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EVE

 THE STORY OF EVE


Names in the Bible often tell us something about the person:
     Eve was at first called  Ishah, which in Hebrew means ‘woman’. Later she was called Eve, which means ‘life-bearer’.
     Adam comes from the Hebrew word  Adham, which means ‘dust of the earth’.

In ancient societies, giving something a name was a way of showing power over it. Adam gave the woman the name of 'Eve', thus exerting power over her, only after they had disobeyed God and the world had become imperfect. 

The character of Eve in the Genesis story is both
                 a mythic figure, the primordial first mother or  Everywoman, and
                 a personality in her own right.

ON THIS PAGE:

What the story is about:

The First Story of Creation

The Second Story of Creation

Summary

Prehistory

Cultural Background

Women's Lives in this Era

Activities and Focus Questions

Eve, like Helen of Troy and Guinevere, is presented as the pivotal cause of unwanted or destructive change in an otherwise stable world.

There are two creation stories in Genesis:
1 The first story of creation (Genesis 1:1-31 and 2:1-4a). 
The earth came into being, and God created everything in the universe. Mesopotamian stories also told of life emerging from the earth or mud, and of a great flood that destroyed everything, as in Genesis 7 and 8.

2 The second story of creation (Genesis 2:4b-24 and 3:1-24). 
God planted a garden in Eden with every good thing. Everything was as it should be, ordered and calm, but this idyll was destroyed by the actions of people.

In many religions in the ancient world, Evil was seen as one among a number of powerful forces existing in the universe. But for the Hebrew people, God was the most powerful force in the universe, more powerful than Evil. Evil could challenge but never conquer God. (See end of page for historical background and information about the lives of women.)

THE FIRST STORY OF CREATION
(Genesis 1:1-31 and 2:1-4a)
In this elegantly structured story, the creation of the universe unfolds. The stages of development show a surprising resemblance to the stages proposed in modern theories about the beginnings of the universe: there is an empty void, then energy appears, the planets are born, the continents emerge and vegetation, animals and humans appear.

'So God created humankind in his image,
In the image of God he created them;
Male and female he created them,
God blessed them, and God said to them
‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth….'
(Read Genesis 1:1-31 and 2:1-4a)

God in the Old Testament is a spirit, without gender. Despite this, we use words such as  ‘he’ and ‘his’ to describe God. Strictly speaking this is incorrect, because God is neither male nor female. Our usage is an echo of the ancient practice of anthropomorphism, when gods were portrayed as male or female, with human personalities and characteristics. In the biblical story of creation, God is neither male nor female, but majestically ‘I Am Who Am’.

At the supreme moment of creation, God conceives a creature ‘in his own image’. What does the phrase ‘in his own image’ mean? Theologians suggest that people, like God, have a nature that is essentially creative. It is natural for them to imagine, to invent, and to change the world around them, as God does in the Genesis story. They themselves are part of, expressions of, the creative energy of God.

The Bible poses the question: how is this creativity to be used? For good or evil?
In this first telling of the story of creation, men and women are created at the same time. They are spoken of in equal terms: ‘male and female he created them’. They form part of the harmony of all creation.

THE SECOND STORY OF CREATION
(Genesis 2:4b-25 and 3:1-24)

In this section of the story, God creates Adam but sees that there is something lacking.

‘So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; he took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.’
So God created Eve, and completed the creation of the universe.
(Read Genesis 2:4b-25)

Eve is formed from the rib of Adam. They are of the same flesh and the same bone. From that moment neither man nor woman can be complete without the other. Working together, they form the basic unit of society, the family. The story recognizes that men's and women’s lives interlock so completely in economic and social matters, that neither can survive without the other.

Eve and Adam are given a perfect world, but they are also given the power of choosing and of making decisions. One of the creatures in the Garden speaks to Eve, suggesting that God has duped her. If she eats the fruit that has been forbidden to her she will gain new understanding and wisdom, so great that it will be comparable to God's.

(Read Genesis 3:1-24) 

Because she has no experience of deceit, Eve believes the snake and makes her choice, deciding to seek knowledge of good and evil rather than be obedient. As humans, we continually test boundaries and try new ideas, and in the Genesis story woman as ‘life-giver’ is the one who initiates this process. It is a dangerous choice, reminding us that the quest for knowledge should always be balanced by wisdom. Eve will soon realize her mistake.

  Minoan priestess holding two snakes, 
                                                     fertility symbols of death and rebirth

Adam eats the fruit without thinking or arguing. Like Eve, he misuses his ability to make decisions and does not consider the consequences. Again, the quest for knowledge should be accompanied by careful judgment. 

Why is the snake used as a symbol of evil? It was an important image in ancient religions. The goddess Astarte, who represented the fertility of nature, was often portrayed with snakes. People saw the dead skins shed by snakes, and assumed that the snake had in some way died but then come alive again. They saw the seasons of the year following the same pattern: in winter all things died, but in spring Nature mysteriously sprang back to life. So the image of a snake was used in polytheistic fertility rituals, especially those relating to the seasonal cycles. To the Hebrew people, the snake was shorthand for polytheism, which was anathema to Jahweh and monotheism.

(Click here to see the section on ‘Women and Ancient Religions).

As the story continues, the original harmony between humanity and nature is disrupted. Both sexes become locked into fixed roles. In a perfect world, a world without sin, things like inequality and injustice do not exist, but the Garden of Eden is lost.

'Adam and Eve', Tamara de Lempicka

PREHISTORY
People have always struggled to understand how the world came into being. Each society developed explanations for creation, and coded these explanations inside stories. Modern science still reflects this universal yearning to understand, inherent in human nature.  The story of Eve is one such story, set in mythic pre-history, the world of beginnings, of unfolding creation. It deals with a time outside time, a moment that lasted an immeasurable eon, as the world became what it is. 

