The Serpent Was Right

Genesis 5:5 says that Adam lived nine hundred thirty years and then he died. The longevity of the patriarchs has been a matter of debate. The many different interpretations about the age of the patriarchs demonstrate that scholars have not yet found a good explanation for the longevity of the antediluvian population.

The statement that Adam died at the ripe old-age of nine hundred thirty years is surprising in light of God’s words to Adam in Genesis 2:17.

After God made man and placed him in the garden of Eden, God gave Adam the following command: “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die” (Genesis 2:16-17).

When Adam told Eve of God’s prohibition, he probably also told her that they were forbidden even to touch the fruit of the tree, for when the serpent enticed Eve to eat of the fruit of the tree, Eve said to the serpent: “God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die’” (Genesis 3:3).

In response to Eve’s reluctance to eat of the fruit, the serpent said to the woman: “You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:4-5).

The serpent was right. The serpent did not lie, for everything the serpent said to Eve happened. This is what happened:

1. Eve touched the fruit (Genesis 3:6) and nothing happened.
2. Eve ate the fruit and gave it to Adam who was by her side (Genesis 3:6) and neither of them died.
3. Adam and Eve became like God, knowing good and evil. God himself said that, after Adam and Eve ate of the tree: “Then the LORD God said, ‘See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil’” (Genesis 3:22).

If the serpent was right and Adam and Eve did not die when they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, what then did God mean when he told Adam that “in the day that you eat of it you shall die?”

The Hebrew construction of the verb in Genesis 2:17 includes two forms of the verb מות (to die): the infinitive absolute and the imperfect. In Hebrew, the infinitive absolute emphasizes an action when it immediately precedes the finite verb.

Gesenius, in his Hebrew Grammar (113n) wrote:

“The infinitive absolute used before the verb to strengthen the verbal idea, I. e. to emphasize in this way either the certainty (especially in the case to threats) or the forcibleness and completeness of an occurrence.” He translates môth tāmûth (מ֥וֹת תָּמֽוּת) thou shalt surely die.

Thus, the full implication of God’s threat to Adam is clear: Adam must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil for the moment he would eat from it he would die. But Adam ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil and he did not die. So, how must one understand God’s prohibition in Genesis 2:17?

One way to interpret the divine prohibition is to say that since one day with God is like a thousand years (2 Peter 3:8), then Adam died before “the Lord’s day” was over.

Another way of interpreting the prohibition is by taking the infinitive form of the verb and translating it as a verbal noun: “dying you shall die.” Thus, God’s threat means that if Adam ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil then, he would eventually die. The Septuagint translates 2:17 as “you shall die by death.”

Another interpretation is that if Adam disobeyed God’s command, he would become mortal. However, this interpretation contradicts Genesis because the book seems to imply that humans were already mortal. The book of Genesis says that man would only live forever after eating from the tree of life: “Then the LORD God said, ‘See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever’” (Genesis 3:22).

In his commentary on Genesis 1-11 (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1984), p. 224, Claus Westermann cites Th. C. Vriezen’s study of the expression “in the day” (Genesis 2:17) to explain that death would not occur the day Adam violated the command. According to Vriezen, the expression “in the day” has a general meaning in the Old Testament and that the expression must not be understood literally, inferring that death would occur immediately after the transgression.

According to Westermann, God’s words to Adam, “in the day that you eat of it you shall die,” “is not a threat of death, but rather the clear expression of the limit which is the necessary accompaniment of the freedom entrusted to humanity in the command. To say no to God–and this is what freedom allows–is ultimately to say no to life; for life comes from God” (p. 224).

I believe that the divine threat should be taken literally, that Adam and Eve should have died on the day they violated the prohibition not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

I disagree with Gordon J. Wenham’s interpretation of this threat as “death before death,” an interpretation that appears in his commentary on Genesis, Word Bible Commentary (Waco: Word Books, Publisher, 1987), p. 74. He wrote: “If to be expelled from the camp of Israel [as lepers were] was to ‘die,’ expulsion from the garden was an even more drastic kind of death. In this sense they did die on the day they ate of the tree: they were no longer able to have daily conversation with God, enjoy his bounteous provision, and eat of the tree of life; instead they had to toil for food, suffer, and eventually return to the dust from which they were taken.”

The reason the divine threat was not fulfilled was because the grace of God intervened and the penalty was not carried out. Probably the best commentary on this verse is found in 2 Peter 3:9: “The Lord is not slow in keeping his word, as he seems to some, but he is waiting in mercy for you, not desiring the destruction of any, but that all may be turned from their evil ways.”

This was the same position taken by John Skinner in his commentary on Genesis: The International Critical Commentary (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1910), p. 67. According to Skinner, the simple explanation why the punishment was not carried out “is that God, having regard to the circumstances of the temptation, changed His purpose and modified the penalty.”

Westermann also intimates a change in God’s decision to carry out the punishment. He wrote: “After the man and the woman have eaten from the tree, a new situation arises in which God acts differently from the way he had indicated.” God’s failure to carry out the punishment “shows that God’s dealing with his creatures cannot be pinned down, not even by what God has said previously” (p. 225).

Westermann concludes his study of Genesis 2:17 by saying: “And so even God’s acts and words are open to misinterpretation and the serpent makes use of this.” I believe it was Westermann who misinterpreted God’s word to Adam when he said that the words in Genesis 2;17 are not a threat but only a warning.

