Journal: Priscilla Papers
Volume: PP 15:1 (Winter 2001)
Article: Another Look At Eve: Mother Eve Gets A Bad Rap. But Is It Justified?
Author: Jane McNally

PP 15:1 (Winter 2001) p. 8

Another Look At Eve:
Mother Eve Gets A Bad Rap. But Is It Justified?

Jane McNally

Jane McNally was a missionary for forty years in India and the founder and editor of Light of Life magazine. She is the author of Abuse of Christian Women in India, published with a response by Berkeley and Alvera Mickelsen, Remedy in 12 Biblical Studies

Traditional Jewish and Christian interpretations of the early chapters of Genesis have led to the heaviest blame often falling on Eve for the entrance of sin and death into the world. I have encountered in most surprising places the almost word-for-word affirmation of apocryphal Sirach 25:24 (c. 250 B.C.): “From a woman sin had its beginning, and because of her we all die.” Faulty interpretations of many Bible texts concerning women foster the low status, oppression, and abuse of women the world around, which is one of the greatest social evils.

John A. Phillips, in his book Eve, The History of an Idea, notes:

Modern scholarship regards most earlier interpretations of Eve as prime examples of eisegesis—that is, the reading into the text of the writer’s own ideas and prejudices. The real Eve is the Eve of Genesis, and a faithful exegesis of the scriptural story . . . will disclose her. The history of the interpretation of Eve, modern scholars hold, is largely a history of misunderstanding and malice . . . and has little to offer in understanding the Eve of Genesis.1

Phillips’s book details a steady flow, for long centuries, of the maligning of Eve, including the imparting to her of attributes of the Greek Pandora myth. But although he shows that change is on the way, he does not come to a final and satisfactory conclusion.

The Witness Of Scripture

What does the Bible really say about Eve’s participation in the Fall? In close reading and rereading of the Genesis account, I have noted as never before the difference in God’s dealing with Adam and with Eve. This, along with the related New Testament passages as well as Job 31:33, has given sharp focus to the whole account of the Fall.

In Genesis 1, God describes his Creation as “very good.” Both man and woman were created in God’s image and were together instructed to multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, and to have dominion over all living creatures.

Adam was to tend the Garden of Eden, which had been prepared for him, and to keep, or guard, it (Heb. shamar, the same word used in 3:24 where cherubim and a sword guarded the wa...