The Purpose of Mankind Through the Christ: Pt. IV - Paradise Lost

Jesus spoke and taught in parables, His wondrous lessons of the Kingdom thus hidden from those not led by the Spirit, but excitingly available to those who are truly His disciples.[1]  We are even promised that the Holy Spirit will teach and reveal to us all things.[2]  I say this to make a point.  If anyone; let me repeat that; anyone inside of or outside of the church ever hits you with the old cliché, “There are just some things we’re not given to know,” then he/she is either not a true follower of the Christ, or refuses to accept the truth that is right before their eyes in God’s recorded word.  The truth, at times, is a startling thing.

What I’m about to lay before you falls into the precincts of the latter, and is based in the foundations of a false doctrine that dates all the way back to the earliest days of the church when first placed under the protection of the Roman Emperor, Constantine.  It is, as mentioned before, quite a startling thing, so follow me all the way through without bailing out at the very first, because I promise you that God’s word will bear me out.  It will do so by establishing itself in many places rather than just one, unlike many of our most accepted modern doctrines, which directly defy the instructions of the Bible, itself![3]  Yes, the footnoted passages concern wrongs, but it is accepted among Biblical Scholars that for every truth illustrated in the Word, the antithesis will also be true, ergo: if wrongs must be established by two or three “witnesses,” then a passage that is accepted for doctrine must also be, and the first contradiction found must deny its doctrinal value.

Now for the first of these doctrinal falsehoods and the first step on the path to freedom in the truth; the serpent of Edenwas not Satan, nor is Satan a fallen angel.  Please stay with me as I establish the reality concerning this statement.  I assure you I will do so quite credibly and without leaving any doubt.  Let’s attack the first half of this premise, the serpent and how Satan relates to this passage of Scripture.  To begin, let’s explore who, or what, the serpent truly was.  For this, we’ll defer to the Jewish Publication Society version of the Bible released in 1917.  Remember, these are the people who consider the first five books of the Bible to be their most sacred of writings. It reads, “Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made.” [4]  Interestingly enough, it reads word for word like the King James Bible we’re all so familiar with.  And how does it identify the serpent, as a beast of the field, nothing more; nothing less.

Yes, the serpent is said to be subtle (rendered “cunning” in some versions) but, none the less, a best of the field.  Neither does any translation of Genesis equate “cunning” or subtle with evil.  In fact, the true rendering of the Hebrew here (`aruwm) is “shrewd, sensible, and prudent.”[5]  This means that the serpent, like so many of us today, had far too much time on his hands and thought too much.  And like so many others, his thoughts took on a logical pattern that sounded reasonable.  That is how the bulk of the false doctrines that permeate the church as accepted, classical beliefs got their foothold.  Someone grasped onto a single passage, thought too long on it, and made it appear to be something it was not, denying the contradictions that arose from it.

There is no evidence, Biblical or extra-Biblical, that supports any claim to Satan as the identity of the serpent of the Garden.  So, who is Satan?  Let’s explore further into this story of man’s downfall from his place of honor and dominion.  Specifically, we will move forward to the curses placed on two of the principle players in this scenario; the serpent and Eve.  In the curse placed on the serpent, we’ll see another validation of who he is, and then explore a spiritual curse placed on him that passes on to his “seed” forever.  First, take another look at the identity of the serpent, as God says, “Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go…”[6]  Here, God is still dealing with the serpent as a beast, but let us look at the next part of the curse; “and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.”

 This begins the spiritual portion of the curse God placed on the serpent.  Nobody in his or her right mind believes that a snake eats dirt.  They eat anything from insects up to (and including) humans depending on the size of the snake.  They certainly do not eat dirt.  So what is really meant by this passage? Simply that the enemy was forbidden to act on humankind through anything but the “flesh” or the physical, base nature.  Did God not tell Adam that he was formed from dirt and would return to the dirt?[7]  This was a curse levied on the serpent and its “seed” to come, but more of that in the next post.

[1] Mark 4:11

[2] John 14:26

[3] 2 Corinthians 13:1, Matthew 18:16, Deuteronomy 19:15

[4] Genesis 3:1a, Jewish Publication Society 1917 version

[5] Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance, #6175

[6] Genesis 3:14

[7] Ibid. 3:19