The creation stories in Genesis 1-3 grew out of a society quite different to our own. There were two separate ways of life, co-existing with each other: 
    *  nomadic life, where  people traveled with their cattle, moving from pasture to pasture as the seasons changed and periods of drought and plenty occurred
    *  settled agriculture - farms and crops provided a relatively stable existence, and villages and towns gradually appeared.

Nomadic life was precarious but relatively free and easy. 
Agriculture was more secure but entailed back-breaking labor and problems such as individual land ownership, hygiene and sanitation, and the stress of living with neighbors.

People chose the system that best suited the climate and fertility of their land, but agriculture gradually won out over nomadic life, because it was more secure and could support a larger population. 
The struggle between these two ways of life is mirrored in the stories of the Garden of Eden, in Eve's choice of the apple, and in the fight between Cain and Abel. 

WOMEN’S LIVES IN THIS ERA
For information about the lives of women in this era, refer to Item 6 in 'Activities' at the end of this chapter.

  'The Guardian of Paradise', Franz Stuck

ACTIVITIES AND FOCUS QUESTIONS

1   Doodling
Take a little time to do the following: Print the words GOOD and EVIL. Cross out one of the O's in GOOD. Put a D in front of EVIL. What do you have?

2  Discovering the characters
The four characters in the Genesis story are God, Woman, Man, and Evil
Working from the text, draw up a list of the characteristics of each of the four. Give at least three words for each. Be careful that the words you think of are related to the story as you read it in the Genesis text, and not to ideas you have inherited from other people.
Compare your list with the list of a learning partner. Are there differences?
Discuss with your learning partner the qualities of each character. (Woody Allen commented that the problem with the Bible is that it suffers from a totally unbelievable main character!)

3   Comparing the stories
Read the two stories about the creation of woman in Genesis 1:26-31 and Genesis 2:21-25.
· What do they tell you about the creation of woman?
· How are the stories different from each other?
· What different impressions do the stories make on you?

4   Discussion
Topic 1: How might the creative potential we have, being made ‘in God’s image’, be used to restore the Garden?
Topic 2: How does the story of Eve illustrate the connection between actions and consequences?

5  Focus Questions 
1. What are the most interesting moments in the story? Why do these particular moments appeal to me?

2. In the story, who speaks and who listens? Who acts? Who gets what they want? If you were in the story, which person would you want to be friends with? Which person would you want to avoid?

3. What is God's interaction with the main characters? What does this tell you about the narrator's image of God? Do you agree with this image?

4. What is happening on either side of the story, in the chapters before and after it? Does this help you understand what is happening?

5. The narrator/editor has chosen to tell some things and leave other things out. What has been left out of the story that you would like to know?

6. Are the characteristics and actions of the people in the story still present in the world? How is the story relevant to modern life, especially your own?

6   Reworking the story of Eve
The following is a re-working of the story of Eve, picking up on some of the main themes of the story, which are 
     God as creator, and humans made in the image of God (The creativity of God and of humans)
     The introduction of agriculture (Eve and the apple, woman as an agent of change) 
     Fertility religions (the Serpent) 
     Conflict between farmers and nomadic herders (Cain and Abel) 
     Warfare (the murder of Abel) 
     Clothing as covering rather than decoration (fig leaves) 
     Living in cities (leaving the Garden of Eden) 

"This is the story of primal woman. Eve is Everywoman, who initially lives in a hunter-gatherer society. 

She and the other tribal women are responsible for gathering fruits, seeds and roots, which form the bulk of her tribe’s diet. The men hunt for meat, the main source of protein. As a fruit- and root-gatherer, she has noticed that plants re-grow in the same area year after year, springing up where seeds have been spilled. 

It occurs to her that planting left-over seed each year rather than simply harvesting random plants would be better, more reliable. She has this knowledge in the back of her mind, but does nothing about it. 

Growing crops becomes women’s work, since men must now concentrate on warfare to defend their area of land. Now that her tribe is only partly nomadic, people begin building more durable shelters whenever they stop in one place. Villages appear, then towns, then cities, with all their accompanying problems. 

They realize there are good seasons and bad ones, and they wonder how they can control Nature. The wind and the rain and the sun seem capricious. What is to be done? The earth is like a great mother to them, giving them everything they need to survive, and water is necessary if their crops are to grow. So it seems that the earth and the rain from the sky are like wife and husband, acting together to produce new life. When people begin to have a little control of Nature, they want more. 

There are quarrels between two of the woman’s  sons, one who promotes farming, and the other who longs for the old nomadic ways. They see their mother’s  innovation as a mixed blessing. One of her sons kills the other in an angry, violent fight. Their quarrel is repeated in the wider world - tribes no longer trust their neighbours, and violence often occurs. 

Because of the new system’s efficiency, there are more people to feed. Groups of them must move to other areas, with colder climates. This means clothing for warmth rather than decoration, one more task for the women. The groups that move out to form new colonies lose touch with the main group, and eventually develop new words and ways of speaking. It becomes difficult for people from different groups to communicate, and eventually they speak different languages, making communication impossible. 

Eve as Everywoman wonders if the changes were a good thing. There is more stability, more security but less freedom, less leisure, and a lot more work. The Garden is gone. She has gambled with God, and she is not sure whether she lost or won."

Re-write this myth to express themes that are relevant to your own personal story, with yourself as Everywoman in a modern context. Begin by identifying the significant themes in your own life, and in modern society. Integrate these two sets of ideas. Construct a story about yourself and your journey through the events of your life.