Eve and the Goddess Innana: Reading Genesis 3:16b in Light of Sacred Marriage Cultic Literature

Abstract

Genesis 3:16b has traditionally been interpreted as proof of woman’s inferiority, her nefarious powers of seduction, and as a license for men to rule and master her. Such an interpretation seems to have a much greater affinity with the Hellenistic context from which it arose than with its immediate Hebraic and Ancient Near Eastern context. If we are to remain faithful to this context—where woman was held in high esteem—we need more than ever to approach Genesis 3:16b with a lens that does not do violence to the woman. This article seeks to offer a new exegetical lens on Genesis 3:16b, as a redemptive rather than a punitive moment. This will entail that the two key concepts “rule” (mashal) and “loving intention” (teshuqah) be re-interpreted, in the light of its Ancient Near Eastern context, as containing vestiges of the sacred marriage trope figuring in Sumerian cultic texts, notably the Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi. The parallels between our story and the Courtship will reveal some stunning parallels, enabling us to illuminate a radically new understanding of Genesis 3:16b as a sacred marriage scene, with the woman enabling the uplifting of man, inaugurating his reign as the king of the land, rather than finding herself dominated by him and a victim of his power over her.

1. Introduction

For centuries, Genesis 3:16b has been used to keep women in their place. Both Jewish and Christian traditions, heavily influenced by Greek thought, have interpreted this passage as pointing to the woman’s inherent moral depravity, her power to seduce man provoking his downfall, and the need for man, therefore, to keep woman in check and rule over her.1 Traces of these interpretations, although offered centuries ago, have endured throughout the centuries in the minds of both clergymen and laymen and, to this day, can still be heard preached from the pulpit or spoken at the dinner table. Yet one wonders how such a degrading interpretation of woman could have emerged from a scripture which, just one chapter before (Genesis 2), celebrated woman’s redemptive power as the ezer kenegdo of the man, the helper, the life-saver of the man.2 If we are to remain faithful to the intention of the text (does God go back on his word?), we need more than ever to revisit Genesis 3:16b with a hermeneutical lens that is not suspicious of woman. This essay proposes a radical re-reading of the “curse” of Genesis 3:16 as a redemptive rather than a punitive moment. This will entail that the two key concepts “rule” (mashal) and “loving intention” (teshuqah)3 be re-interpreted, in the light of Ancient Near-Eastern text and culture rather than through a Greek philosophical lens.4

Samuel Noah Kramer has observed the inter-textual connections that exist between the Hebrew Bible and the Sumerian cultic texts, notably the literature surrounding the worship of the goddess Inanna.5 Our explorations will take us to Kramer’s translation of The Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi6, in the light of which we will attempt to re-interpret Genesis 3:16b. Striking to us (and to our readers), will be the connection in the Courtship of Innana and Dumuzi text between the love of the goddess and her bestowing upon the man rulership (symbolized by the throne, scepter and dais that is given him on the morning of their wedding night). Even more striking are the parallels between the Courtship text and Genesis 3:16b where we find a stunningly similar reciprocal connection between the “loving intention” of the woman (teshuqah) and “rulership” (mashal) of the man. Does it not then become possible to re-interpret Genesis 3:16b as containing vestiges of sacred marriage cultic texts and as describing, as in the Courtship text, a scene of enthronization of man as he emerges from intimate contact with the woman?7 The remarkable parallels between the two scriptures invite us to do so, thereby shedding a powerful new light on Genesis 3:16b, one that reveals woman, not as responsible for the downfall of man, but, on the contrary, as an agent of elevation of man to his royal destiny.

2. Inanna and Dumuzi

Any genuine understanding of Genesis 3:16b will entail a journey back into its Ancient Near Eastern context. As Kramer has argued, the Biblical stories do not happen in a vacuum. They emerge against the backdrop of Ancient Near Eastern cultic literature, borrowing from it themes, motives and even phraseology.8 One of the central themes borrowed from the Ancient Near Eastern context, and woven throughout the Hebrew Bible, is the trope of the sacred marriage. The theme of the sacred marriage can be glimpsed already during the reign of the kings of Jerusalem9, emerging again in the discourse of the prophets,10 and finally finding its way in the wisdom literature of the Bible, notably in the books of Ruth, Esther, Proverbs and Song of Songs.11 This essay argues that there is evidence of the sacred marriage trope as early as the book of Genesis, notably in the story of Genesis 3:16b. But before we can begin to make this final connection, more must be said on the ritual itself and its significance for Ancient Near Eastern religious life.

