Genesis 3 Footnotes

3:15 This predicted battle between the serpent and the woman would not be a literal confrontation in the garden. The language is figurative, indicating the life-and-death struggle between the adversary and the human family borne by the woman. Like the word sheep in English, the word “offspring” in Hebrew is both singular and plural, meaning either descendants without number, taken as a whole, or one particular descendant. The passage incorporates both meanings by referring to the ongoing opposition to the people of God by their enemies and by predicting the rise of a particular seed, Jesus Christ, who will destroy the serpent in the end (Rm 16:20; Rv 12:9-10).

3:16 The woman’s penalty was not in bearing children but in the increased pain attached to giving birth. “Yet he will rule over you” does not warrant the enslavement of women as chattel. Woman is also created in the image of God and has the honored role of giving birth by which the blessing for all humanity is realized (1:26-28). The Lord’s pronouncement predicts the future rivalry between the sexes for dominance, a rivalry resulting from the sinful condition of the man and woman. These words are not an exhortation directed to the man to dominate his wife. Hebrew law recognized the vulnerability of women and required special deference to them (Ex 22:22; Dt 25:5-10). The NT explicitly commands husbands to love and honor their wives (Eph 5:25; Col 3:19; 1Pt 3:7), and Christian husbands and wives observe their spiritual equality (Gl 3:28) while carrying out their respective God-given roles.

3:22 God’s admission that the man “has become like one of us” does not indicate that the serpent’s suggestion that God was insecure about his position was correct. God was not threatened by the man’s wisdom when he expelled him from the garden, but it was necessary to prohibit the couple’s access to the tree of life, or the penalty of death for disobedience could not be carried out. Although the human couple would die, it was ultimately merciful to deny them the tree; otherwise, they would live forever in a sinful and painful world. God graciously provided for their new environment outside the garden (v. 21), and ultimately for their eternal salvation through the promised “offspring” (v. 15). For the plural “us,” see note on 1:26-27.