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Genesis

About this book

Disobedience and Expulsion from the Garden

Chapter 3

1 Now the serpent was shrewder than any of the wild animals⁠ that the Lord God had made.⁠ He said to the woman,⁠ “Is it really true that God said, ‘You must not eat from any tree of the orchard’?”⁠ 2 The woman said to the serpent,⁠ “We may eat of the fruit from the trees of the orchard;⁠ 3 but concerning the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the orchard God said, ‘You must not eat from it, and you must not touch it, or else you will die.’”⁠ 4 The serpent said to the woman, “Surely you will not die,⁠ 5 for God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will open and you will be like God,⁠ knowing good and evil.”⁠ 6 When the woman saw that the tree produced fruit that was good for food, was attractive to the eye,⁠ and was desirable for making one wise,⁠ she took some of its fruit and ate it.⁠ She also gave some of it to her husband who was with her,⁠ and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them opened, and they knew they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.⁠ 8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God moving about in the orchard at the breezy time of the day,⁠ and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the orchard. 9 But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?”⁠ 10 The man replied, “I heard you moving about in the orchard, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.”⁠ 11 And the Lord God said, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” 12 The man said, “The woman whom you gave me, she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it.”⁠ 13 So the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” And the woman replied, “The serpent tricked me, and I ate.”⁠ 14 The Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all the cattle and all the living creatures of the field!⁠ On your belly you will crawl⁠ and dust you will eat all the days of your life.⁠ 15 And I will put hostility between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring; he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”⁠ 16 To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your labor pains;⁠ with pain you will give birth to children.⁠ You will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you.”⁠ 17 But to Adam he said, “Because you obeyed the voice of52 your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you,⁠ ‘You must not eat from it,’ the ground is cursed because of you;⁠ in painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.⁠ 18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, but you will eat the grass of the field.⁠ 19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you will return.”⁠ 20 The man named his wife Eve,⁠ because she was the mother of all the living. 21 The Lord God made garments from skin⁠ for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.⁠ 22 And the Lord God said, “Now that the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil,⁠ he must not be allowed to stretch out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”⁠ 23 So the Lord God expelled him from the orchard in Eden⁠ to cultivate the ground from which he had been taken. 24 When he drove the man out, he placed on the eastern side of the orchard in Eden angelic sentries who used the flame of a whirling sword⁠ to guard the way to the tree of life.⁠

Texts in conversation

Compare Genesis 3:10 and Isaiah 47:3

Hebrew Bible

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Summary

Genesis 3 describes Adam hiding because he was naked and afraid, connecting nakedness with fear and shame. Isaiah 47 similarly uses the exposure of nakedness as a metaphor for Babylon’s humiliation.

Passages

Genesis 3:10

Hebrew Bible
8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God moving about in the orchard at the breezy time of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the orchard. 9 But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” 10 The man replied, “I heard you moving about in the orchard, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.” 11 And the Lord God said, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” 12 The man said, “The woman whom you gave me, she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it.”
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Genesis

Isaiah 47:3

Hebrew Bible
1 “Fall down! Sit in the dirt, O virgin daughter Babylon! Sit on the ground, not on a throne, O daughter of the Babylonians! Indeed, you will no longer be called delicate and pampered. 2 Pick up millstones and grind flour. Remove your veil, strip off your skirt, expose your legs, cross the streams. 3 Let your naked body be exposed. Your shame will be on display! I will get revenge; I will not have pity on anyone,” 4 says our Protector—the Lord of Heaven’s Armies is his name, the Holy One of Israel. 5 “Sit silently! Go to a hiding place, O daughter of the Babylonians! Indeed, you will no longer be called ‘Queen of kingdoms.’
740–450 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Isaiah

References

"... In order to harmonize nakedness, a catchword central to the Yahwist composition, and connect it with other parts of the text, we find in Genesis 2:25 before the temptations: “And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed,” implying that there was no ‘guilt’ before the serpent intervened. In Genesis 3:10 both hide because they are naked (whereas three verses earlier they have made their own loincloths) and because they are afraid. Nakedness is again present in Genesis 3:11 where the Lord God said: “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” ... Isaiah’s own nakedness is used to prefigure Egypt and Ethiopia’s downfall. The prophet’s nakedness is an allegory of Israel’s shame that will be avenged, roles at long last inverted. The Lord said to Isaiah “Go loose the sackcloth from your loins and take the sandals off your feet” and he had done so, walking naked and barefoot. Then the Lord said “Just as my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot for three years, as a sign and a portent against Egypt and Ethiopia, so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians as captives, and the Ethiopians as exiles, both the young and the old, naked and barefoot, with buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt.” (After Assyria had conquered Israel in 740, many fled to Egypt for safety ... Esarhaddon in 671 BCE took Egypt with surprise and ease, drove out the Ethiopian rulers and destroyed the Kushite Empire in the process) Isaiah 47:3 ... humiliation of Babylon: The town is addressed as ‘virgin daughter’, again a feminine allegory. “Your nakedness shall be uncovered, and your shame shall be seen. I will take vengeance, and I will spare no one.” ..."
Chris Albert Wells, Adam and Eve Misguided: Ancient Israel's Original Sins (Université Paris, 2020), 1–20.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Genesis 3:10 and Isaiah 47:3

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