Federal Headship and the Fall

[py3ak]

How clear do you think it is in the text of Genesis 3 itself or in the NT allusions to this passage that Eve acted in isolation from Adam, and was therefore not submitting to her federal head? Basically I am wondering, if you had to make this point in about one paragraph or less, how would you prove that this was part of what was going on with the Fall? (Assuming you believe that, naturally.) If you don't, why not?

 

[Romans922]

You don't think Adam was standing right there with her?

She didn't submit to God, she seems to be submissive to her husband. He seems to be taking part in the sin when he doesn't say anything. His leadership was not good.

 

[satz]

I don't think its clear at all to be honest.

Unless you are saying that women can't even eat fruit without checking it out with their husbands first.

As Andrew mentioned, Eve's problem was not obeying God. Besides, isn't the submission of the wife unto the husband as we know it now a result of the fall?

I think people often try to read to much into this passage. Whilst there is obviously wisdom to be gleamed for us fallen humans, trying to say Adam was wrong to do this or Eve was wrong to do this forgets that living in a world without sin and not yet having the knowledge of good and evil, the two of them would not have known the concepts of danger temptation and wisdom like we do.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

I agree with Andrew. What is really the strange part that, in addition to Adam being with her, Paul says that Eve was the one deceived! I wonder if he was conducting some kind of experiment seeing if she would die when she ate it or something. I just don't understand it.

 

[py3ak]

Well, it doesn't say that Adam was right there. God says that Adam listened to his wife, not the serpent. That seems to me to indicate that Adam was not with Eve at the moment (and so also Leupold and Milton).
It wouldn't be checking out the eating of fruit --it would be the checking out of what a talking serpent said that I would think would be a good reaction for a wife.
Still, this is why I'm asking. A lot of people seem to see stuff like that there in : Genesis, and that one was not as clear to me as the fact that: 1. Eve listened to a snake who was attacking God's word; 2. She hearkened to her desires rather than to the word of God.

 

[py3ak]

Mark,

I think the disordered submission as we now know it is a result of the Fall. But woman was created for the man (1 Corinthians 11:9), so I think right from the beginning male headship was the plan. You will notice that Paul appeals not only to the events of the fall (a la 1 Timothy 2:14) but also to the creation order (a la 1 Timothy 2:13).

Rich,

I think Adam conducting an experiment would have a Fall before the Fall; and God condemnds Adam for listening to his wife, not for anything else.

 

[py3ak]

Josh,

Leupold felt that the phraseology there actually indicated that Adam was not there with her at the time. The NT doesn't reference Adam in connection with the serpent, and Adam listened to Eve --not to anyone else, apparently.

He says:

The man´s consent to the same sin is reported with such brevity as to amaze us: "she gave to her husband who was with her and he ate." There must be a reason for this. This reason is primarily that through the woman, now already fallen, the same temptation was presented to Adam as had previously been presented through the serpent to Eve, and with the same result. Adam, then, must have fallen exactly as Eve had, with as little excuse, with as great a guilt. The only difference appears to be that, as Eve had eaten and apparently had suffered no ill effect, this constituted an additional argument why Adam need not hesitate to adopt the same course. Whatever stouter resistance Adam might have offered was completely overcome by this argument. The fact, however, that the prepositional phrase "with her" ( ´immah ), which we rendered as a clause, is first found at this point, strongly suggests that at the outset, when the temptation began, Adam was not with Eve but had only joined her at this time. Here, too, Satanic ingenuity displays itself: to approach both while they were together would have found them in a position where they would mutually have supported one another. Such notions, then, as Milton´s, that Adam sinned from a kind of sense of chivalry, not desiring to abandon Eve to her fate, have no support in the text. Nor has the opinion any value that Adam was too closely attached to Eve, a thought that would lead to a fall before the Fall, for it involves that he loved her more than he loved God.

 

[py3ak]

John Calvin:

And gave also unto her husband with her. From these words, some conjecture that Adam was present when his wife was tempted and persuaded by the serpent, which is by no means credible. Yet it might be that he soon joined her, and that, even before the woman tasted the fruit of the tree, she related the conversation held with the serpent, and entangled him with the same fallacies by which she herself had been deceived. Others refer the particle "œwith her," to the conjugal bond, which may be received. But because Moses simply relates that he ate the fruit taken from the hands of his wife, the opinion has been commonly received, that he was rather captivated with her allurements than persuaded by Satan´s impostures. For this purpose the declaration of Paul is adduced, "˜Adam was not deceived, but the woman. (1 Timothy 2:14.)
But Paul in that place, as he is teaching that the origin of evil was from the woman, only speaks comparatively. Indeed, it was not only for the sake of complying with the wishes of his wife, that he transgressed the law laid down for him; but being drawn by her into fatal ambition, he became partaker of the same defection with her. And truly Paul elsewhere states that sin came not by the woman, but by Adam himself, (Romans 5:12.) Then, the reproof which soon afterwards follows "˜Behold, Adam is as one of us,´ clearly proves that he also foolishly coveted more than was lawful, and gave greater credit to the flatteries of the devil than to the sacred word of God.

[Edited on 3-11-2006 by py3ak]