The earliest versions of the sacred marriage date back to 2000 B.C.E, and were found narrated on clay tablets excavated in southern Iraq, in what used to be the site of the ancient Sumerian empire.12 Ancient Sumer was located in Southern Iraq, in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates, and was the civilization that gave rise to the Babylonian Empire. The Sumerians worshipped a pantheon of gods, as is evident from the sprinkling of ziggurats13 across the territory honoring different deities. But very quickly, one of these, a goddess, began to emerge as supreme: the goddess Inanna, goddess of love and wisdom. A number of stories around the goddess Inanna have been compiled by Kramer and a close reading of these show striking parallels with the stories narrated in Genesis 2–3 about the human couple, notably Eve. In one of these stories,14 we meet a young Inanna, who is strikingly similar to Eve. This young Inanna, not unlike her Hebraic counterpart, also finds herself connected to a tree. This tree, however, is sadly inhabited by three creatures of chaos: a snake, the Anzu bird, and none other than Lilith. It takes the brutal intervention of Gilgamesh to chase the creatures away and fashion for her, out of the tree, her bed and her throne. The parallels between the two stories are striking and invite us to explore the possibility that the story and character of Eve might have evolved from that of the goddess Inanna.15 It could well be that the writer or storyteller of our story in Genesis 3:16b was cognizant of the literature surrounding the goddess Inanna and drew from it in his/her composition.

But it is the story depicting the sacred marriage between the Goddess Inanna and a young shepherd called Dumuzi which holds a central place in Inanna’s cultic literature and which particularly interests us here (Kramer and Wolkstein 1983, pp. 30–49). In this story, we see an Inanna who has come of marriable age. She is presented with two possibilities: Dumuzi the shepherd, or a nameless (in our story) farmer. Initially attracted to the farmer, she is nevertheless advised by her mother to choose Dumuzi.16 There ensues a season of courtship, during which she enters his garden and shares her fruits with her lover while enjoying his: he her plants, and she his milk and cream. The courtship leads to marriage and, in the scenes following the courtship of Inanna, Dumuzi finds himself invited into her mother’s house to consummate the marriage—to give her her bed and throne. The next morning, upon rising from the marriage couch, a fulfilled and satiated Inanna bestows upon her new bridegroom the throne of the land:

The Queen of Heaven

The heroic woman, greater than her mother

Who was presented the me by Enki

Inanna the First Daugher of the Moon

Decreed the Fate of Dumuzi:

In battle I am your leader

In combat, I am your armor-bearer

In the assembly I am your advocate

On the campaign I am your inspiration

You the chosen shepherd of the holy shrine

You the king, the faithful provider of Uruk

You the light of An’s great shrine

In all ways you are fit:

To hold your head high on the lofty dais

To sit on the lapis lazuli throne

To cover your head with the holy crown

To wear long clothes on your body

To bind yourself with the garments of kingship

To carry the mace and sword

To guide straight the bow and arrow

To fasten the throw-stick and sling by your side

To race on the road with the holy scepter in your hand

And the holy sandals on your feet

To prance on the holy breast like a lapis lazuli calf

You the sprinter, the chosen shepherd

In all ways you are fit

May your heart enjoy good days

That which An has determined for you—may it not be altered

That which Enlil has granted—may it not be changed

You are the favorite of Ningal

Inanna holds you dear

(Kramer and Wolkstein 1983, p. 45)

The goddess Inanna thus becomes the one who inaugurates the reign of this earthly king—setting the gold standard for all future enthronizations in the Ancient Near East, including Egypt. From then on, Sumerian kings would receive their authority from the goddess Inanna, replaying the Dumuzi–Inanna sacred marriage every year during the annual festivities preceding fall harvest.17 The king would enter the temple of Inanna and engage in (or fake) intercourse with the priestess of Inanna. He would then emerge from their lovemaking with renewed authority and with the assurance of a plentiful harvest.18 In Babylon, the sacred marriage trope story would be passed on from Sumer, but this time occurring between the goddess Ishtar and the man Tammuz. Like the Sumerian kings, the kings of Babylon would derive their authority and protection from the goddess Ishtar.19 In Egypt, the pharaoh would find his authority derived from his ability to connect to the goddess Ma’at, to her precepts of justice, symbolically offering her back to the gods in order for them to protect his reign and ensure the sustenance of his subjects.20 Even the kings of Israel, as we will show below, will receive their authority from a powerful feminine figure reminiscent of the goddess, Woman Wisdom.21 Thus, it is through an intimate rapport with the goddess of wisdom that the king receives his authority to rule wisely and justly.