I do not think the serpent misunderstood God. The serpent knew that Eve would not die because it knew the true nature of God, that he was a compassionate God who is gracious to whom he wants to be gracious and who shows mercy on whom he wants to show mercy (Exodus 33:19).

As the Lord said to Moses at the time he had decided to consume Israel because of their great sin (Exodus 32:10): “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin” (Exodus 34:6-7).

So, when it comes to understanding God’s acts and words, Westermann was wrong and the serpent was right.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tags: Adam, Eve, Genesis 2:17, Serpent

The Use of Upper Case in Translations of the Bible

In a recent post on the use of upper case in translating biblical passages, Suzanne McCarthy at Better Bibles Blog wrote:

However, one can see how the choice of whether to use upper case or not could well be doctrinally motivated.

We can’t really have the same experience as those who read this in the original language. Having upper case letters means one thing and not having them means something else.

In her study, she provides examples taken from Judges 9:13, Psalm 110:1, Psalm 2:2, and Isaiah 63:10. In this post, I want to demonstrate that two of Suzanne’s statements are true, that is, “the choice of whether to use upper case or not could well be doctrinally motivated,” and that “having upper case letters means one thing and not having them means something else.”

The use of upper case in English is very common and represents an author’s deliberate effort to communicate a message to the reader. For instance, the word “god” is used to represent a false god while the word “God” is used to represent the God of the Bible. The word “son” is used to designate the offspring of a father or mother while the word “Son” represents Jesus Christ. In the same way, the word “he” is used to designate a man, while the word “He” is used to designate God or Jesus Christ.

This use of upper case to convey a theological message is generally used by Christian writers. For instance, in his book Old Testament Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007), Bruce K. Waltke believes that the Hebrew word for serpent in Genesis 3:1 “functions as a proper name.” He wrote (p. 222): “In Genesis 3:1 the Serpent–with a capital S to represent its uniqueness–brings unaided humanity under its rule.” Thus, the serpent ceases being one of the “beasts of the field which the LORD God had made” to become the incarnation of Satan (p. 265), “that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan” (Revelation 12:9).

In the same manner, the “seed of the woman” becomes a reference to Jesus Christ. Waltke asks: “To whom does the ‘seed’ refer?” He answers his own question by saying: “Surely the most satisfactory identification of the ‘seed’ is Jesus Christ and the church” (p. 62). Although Waltke never uses upper case for “seed,” the New King James Version does: “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel” (Genesis 3:15 NKJ).

These two examples demonstrate that Suzanne’s statement, that the “choice of whether to use upper case or not could well be doctrinally motivated,” is true. The use of upper case in translations of the Bible serves, in many cases, to emphasize a certain theological perspective about a text.

Suzanne’s other statement, that “having upper case letters means one thing and not having them means something else,” can be demonstrated by different translations of Daniel 9:25. Let me illustrate this point by quoting from the King James Version:

Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times (Daniel 9:25 KJV).

It is clear in this translation from the KJV that the word “Messiah” with upper case is a clear reference to Jesus Christ. In late Judaism, the Messiah was considered to be God’s agent who would bring restoration to Israel. The New Testament used the title and applied it to Christ to designate him as the savior of the world.

There is no doubt that readers of the King James would identify the “Messiah” with Christ. The problem with the KJV’s translation, besides the upper case, is that in Hebrew, however, the word “mashiach” means “the anointed one.” So, to do justice to the Hebrew word, the NIV translates Daniel 9:25 as follows:

Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven ‘sevens,’ and sixty-two ‘sevens.’ It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble (Daniel 9:25 NIV).

The NIV corrects one of the mistakes of the KJV. The NIV correctly translates the word “Messiah” but it keeps the upper case in “Anointed One.” Thus, a reader of the NIV will also have no problem identifying the “Anointed One” with Jesus Christ.

The problem with both the KJV and the NIV is that they use the upper case to show that, in the mind of the translators, the “Messiah” or the “Anointed One” was Jesus Christ. The Revised Standard Version eliminates this problem by eliminating the upper case. The RSV reads as follows:

Know therefore and understand that from the going forth of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with squares and moat, but in a troubled time (Daniel 9:25 RSV).

So, in the RSV, the “Messiah” and the “Anointed One” becomes “an anointed one.” However, another problem with the KJV and the NIV is that in they use the definite article “the” to identify the person referred to in Daniel 9:25. In the KJV that person is “the Messiah.” In the NIV it is “the Anointed One.” In the Old Testament two people were anointed: the priest and the king. By using the definite article, both the KJV and the NIV are saying (indirectly) that the “Messiah” or the “Anointed One” is a king.

However, the definite article does not appear in the Hebrew text and the RSV’s translation reflects this fact: “to the coming of an anointed one.” This means that the “anointed one” of Daniel 9:25 could be either a priest or a king. The proper exegesis of Daniel 9:25 reveals that the “anointed one” in Daniel 9:25 is a priest.

Thus, by using the upper case in Daniel 9:25, the translators of the KJV and the NIV say that the “Anointed One” was Jesus Christ, while the RSV by not using upper case is saying that the one coming could be either a priest or a king.

In conclusion, translators should refrain from using upper case in translating biblical texts from Hebrew into English because the use of upper case in translation of biblical texts infuses a text with a theological meaning that may not be present in the original text. This infusion of meaning becomes in itself an interpretation of the text that then is transmitted to readers who have little or no knowledge of the original language. These readers, in turn, will accept the inference that these theologically infused translations represent the real meaning of the text.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tags: Bible Translation, Daniel 9:25, Satan, Serpent