Grant’s point is one I think I’ve heard before, and that interpretation also fits very well with the conclusion that men and women’s relationship with each other will get harder after this point.

As for yoooou Petey, yes, I actually put that Eve added to what God said, but then I deleted it because my post was too long, haha. Interesting theory about Adam passing on the message wrong, and men having to redeem the role that Adam screwed up, but humans have a long history of adding to God’s word, so I don’t think Eve would have needed anyone else’s help to do that. (Could extrapolate lots of lessons about legalism though!) And I don’t think God would forbid women to teach on the basis that men need to make up for Adam’s mistake, he seems to give other reasons which we shall get to later. But you’re jumping ahead Petey, the rest of us are still in Genesis.

1) When Eve replies to the first question of the serpent she doesn’t quote God’s command accurately – she adds to it “In fact we must not even touch it or we’ll die”, God’s word is sufficient, she didn’t need to add the bit about touching. Basically Eve didn’t know how to use the Word effectively so when she tried to defend herself against the devil he spotted the weakness and attacked.

2) When the serpent is getting his punishment being the enemy of the woman is part of it. In other words God’s saying ‘look out, she’ll be coming after you and one of her children will get you’ – some liberties taken in the translation…

Thinking out loud, if God had given the initial warning to Adam it is most likely that Adam would have passed it on to Eve, and perhaps he didn’t communicate it very well (as her error in quoting would indicate). Perhaps this would bear on Paul’s instruction in 1 Timothy 2 that women were not to teach – is Paul thinking here that men have to redeem the role they screwed up in the garden? Meh, I’ve no real understanding of this scripture and commentaries on it rarely agree. just thinking