But special attention needs to be given here to this dyad love/rulership that emerges from this story. The love shared with the goddess and the inauguration of the man’s destiny as king are intertwined and exist in reciprocal connection: As the man receives the goddess’s love, he becomes empowered, as a result, to rule the land. As a result of this loving and intimate encounter, she becomes his protector in war and empowers his kingship, as evidenced by her bestowing upon him the “dais”, “throne”, “crown”, and “scepter”. We are now ready to enter our text Genesis 3:16b.

3. Eve and Adam

In our text, not only are the two elements essential to the sacred marriage present—love and rulership—but they also stand in reciprocal relation: “Your loving intention for your husband and he will rule [over]22 you”. Thus, not only are love and rulership intertwined in our passage as they are in the sacred marriage trope, but they stand in relation. The clause about the husband’s rule follows, or is grounded, made possible, by the woman’s love. First her love, then his rule. The parallel is striking here between our passage and the sacred marriage story we have just explored. Could it be that, far from being a punishment, or negative consequence for the woman’s sin, this passage might be read as a scene of enthronization of the man by the woman, in a way reminiscent of the goddess Inanna’s enthroning of Dumuzi? Could it be that, far from signifying the woman’s subjection to the man, this passage might be understood as the man’s uplifting by the woman? But why would this be happening precisely at this moment, the worst moment it seems, when God has arrived on the scene, unmasked the human couple’s weakness and transgression, and decreed their mortal fate? A deeper exploration of the events preceding Genesis 3:16 is necessary here.

In our story, Eve resembles Inanna, the goddess of love and wisdom. Like Inanna, she seems made for love, fashioned to be a partner to her man. Likewise, like Inanna, she has a powerful, even transgressive attraction to wisdom. One of the stories surrounding young Inanna depicts her as journeying to Enki (cf. Kramer and Wolkstein 1983, pp. 12–27)., the god of wisdom and stealing the me from him in order to endow it to humanity. Like Inanna, Eve is also positioned to “steal” the fruit of wisdom when it has been forbidden her. Unlike Inanna, however, Eve seems to have no interest in love. In many ways, Eve is a deeply solitary being. She doesn’t speak, doesn’t reciprocate the affection and loving words of her man when he exclaims: “Bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh!” upon meeting her for the first time. Eve’s solitude is in fact exacerbated by her husband’s words, inasmuch as Adam, in this beautiful ode to Eve, does not even seem to be addressing her directly. He seems to be addressing himself, or the world around him; he speaks of her but never to her.23 The first time Eve is heard speaking is when the serpent addresses her—which perhaps is the problem here! No one, not even God, has truly addressed her, engaged her in conversation, cared to hear her perspective. The human couple is never seen in conversation, nor do they interact in any way.

Even at the foot of the tree, Eve acts alone. Her focus is wisdom and divinity. Like Inanna, she craves the wisdom that does not belong to her. Like Inanna, she wants to reign alone and without partner. This is evident in the way that Eve, in our text, finds no need to consult with her man as to what to do, even though the text reveals to us that he is there “with” her.24 We are reminded here of one of the most famous stories of Inanna, who, not satisfied with ruling the realm of the heavens, descends into the Underworld—kingdom of her sister Ereshkigal—in order to possess it also. After a treacherous journey in which she finds herself momentarily stripped of all of her powers, she emerges, triumphant, Queen of heaven and earth (Ibid., Kramer and Wolkstein 1983, pp. 52–73). Eve’s solitary quest for power mirrors here Inanna’s craving for total control of the universe. Ultimately, it is to the status of goddess that Eve aspires, of a goddess ruling the world alone in blatant contradiction with the divine command in Genesis 1 that the rulership (radah) over the world be shared!25

This usurping desire for total power is hinted at in our passage when Eve “gives” (natan) the fruit to her husband (Gen. 3:6), an action which hereto in our text was reserved for the Creator: “God said, ‘See I give (natan) you every seed-bearing plant that is upon all the earth, and every tree that has seed-bearing fruit: They shall be yours for food” (Gen. 1:29). The giving (natan) of food was, up until our passage, a divine prerogative, a symbol of the Creator’s power and of total control over the lives of his creatures. When Eve gives of the fruit to Adam, she is therefore taking over a divine prerogative, she is adopting the stance of a divinity, of a goddess towards him, thereby stripping him of all equal claims to the throne of the universe. As for Adam, and perhaps as a result of Eve’s usurping actions, he remains strangely silent and disengaged. He, who once had such a way with words, now reduced to a muted and erased figure. When Eve takes the fruit and gives it to Adam, he receives it without any resistance.26 The absence of dialogue between the human couple is here both poignant and striking. We are reminded of the absence of dialogue between Cain and Abel which led to the murder of Abel.27 Likewise, we can sense here the erasure of Adam in the silence of Eve. Once king of the world alongside his queen, Adam now stands defeated, erased through her indifference and through her usurpation of power. Her incapacity for love and for sharing power have disempowered him, stripped him of his dignity and, as a result, thrown the world into havoc. Ignored by his queen, relinquished to the sidelines of history, unloved, the man loses his birthright as king having the authority to rule, to judge, to decide alongside her.

