the reader to understand that, once life was put into Adam, what was created from his rib was of equal value, and it was life. I find this to be a prime argument against today’s pro abortion movement. Particularly when attempts are made to justify abortion by denying the humanity or the living nature of the unborn child.
The command given to the man and the woman to be fruitful, multiply and replenish the earth now makes much more sense. The act of procreation between a man and a woman will result in more human life from conception.
The Story of Redemption
In Genesis’s judgment, God doesn’t use many words, but what is said goes to the core of the issue and looks beyond the entire history of humanity, which was yet to come. This is typical of God and the Bible: to condense in one statement so much theological weight. In that, in one verse, to have a promise and a prophecy of redemption through Christ, the seed of the woman, by the bruising of the cross. Bound into one speech of judgment to the Serpent. The culmination of the promise is to end in the victory that is yet to come at the end times, when Christ the Redeemer will crush the head of the Serpent. These great promises are found in Genesis 3:15. But one other important aspect is equally found in the same verse, which will ultimately change how any reader sees God and relates to Him. The promise of an incarnate Redeemer and Victor is made when God speaks judgment upon the Serpent.
Adam will name7 his wife Eve after God speaks His judgments, which bear further weight. Because Eve is not only the mother of all living, but through the seed of the woman, Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, will be conceived. The promise of Genesis 3:15 is foundational to the Christian creed. Because in the midst of judgment against the Serpent, God speaks of redemption. This has a double implication and meaning. For the Serpent, it is judgment ending in final sentencing, being crushed by the seed of the woman at the end of time8. For the woman, Adam and humanity, what is heard as judgment against the Serpent is good news. We ought to see this good news as grace and love, as mercy, justice and salvation.
The story of Redemption is one of life because God is life. God put the man in the Garden of Eden and commanded him not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Because on the day he eats, death will come upon him. And death has surely happened; we see it in Genesis chapter 3, when God clothed Adam and Eve with coats of skins. This is a picture of what was yet to come through Jesus Christ, the promised seed. However, from there onwards, we see death, destruction, and a curse upon humanity. Nonetheless, the Giver of Life and the promise of Redemption is the culmination of new life through faith in Christ.
I do not find it to be incidental that the naming of Eve, the mother of all living, happens after the fall. It speaks more and points to what the enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the Serpent will culminate in. Indeed, Eve is the mother of all the living in the literal sense. However, not all will live, but some will die in rejection of God, his promises and salvation.
Redemption is eternal life through Christ, the seed of the woman. Those who put their faith in the promise of the Messiah looked forward to its fulfilment, while those who witnessed the Lamb of God upon the cross saw the fulfilment of the promise first announced in Genesis 3:15.
Physical death entered the human condition through the Fall. Through the seed of the woman, everyone who believes in Christ becomes a new creation, and what the fall brought upon humanity is reversed into eternal life. Eve was the first woman and mother of humanity. Scripture introduces her as the mother of all living precisely after death has entered the human condition, and after the promise concerning the woman’s seed has been announced. Therefore, the promise of redemption reaches beyond physical death, offering eternal life through Jesus Christ. For those who are in Christ, physical death is not the end, and the second death has no power over them. When death itself is finally abolished, it will no longer be a threat nor a possibility, but merely a dimmed memory.9
Bible References
NEXT IN THE SERIES · Feminism and Femininity – From Promise to Fulfilment
PART 3 OF 7 · Tamar, Preserving the Royal Line – Continuing our exploration of the woman’s significance in God’s unfolding redemptive purposes.
Read PART 1 – Feminism and Femininity – The Grace of Judgement
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Very helpful 👌
This is great, Ruben. I had never before noticed that Eve is not given her name until Gen 3:20. Until this point she is referred to as “a/the woman”, “bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh”, and “wife”. She earns this name because she is “the mother of all living”, as you so elegantly explain in this piece. Thank you!