Eve has been vilified throughout the ages as the first to sin and a seductress. Most early interpreters and many modern preachers continue to cast off the blame like Adam did for eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil: “The woman you put here with me — she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it” (Gen. 3:12, NIV).
These are the last words we hear from Adam in the Bible. What are the problems with Adam’s response and how is Eve redeemed through the rest of the story in Genesis 4?
The Scene of the Serpent’s Temptation
While the serpent directed his conversation to the woman, the man was present. Although speaking to the woman, the serpent used the masculine plural form of the Hebrew “you” with corresponding verbs in every sentence (Gen. 3:1, 4, 5). The woman replied using “we” (Gen. 3:2).
While this might be explained away, Genesis 3:6 carries a string of sequential narrative verbs (wayyiqtol) informing that “she saw … she took … she ate … she gave also to her man who was with her and he ate” (translation and emphasis mine). The woman did not go looking for the man as John Milton’s fanciful, misogynistic Paradise Lost portrays, with Adam “fondly overcome with female charms.”1 Rather, the man acted willfully.
Both were undeniably culpable. After eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, both man and woman tried to cover up the new awareness of their naked vulnerability and tried to hide from the Lord in fear when they heard him in the Garden.
God called out to the man, since God had first given the man the instructions to not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. God confronted Adam to give account for his actions. He took no responsibility, but blamed not only the woman, but at the core, blamed God who gave her to be with him (Gen. 3:12). The problem was not that the man listened to the woman but that he failed to obey God. “God does not let the man off the hook but asks him, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” (Gen. 3:11, NIV, emphasis mine).2 God holds the man accountable for his actions, just as he holds the woman responsible for hers.3
God then asks the woman with equal dignity to give account for her actions. She answers truthfully, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate” (Gen. 3:13; 1 Tim 2:14, NIV).
But this is not the last we hear from her. The voice of Eve is heard two more times in Scripture: at the birth of Cain and at the birth of Seth (Gen. 4:1, 25). These two utterances point to her faith in God’s redemption. Although Eve sinned and experienced deep grief, she believed the promise of God recorded in Genesis 3:15 when he spoke to the serpent:
I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will strike your head,
and you will strike his heel.
— Genesis 3:15 (NRSVue)
This passage in Genesis 3:15 is often called the protoevangelium, meaning, “the first gospel.” Due to the serpent’s actions, conflict becomes assigned between him (malevolent forces or Satan) and the promised “seed” of the woman: the one who would strike the head of the serpent as a mortal blow, while the serpent would only inflict a wound, striking the heel of the promised one.
Let’s be clear. Both Adam and Eve betrayed God when they each chose to follow the serpent’s words rather than God’s. Their actions brought chaos and conflict into the world in both the earthly and the spiritual realms. Tim Mackie calls the consequences God pronounced upon the woman and the man “God’s lament”: “Yahweh naming the new normal in light of the decisions that they have made.”4
But hope prevailed.
Eve Speaks Words of Faith After the Exile
East of Eden, outside the Garden, Adam and Eve gave birth to their first son. Eve named him Cain, saying “I have acquired (qnh) a man (ish) with Yahweh” (Gen. 4:1, my translation). This birthing narrative is highly unusual. There is nothing like it in the Bible.5 Her hope in God’s promise of providing an offspring through the woman who would crush the serpent’s head is hinted through her strange words.6
She names her son Cain from the Hebrew word qanah, or qnh, in Hebrew, which can mean “to buy, acquire, produce ”or “create.”7 Furthermore, she doesn’t call him a baby or boy, but a man, an ish. Eve’s language echoes Adam’s excitement when he first saw her and called her ishshah in Gen. 2:23. “Eve now says, in effect: ‘I, a woman (ʾishah), was produced from man (ʾish); now I, a woman, have in turn produced a man.’”8 Old Testament scholar Gordon Wenham takes her statement as a declaration of faith in the messianic promise from Gen 3:15.9
“She declares that this man she bore was acquired not with Adam but with Yahweh, which can imply ‘together with’ the LORD. But there is further possible ambiguity concerning the meaning of the little word connecting man (ish) with the LORD (Yahweh). Some understand her statement as a declaration of faith in the messianic promise from Gen. 3:15, saying, ‘I have gained a man, the LORD.’10 Regardless of how her curious words are understood, we should not miss that Scripture records that the sacred covenant name of Yahweh was first uttered by the woman, Eve.11 And she is the first to give God glory after their exile from the Garden.”12
Eve was mindful of crediting God for what she as a woman was naturally created to produce, despite the fact that God had rightly judged her.
Eve’s Final Words Express Her Continued Hope of Redemption
For Eve, the worst possible happens. Her hope is dashed when Cain murders her second son, Abel. The grief of losing a son at the hands of her firstborn must have been overwhelming! Yet, she expressed faith again that God will fulfill his word.
“Then Adam knew his wife again, and she gave birth to a son. And she called his name Seth (shet), for (she said) “God has appointed (shyt) to me another seed in place of Abel, because Cain killed him.” And as for Seth, he also fathered a son, and he called his name Enosh. At that time people began to call on the name of Yahweh.” — Gen. 4:25–26 (my translation)
With the birth of Seth, Eve more specifically referenced the protoevangelium. She credited God once again for the birth of her son and in addition, used two key words that previously only occur together in the Hebrew of Genesis 3:15: the words “appoint, set, put, or grant” and “seed, or offspring.”
