Sonde Gen 3

The Story of the Fall (Gen. 3). This story stands aloof from legal concepts and does
not influence them. Perhaps using and bending mythological materials, the author depicts
the origin and results of sin with childlike force. He does not use the common terms,
since these would be out of place in this portrayal of life. Apart from a few hints he lets
readers draw their own conclusions, focusing on the events that the terms are meant to
explain. He thus brings out far more clearly the sinister reality with which theology and
cultus deal.
The basic ideas of the story are the prohibition that expresses the divine will, the
clever serpent that sees the apparent disproportion between the transgression and its
consequence, the question put to the woman, her readiness for scepticism, the suggestion
that the warning is not serious and is only in the divine interest and against human
interests, the attractiveness of the fruit, the foolish violation by the woman and the
compliance of the man, and the four results: shame at nakedness, hiding from God,
subterfuges to excuse the action, and punishment by God.
The stress in this chain of events lies on what is mysteriously indicated by the phrases
“being as God” and “knowing good and evil.” “Being as God” involves doubt that God’s
rule is really in the human interest and unconditionally binding. Helped by the serpent,
the man and woman see that they can transgress the divine order. Indeed, they believe
that practical reason, exalting itself as lord and God, impels them to do so without
bothering about religious correctives or divine judgment.
Yet the story also points out that there is no escaping divine accountability. Those
who try to be as God finally stand before God like children who have been found out and
are full of evasions. The author thus brings out the full absurdity of the Prometheus motif.
But he does so with insight into the tragic human situation in which it seems that there is
immanent justification—in the desire for culture, the work of thought, and sensual
longing—for human hostility to God and the attempt to break free from the divine
prohibition. The true reality of sin can be grasped only when one perceives that the divine
likeness itself opens up the possibilities of deviation and the unfathomable distress which
every act of deviation causes when it comes under the pitiless divine glance.
In spite of aetiological features, then, the story in its totality offers a perspective on
human existence as a whole. The curses undoubtedly explain common features of human
life, just as the realization of nakedness explains the general use of clothing.
Nevertheless, the explanations carry weight only because they relate, not to an isolated
act, but to an act that is typical of the way that all of us act toward God and incur guilt
before him. The aetiology thus extends beyond details—even such momentous details as
sorrow, work, shame, and death—to the reality of sin as the real force behind all human
unrest and unhappiness. Incidentally, shame at nakedness serves very well to express the
shame, the insecurity, and the secretiveness that result from sin, quite apart from the
problem of sexuality which it also involves.
A more general aetiological explanation justifies us in building on the story a doctrine
of original sin in the sense of universal sinfulness. Sin is motivated by a human impulse
that is present in all of us, so that in thousands of variations we will all be tempted
similarly and sin similarly. The uncontrolled intellect is in conflict with religion, and
freedom of will and thought prepares the ground for sin. By making the serpent the
representative of the uncontrolled intellect, the author stresses the demonic character of
the thinking which derives from doubt and engages in fanatical striving. This comes over
us like an outside force, strengthens existing desires, and thus overpowers uncritical
obedience. Our experienced inability to resist at this point compels us to recognize the
general validity of the phenomenon. Wishing and to some extent able to be wiser than
God and to pierce behind his thoughts, we open up a sphere of mistrust in which we
renounce our proper attitude as creatures, regard the Creator with cynicism, and act as
though we were ourselves God, responsible only to ourselves. Since reason and the
power of judgment are native to us, the motive for sinning is present just as necessarily as
life itself.
The author, however, is not trying to give a theological but a popular account. Piety
rather than theology comes to expression in his simple presentation. An unsparing desire
for truth gives it its unforgettable impress. Nowhere else in the OT do we find religious
discussion that is so penetrating and yet so sustained by piety. The narrator is not
spinning a theory but speaking out of the compelling experience of inner tension and
trying to give his readers some sense of the serious situation which is inseparable from
human existence. Why God made us thus, he does not try to say. His religion is to be
found in this silence. [G. QUELL, I, 267-86]
1

OT Old Testament
1Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. 1995, c1985. Theological dictionary of the
New Testament. Translation of: Theologisches Worterbuch zum Neuen Testament. (45).
W.B. Eerdmans: Grand Rapids, Mich.