Genesis 3:1 - Meaning and Application

Here we have the story of the temptation by which Satan attacked our first parents and brought them into sin. It proved deadly for them. The tempter was the devil, acting in the form and likeness of a serpent. This is the same devil and Satan who is called the old serpent (Revelation 12:9). He was created as an angel of light and once stood close before God’s throne, but sin turned him into a rebel against God’s rule and honor.

Many angels fell, but this one was surely the leader of the rebellion. He became a sinner, then a Satan, that is, an accuser and enemy, and then a tempter. He was angry against God’s glory and jealous of man’s happiness. He knew he could not ruin man except by corrupting him. Balaam could not curse Israel, but he could tempt Israel to sin (Revelation 2:14). Satan’s goal, then, was to draw our first parents into sin and break their fellowship with God. In that way, the devil was a murderer from the beginning and the great troublemaker of the human race.

He came in the likeness of a serpent. We cannot be sure whether this was only the visible appearance of a serpent, or a real serpent controlled by the devil. By God’s permission, it could have been either. Satan chose this form partly because the serpent was a fine-looking creature, and perhaps even seemed to come from above, like a messenger from the higher world. Many dangerous temptations come to us dressed in bright colors that hide what they really are. Satan can still appear like an angel of light.

He also chose the serpent because it is a sly and clever creature. Scripture tells us to be wise as serpents, but this serpent, moved by the devil, was more cunning than any other. The devil keeps the skill to do evil, even though he has lost all holiness. He knows how to use whatever he can for his own purpose. Nothing serves him better than cleverness without purity. We do not know exactly what Eve thought when the serpent spoke, and perhaps she herself was unsure what to make of it. She may first have thought it was a good angel, and later grown uneasy. It is striking that many pagan idolaters worshiped the devil in the shape of a serpent, openly siding with that fallen spirit.

The person tempted was the woman, now alone and away from her husband, though near the forbidden tree. This was Satan’s cunning. He aimed at the weaker vessel. Though Eve was perfect in her kind, she may still have been less strong than Adam in knowledge, courage, and steadiness of mind. Some think she had received the command not directly from God, but through her husband, and so might more easily be led to doubt it.

It was also Satan’s policy to talk with her when she was alone. If she had stayed close to the side from which she had been taken, she would not have been so exposed. Solitude gives many temptations a great advantage, while the fellowship of believers strengthens and protects us. He also took advantage of finding her near the forbidden tree, likely looking at its fruit out of curiosity. Those who want to avoid forbidden fruit must stay away from the forbidden tree. Avoid it, do not go near it (Proverbs 4:15).

Satan tempted Eve so that through her he might tempt Adam. In the same way, he tempted Job through his wife and Christ through Peter. This is often his method, to send temptations through hands that do not seem suspicious and through people who have great influence over us.

The temptation itself was handled with great craft. Scripture often warns us about Satan’s devices (2 Corinthians 2:11), his depths (Revelation 2:24), and his schemes (Ephesians 6:11). His clearest examples are his temptations of the two Adams, here and in Matthew 4. In this case he succeeded, but in the other he was defeated. What he said to them, since he had no sinful weakness in them to work on, he now speaks in us through our own deceitful hearts and fleshly reasoning. That makes his attacks less obvious, but no less dangerous.

What the devil wanted was to persuade Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. To do that, he used the same approach he still uses now. He questioned whether it was really a sin, denied that there was any danger in it, and suggested that great gain would come from it. These are still his usual arguments. He first raised doubt about whether God had truly forbidden the fruit. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You shall not eat’?” He began as though he were simply asking about something he had heard, and perhaps he took hold of some private thought already moving in Eve’s mind. One thought often leads strangely to another, and sometimes to something evil in the end.

At first, he did not show his real purpose. He only asked a question that sounded harmless, as if he were saying, “I heard something, is it true, has God forbidden you to eat from this tree?” In that way, he tried to draw her into conversation. Anyone who wants to be safe must be wary of talking with a tempter. He also quoted the command in a twisted way, as if God had forbidden not just that one tree, but all trees. God had said they could eat from every tree except one. Satan exaggerated the restriction in order to weaken the gift. God’s command cannot be made to look bad unless it is first misrepresented.

He seems to speak with a mocking tone, almost scolding the woman for being so careful about that tree, as if to say, “You are being too strict just because God said, ‘You shall not eat.’” The devil has always been a liar and a scoffer, and the scoffers of later days are his children. In this first attack, he aimed to lessen Eve’s sense that God’s command had real authority over her.

Here Satan says, in effect, “You are mistaken. It cannot be that God would keep you from this tree. He would not do such an unreasonable thing.” We see here that Satan’s subtle trick is to damage God’s law by making it seem doubtful or unfair, and then lead people into sin. So our wisdom is to keep a firm trust in God’s commands and a deep respect for them.

When God says, “You shall not lie,” or “You shall not take his name in vain,” or “You shall not get drunk,” and so on, our answer should be clear: “Yes, God has said it, and it is right. By his grace, I will keep it, no matter what the tempter says.” This kind of settled belief helps guard the heart against temptation.

In answer to the serpent, the woman gives a plain and complete account of the law they were under (Genesis 3:2, 3). Here we should notice, first, that it was a weakness in her to keep talking with the serpent. She could have seen from his question that he meant no good, and should have turned away at once with a firm refusal. But curiosity, and perhaps surprise at hearing a serpent speak, drew her into more conversation.