For it is precisely this authority to rule the world (alongside of Eve) that constituted the man’s destiny given to him by God. As such, Adam resembles Dumuzi and, like him, wears the mantle of kingship. Like Dumuzi, Adam is the one made responsible by God for cosmic harmony. In the Genesis story, Adam is elevated to this royal role in two ways: He receives the command to “work and protect” the garden (Gen. 2:15) and he receives the negative command from God to “not eat” of the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Both of these tasks are hugely significant in light of Ancient Near Eastern literature. The duty to tend to the garden is anything but mundane inasmuch as the kings of old also were seen as gardeners of the garden of God, which symbolized the dwelling place of God on earth.28 As such, they ensured the divine presence endured in the world, thereby protecting it from the forces of chaos. The command to “not eat” is also significant inasmuch as it introduces the notion of law, echoing the Sumerian me and the Egyptian ma’at, which the king was tasked to protect in order to keep the forces of chaos at bay and protect the cosmic order. So, from the start, Adam is presented to us as a king with royal duties—those of protecting the cosmic order. We now understand the devastating consequences of Adam’s partaking of the fruit. Unlike Eve, who eats of the fruit under the delusion of the snake, Adam knows full well what he is doing. He also knows full well what he is throwing away with this gesture: his rulership and his destiny as protector of the cosmic order. Adam knows that, the moment his lips have touched the fruit, he will have forfeited his authority, his kingship, his crown and his rulership. All for the sake of Eve, whom he perhaps cannot bear to lose. And so, rather than inaugurating the reign of man, Eve, because of her inability to love, to even desire the man, ends up dethroning him, casting his crown down and breaking his throne. As a result of her lack of teshuqah (“loving intention”), he has lost his mashal (“rulership”). We are now perfectly positioned to understand God’s next move.29

To the woman, who has never known the stirrings of desire, to the woman who has never known love, who has shown herself incapable of it, God sets a “loving intention” (teshuqah) in her heart: “To your man, your loving intention” (Gen. 3:16b). This interpretation of teshuqah as a loving intention (and not, as many commentators have argued, an act of seduction or lust) is confirmed in the way it is used in the Song of Songs, this time to describe the man. In the Song of Songs, the man’s desire for the woman is from the start unfocused and diffused—he loves not just her, and is found also “browsing in the lilies” (Song 2:16, 6:3), the lilies serving as a metaphor for other women. It is only at the end of a long and perilous journey with this woman, that his desire comes into strong focus, with her becoming the only object of his love (Song 7:10). Teshuqah in the Song of Songs has then everything to do with a re-orientating, a focusing of desire onto the beloved.30 Against this backdrop, it is possible to understand the teshuqah in our passage as God re-orienting Eve,31 turning her away from her solitary and hubris-filled quest for wisdom and divinity and towards her man. He turns her away from the path of the goddess, and throws her back onto her humanity, back to the earth, back to the hummus from whence she came, back to the man, Adam, the fragile being of clay she has been made from and made for.32 He reminds her of her forgotten destiny as the ezer kenegdo of man, as protector and challenger of the man. He reminds her of her inherent relationality, of the inherent intentionality of her being. Therein is her glory, her truth and her magnificence. She shines not in solitary divinity, but as the loving companion and protector of the human, the clay one, the fragile one.

It is in the light of this dawning love in the heart of the woman, that the man slowly emerges anew as a king, again ruling over (mashal) the cosmos. Our readers will notice that we understand mashal here very differently from traditional interpretations. In these interpretations, mashal is seen as lording over the woman. This in our view is a grave misunderstanding of the scope that is generally given to mashal in the Hebrew Bible. Mashal there is usually not stretched over an individual but typically concerns a body of cosmic proportions: the day, the night (in the case of Genesis 1), or a kingdom.33 The meaning of mashal is furthermore not necessarily a negative one of domination and oppression, but of justice and of protection.34 The connection to Genesis 1, where we find the first mention of mashal attributed to the sun and to the moon, is particularly illuminating (no pun intended!). In ancient Egypt, the cosmic rule of the sun was echoed by the Pharaoh’s all-encompassing rule over his kingdom.35 So the mention of the rule of the sun should immediately bring to mind that of the king. As the sun “rules” (mashal) over the cosmos, likewise the king “rules” (mashal) over his kingdom. The Egyptian connection and the Genesis 1 connection thus both emphasize the cosmic scope of mashal and its connection to justice. The mashal that was lost then was never his authority over the woman, as traditional interpretations have made it seem to be, but his authority over his kingdom!