Eve gave her newborn son the name Seth, which comes from the Hebrew word shyt — “to set, place, appoint,” — that the Lord used when telling the serpent that he would “set, place, appoint” enmity between him and the woman. The second word Eve uses, “seed, or offspring” is also used in Genesis 3:15 as the “seed of the woman” who would crush the serpent’s head. Eve expressed her continued faith in Yahweh by directly connecting the name she gave her son Seth as her “seed” of God’s promise.
In addition, the closing verse of Genesis 4 points to the fruit of her faith: “Seth also had a son, and he named him Enosh. At that time people began to call on the name of the Lord” (Gen. 4:26, NIV).
Seth’s son, Enosh, comes to mean “human,” with an emphasis on mortality, just as “Adam” also means “human” in the rest of the Hebrew Bible.13 In this sense, Enosh became a second Adam, but one aware of his mortality and dependency on Yahweh.14 Through the line of Seth and Enosh, the messiah is birthed.15
Eve’s reference to her “appointed” son Seth as another “seed” is followed by a significant statement, “At that time people began to call on the name of the Lord.”
“To ‘call on the name of the Lord’ is to worship him according to the whole revealed truth of God.”16 In addition to worship, calling on the name of the Lord becomes associated with salvation. The prophet Joel prophecies deliverance in the last days, proclaiming “And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Joel 2:32, NIV). Peter quotes Joel’s prophecy in his first sermon on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:21). And Paul in Romans 10:13 repeats the famous verse, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”17
The conclusion of Genesis 4 introduces the theme of worship, the promise of the messianic lineage, and the message of salvation. Although Eve failed God, she is remembered in Scripture as the first one to call upon the covenant name of Yahweh and express continued faith in God’s promised one who would crush the serpent under his feet (Rom. 16:20).
What roles have women in the Bible played in advancing God’s story of salvation?
Redeeming Eden, by Ingrid Faro and Joyce Koo Dalrymple, stands out by highlighting the often overlooked but significant role of women in shaping redemptive history. It weaves together a cohesive narrative that demonstrates how women, despite being frequently undervalued in Ancient Near Eastern cultures, courageously initiate and advance key movements in Scripture.
This book has everything you need for a full personal or group study experience — including access to free streaming video study sessions!
Footnotes
- John Milton, Paradise Lost, 9:270–275, accessed August 19, 2025. ↩︎
- Jacob L. Wright, Why the Bible Began: An Alternative History of Scripture and Its Origins (Cambridge University Press, 2023), 357. ↩︎
- Ingrid Faro, Redeeming Eden: How Women in the Bible Advance the Story of Salvation (Zondervan, 2025), 43. ↩︎
- Does God Punish Women with Pain in Childbirth?, Bible Project Classroom: Genesis (Portland, OR: BibleProject, 2023). ↩︎
- Gordon John Wenham, Genesis 1-15, Volume 1, ed. David Allen Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker, and John D. W. Watts, Word Biblical Commentary 1 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2014), 101–2. ↩︎
- Kenneth A. Mathews, Genesis 1-11:26: The New American Commentary (Nashville, TN: Holman Reference, 1996), 265. ↩︎
- The NET Bible, Gen. 4:1 notes “There are two homonymic verbs with this spelling, one meaning ‘obtain, acquire’ and the other meaning ‘create’ (see Gen 14:19, 22; Deut 32:6; Ps 139:13; Prov 8:22)” (especially in Ugaritic and Phoenician). However, nearly every use in the Pentateuch is the former, “to obtain, acquire, or purchase.” See Mathews 1.265; and Sarna, 32. ↩︎
- Nahum M. Sarna, The JPS Torah Commentary: Genesis, 1st edition (Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 2001), 32. See also Wenham, Genesis 1-15, Volume 1, 101. ↩︎
- Wenham, 101–102. ↩︎
- Wenham, 101–102. ↩︎
- Sarna, The JPS Torah Commentary, 32. ↩︎
- Faro, Redeeming Eden, 48–49. ↩︎
- Enosh is first used to refer to humanity (or, mortals) in Deu. 32:26, then in Job (18x); Psalms (12x, esp. note Ps 90:3 Prayer of Moses); and Isaiah (8x). ↩︎
- Mathews, Genesis 1-11:26, 290. ↩︎
- Kuyper, 8. ↩︎
- Werner Herman Franzemann, Bible History Commentary: Old Testament, electronic ed. (Milwaukee, WI: Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, 1980), 62–63. See Abraham (Gen. 12:8; 13:4; and 21:33), Isaac (Gen. 26:25), Moses (Exod. 33:19), David (2 Sam. 6:18; 1 Chron. 16:2), Elijah (1 Kings 18:24, 32, 36). ↩︎
- Faro, Redeeming Eden, 51. ↩︎
Ingrid Faro (PhD, MDiv) is Professor of Old Testament at Northern Seminary, Lisle, IL. She previously served as Dean of Academic Affairs at Northern, Dean of Theology at the Scandinavian School of Theology, and Director of Masters Programs at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School where she also taught Hebrew and Old Testament. She is an international speaker and the author of Evil in Genesis, Demystifying Evil, co-author of Honest Answers, as well as articles, chapters, and reviews. Ingrid has two married children and four delightful young grandchildren.
