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Jubilees offers a literal interpretation of the talking serpent in Genesis by saying all animals originally spoke the same language as humans. This is shared by Josephus and similar traditions, who describe the serpent’s speech as natural.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Jubilees 3:28
Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions
27 And on that day on which Adam went forth from the Garden, he offered as a sweet savour an offering, frankincense, galbanum, and stacte, and spices in the morning with the rising of the sun from the day when he covered his shame. 28 And on that day the mouth of all beasts, and of cattle, and of birds, and of whatever walks, and of whatever moves, was closed, so that they could no longer speak: for they had all spoken one with another with one lip and with one tongue. 29 And He sent out of the Garden of Eden all flesh that was in the Garden of Eden, and all flesh was scattered according to its kinds, and according to its types to the places which had been created for them. 30 And to Adam alone He gave (the wherewithal) to cover his shame, of all the beasts and cattle.
Date: 170–125 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Classical
4 God therefore commanded that Adam and his wife could eat from all the rest of the plants, but should avoid the Tree of Knowledge; and foretold that if they touched it, it would lead to their destruction. But while all the living creatures had one language at that time, the serpent, which then lived together with Adam and his wife, showed an envious disposition at his assumption of their living happily and in obedience to God’s commands. And thinking that if they disobeyed them, they would fall into misery, he persuaded the woman, out of a malicious intention, to taste the Tree of Knowledge, telling them that in that tree was the Knowledge of Good and Evil; and that when they obtained it, they would lead a happy life, indeed a life not inferior to that of a God.
Date: 93–94 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Jubilees portrays animals as even more rational than in the Bible. Language is important to Jubilees and is original to creation. Thus, it seems that even animals spoke Hebrew in the beginning. Targum Neofiti (Genesis 11:1) may also hint that animals could speak with humans and each other: “and all the inhabitants of the earth were of one tongue and one speech, and in the language of the Temple they used to converse, for through it had the world been created in the beginning.” Others writing around the time of Jubilees also unquestioningly accepted the idea of original animal speech. Josephus notes that at that time, “all the creatures spoke a common tongue” (Jewish Antiquities 1:41; compare 1:50). Philo concurs, “it is said that, in olden times ... snakes could speak with a man’s voice” (On the Creation of the World, 156). The Life of Adam and Eve (37:1–3) records the story of a serpent biting Seth while he was walking with Eve. Eve curses the serpent because it was not afraid to set itself against a human as the image of God, but the serpent “answered in a human voice: ‘O Eve, is not our enmity against you?’” ..."
A. Rahel Wells, “‘One Language and One Tongue’: Animal Speech in Jubilees 3:27–31,” JSP 28.4 (2019): 319–337.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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