聖經註釋書

Genesis 3:6. When the woman saw, (or perceived) — But how? Certainly by believing Satan and disbelieving God. Here we see what her parley with the tempter ended in; Satan, at length, gains his point; God permitting it for wise and holy ends. And he gains it: 1st, By injecting unbelief respecting the divine declaration. 2d, By the lust of the flesh: she saw that the tree was good for food, agreeable to the taste, and nutritive. 3d, By the lust of the eye, that it was pleasant to the eye. 4th, By the pride of life, a tree not only not to be dreaded, but to be desired to make one wise. In a similar way Satan still tempts, and too often prevails: by unbelief and their own lusts, men, being tempted and drawn away (εξελκομενος, drawn out of God, James 1:14) from his fear and love, and obedience to his will, are enticed, insnared, and overcome.

She gave also to her husband with her — It is likely he was not with her when she was tempted; surely if he had been, he would have interposed to prevent the sin; but he came to her when she had eaten, and was prevailed with, by her, to eat likewise. She gave it to him; persuading him with the same arguments that the serpent had used with her; adding this, probably, to the rest, that she herself had eaten of it, and found it so far from being deadly, that it was extremely pleasant and grateful. And he did eat — This implied unbelief of God’s word, and confidence in the devil’s; discontent with his present state and an ambition of the honour which comes not from God. His sin was disobedience, as St. Paul terms it, Romans 5:19, and that to a plain, easy, and express command, which he knew to be a command of trial. He sins against light and love, the clearest light and the dearest love that ever sinner sinned against. But the greatest aggravation of his sin was, that by it he involved all his posterity in sin and ruin. He could not but know that he stood as a public person, and that his disobedience would be fatal to all his seed; and if so, it was certainly both the greatest treachery and the greatest cruelty that ever was.

Genesis 3:7. The eyes of them both — Of their minds and consciences, which hitherto had been closed and blinded by the arts of the devil; were opened — As Satan had promised them, although in a very different sense. Now, when it was too late, they saw the happiness they had fallen from, and the misery they were fallen into. They saw God was provoked, his favour forfeited, and his image lost. They felt a disorder in their own spirits, of which they had never before been conscious. They saw a law in their members warring against the law of their minds, and captivating them both to sin and wrath; they saw that they were naked — That is, that they were stripped, deprived of all the honours and joys of their paradise state, and exposed to all the miseries that might justly be expected from an angry God; laid open to the contempt and reproach of heaven, and earth, and their own consciences. And they sewed, or platted fig leaves together — And, to cover at least part of their shame one from another, made themselves aprons — See here what is commonly the folly of those that have sinned: they are more solicitous to save their credit before men, than to obtain their pardon from God!

Genesis 3:8. They heard the voice of the Lord God walking, &c. — It is supposed he came in a human shape; in that wherein they had seen him, when he put them into paradise. For he came to convince and humble, not to amaze and terrify them. And they hid themselves, &c. — A sad change! Before they had sinned, if they heard the voice of the Lord God coming toward them, they would have run to meet him; but now God was become a terror to them, and then no marvel they were become a terror to themselves.

Genesis 3:9. The Lord God called, (probably with a loud voice,) Where art thou? — This inquiry after Adam, may be looked upon as a gracious pursuit in order to his recovery. If God had not called to him to reduce him, his condition had been as desperate as that of fallen angels.

Genesis 3:10. I was afraid, because I was naked — He confesses his nakedness, which was evident; but makes no mention of his sin. This he wished rather to hide, feeling, indeed, the shameful effects of it, but not yet being truly penitent for it.

Genesis 3:11. Who told thee thou wast naked? — That is, how camest thou to be sensible of thy nakedness as thy shame? Hast thou eaten of the tree — Though God knows all our sins, yet he will know them from us, and requires from us an ingenuous confession of them, not that he may be informed, but that we may be humbled; whereof I commanded thee — Not to eat of it; I thy Maker, I thy Master, I thy Benefactor, I commanded thee to the contrary. Sin appears most plain and most sinful in the glass of the commandment.

Genesis 3:13. What is this thou hast done? — Wilt thou own thy fault? Neither of them does this fully. Adam lays all the blame on his wife; nay, tacitly, on God. The woman whom thou gavest to be with me as my companion, she gave me of the tree. Eve lays all the blame on the serpent. The serpent beguiled me.

Genesis 3:14. God said unto the serpent — In passing sentence, God begins where the sin began, with the serpent, which, although only an irrational creature, and therefore not subject to a law, nor capable of sin and guilt, yet, being the instrument of the devil’s wiles and malice, is punished as other beasts have been when abused by the sin of man, and this partly for the punishment, and partly for the instruction of man, their lord and governor.

Upon thy belly shalt thou go — And “no longer on thy feet, or half erect,” say Mr. Henry and Mr. Wesley, (as it is probable this serpent, and others of the same species, had before done,) “but thou shalt crawl along, thy belly cleaving to the earth,” the dust of which thou shalt take in with thy food. And thou, and all thy kind, shall be reckoned most despicable and detestable, (Isaiah 65:25, Micah 7:17,) and be the constant objects of the hatred of mankind. But this sentence, directed against the serpent, chiefly respected the infernal spirit that actuated it, and his curse is intended under that of the serpent, and is expressed in terms which, indeed, properly and literally agreed to the serpent; but were mystically to be understood as fulfilled in the devil; who is “cursed above all irrational animals; is left under the power of invincible folly and malice, and, in disgrace, is depressed below the vilest beasts, and appointed to unspeakable misery when they are insensible in death.” — Brown.