This is a dangerous thing, because temptation should be rejected at the start with contempt and disgust. A fortress that agrees to talk peace is close to giving itself up. Those who want to stay safe must stay away from danger. See Proverbs 14:7 and Proverbs 19:27.

Second, it was wise of her to mention the freedom God had given them, in reply to the serpent’s sly suggestion that God had only placed them in paradise to tease them with beautiful but forbidden fruit. “Yes,” she says, “we may eat the fruit of the trees.” In other words, they had enough variety and plenty, and they owed that to their Maker. It helps to remember often the blessings and freedoms religion gives us, so we do not grow restless under its limits.

Third, she showed some firmness in sticking to God’s command and repeating it as something sure: God had said they must not eat from that tree. When she adds, “Neither shall you touch it,” she seems to be trying to put a fence around the command. It was likely a sincere effort to avoid even the first step toward sin. If we must not eat, then we should not even touch.

Fourth, she seems less exact when she repeats the warning. God had said, “In the day you eat of it you shall surely die,” but she weakens that into, “Lest you die.” Wavering faith and wavering resolve give the tempter a great advantage.

The serpent then flatly denies that there is any danger. He insists that even if they break the command, they will not suffer the penalty: “You shall not surely die” (Genesis 3:4). The wording is a direct contradiction of what God had said. Some take him to mean, “It is not certain that you will die,” as though God’s warning were only doubtful. Satan often tries to shake what he cannot destroy, by questioning the truth of God’s threats. Once a person thinks God’s word may be false or uncertain, unbelief has already found a doorway.

Others understand him to mean, “You will certainly not die.” In that case, he speaks with the same kind of certainty God used when giving the warning. He first questioned the command in Genesis 3:1, but when the woman held to that, he turned to the threat, where he saw she was less steady. He is quick to notice any weakness and strike where the wall is thin. This was a lie, a plain lie, because it stood against God’s true word (1 John 2:21, 27).

It was also against Satan’s own knowledge. When he told them there was no danger in disobedience, he said what he knew from bitter experience was false. He himself had broken the law of his creation and learned, at great cost, that rebellion does not prosper. Yet he tells our first parents they will not die. He hides his own misery so he can drag them into the same ruin. Satan still deceives sinners in this way. He tells them they can sin and still live, and they believe him more readily than God, who says, “The wages of sin is death.” The hope of escaping punishment is a strong support for wickedness and hard-heartedness. “I shall have peace, even though I follow the stubborn thoughts of my heart” (Deuteronomy 29:19).

Then he promises them gain from disobedience (Genesis 3:5). Here he presses his attack, and it is a deadly one at the root. He does more than claim they will not lose anything, he promises that they will gain great things if they take the bait. He could not have led them to risk their own ruin unless he first held out some hope of improving their condition.

He suggests the great advance they would make by eating the fruit, and he matches the temptation to their present innocent state. He does not offer them bodily pleasures, but the delight of the mind. These are the hooks he hides beneath the bait. First, “Your eyes will be opened.” That is, you will have more power and pleasure in thinking and understanding, and you will see farther into things than you do now. He speaks as if they were blind or dim-sighted compared with what they would become then.

Second, “You will be like gods,” like mighty divine beings, not only knowing everything, but also having power. Or he means, “You will be like God himself, equal with him, rivals of him, ruling for yourselves and no longer dependent on him.” What a foolish suggestion. As if creatures made yesterday could become like their Creator, who has always been.

Third, “You will know good and evil,” meaning, you will know everything worth knowing. To support this temptation, Satan twists the name of the tree. It was meant to teach practical knowledge of good and evil, that is, of duty and disobedience. It would also bring experimental knowledge of good and evil, that is, of happiness and misery.

In these ways, the tree’s name was meant to warn them not to eat from it. But Satan twists its meaning and turns it toward their ruin, as if this tree would give them a higher, more detailed knowledge of the nature, kinds, and origins of good and evil. And all of this happens right away, with the promise, “The day you eat it, you will see an instant and improved change for the better.”

In all these suggestions, Satan aims to create two wrong desires. First, he wants them to become dissatisfied with their present state, as if it were not as good as it should be. No situation will satisfy us by itself unless our minds are brought into agreement with it. Adam was not content, even in paradise, and the angels were not content in their first state (Jude 1:6). Second, he stirs up ambition, the desire for advancement, as if they were fit to be gods. Satan ruined himself by wanting to be like the Most High (Isaiah 14:14), and now he tries to infect our first parents with the same desire, so that he can destroy them too.

He also suggests that God had no good purpose in forbidding this fruit. In effect, he says, “God knows this will raise you up, so in envy and spite he has kept it from you.” As if God were afraid to let them eat, because then they would learn their own strength and no longer stay in a lower place. Or as if God resented the honor and happiness that this tree might bring them. This was a terrible insult to God, the greatest disrespect possible. It attacked his power, as if he feared his creatures, and even more it attacked his goodness, as if he hated what his own hands had made and did not want his creatures to be happy.

No wonder then if even the best people are misunderstood and spoken against, since God himself is treated that way. Satan, who accuses believers before God, also accuses God before believers. In this way he spreads division, and he is the father of those who do the same. This was also a very dangerous trap for our first parents, because it would turn their hearts away from God and weaken their loyalty to him. The devil still wins people over by making them think harsh thoughts about God and giving them false hopes that sin will bring gain. So let us do the opposite: think well of God, as our highest good, and think badly of sin, as the worst evil. Then we will resist the devil, and he will flee from us.