Interestingly, God is not the one bestowing upon man his mashal. He is not the one who gives man back his reign. Rather, it is the woman who, in love, restores the man and sets upon his head the crown of cosmic rule. The mashal of man is not here God-given,36 it emerges rather from the love of the woman: “Your desire for your husband and (from this, as a result of this) he will rule [over] you”. The mashal of the man is here grounded, birthed by the woman’s love. It is the woman who inaugurates, grants and bestows kingship on the man in a profound restorative gesture: The crown that she had thrown to the ground and broken into pieces she now lays anew on his head. It is to the degree that he welcomes this woman, that he is capable of opening himself up to her, that the man regains his lost kingship.37 We are at the very heart of the sacred marriage trope here, where intimacy with the goddess is what inaugurates the king’s reign.

Thus, Genesis 3:16b, far from being a curse or a punishment, emerges from its surrounding darkness as a luminous opening onto hope and restoration. It is as if God is performing the sacred marriage himself, healing the wounded and broken relationship between Adam and Eve, restoring love, restoring dignity and, as a result, the delicate equilibrium between man and woman needed for them to rule together, to protect the cosmic order together. A sacred marriage which, in the midst of the pain and mortality that the couple has been thrown into, opens up a horizon of restoration, of renewal, of redemption. A sacred marriage, which perhaps constitutes the very ground, or foundation of future restoration for, through it, cosmic order rises again, defeating the chaos threatening the whole world. Interestingly, the structure of our passage highlights this emergence of Genesis 3:16b against the rest of the text. A closer look at the Hebrew text reveals that Genesis 3:16b is located at the exact center, at the very heart of the judgment of God against the serpent, woman and man: 48 words precede it, and 48 words follow it. This literary structure, common in Ancient Hebrew literature, is meant to create emphasis, to reveal to us the very key of the text. Genesis 3:16b thus functions as a key, opening up a new horizon of hope and redemption for the human couple, beyond the pain, toil and death that they now must face.

Against the backdrop of this sacred marriage a new translation can now emerge; rather than the traditional renderings of the passage as “he will rule over her” we may now read “he will rule through her”. The Hebrew preposition b-, translated as “over” by traditional interpreters also has the meaning of “through, by means of” in other contexts.38 Translating this preposition thus requires an awareness of the polysemy of the word b- as well as the wide variety of meanings it harbors in the Biblical text. Often, the best way to go about favoring a meaning over another is to remain attentive to the context. If, as has been argued in this essay, the context of Genesis 3:16b is in fact a sacred marriage scene, where God is in a way restoring, renewing a broken relationship, then the text itself invites us to understand the preposition b- as meaning “through” rather than “over”. This is especially true if we understand this passage, not as it has traditionally been understood as a punishment or as a consequence for sin (even though the word for sin is significantly absent from our passage!), but as a restorative gesture on the part of God to heal a broken relationship. For in such a case, the inauguration by God of a hierarchical, oppressive relationship, as would be inferred from b- as “over” would be out of the question. This is all the truer as we have been forced to admit that the man, in our story, has precisely shown himself to be anything but a reliable ruler more deserving/able somehow than woman to rule. But there is an even stronger argument for a translation of b- as “through”, this time from the book of Proverbs.

4. Woman Wisdom and the King

In the book of Proverbs, we find the traits of the goddess Inanna again, but this time, embodied by Woman Wisdom. The author of the book of Proverbs is well versed in sacred marriage literature, and we can find there a continuation of the idea that the goddess (embodied by Woman Wisdom in our text) empowers the king to rule. In the book of Proverbs, Woman Wisdom, not unlike her Sumerian and Egyptian counterparts, is she who gives the king his authority. We find her holding “long life in her right hand and honor in the other” (Prov. 3:16), in a way reminiscent of the goddess Ma’at (the Egyptian goddess assigned to the pharaohs of Egypt) who also holds life and scepter in her hands.39 This is also reminiscent of Inanna’s bestowing on Gilgamesh the “pukku” and the “mikku”, understood by translators to possibly refer to the royal rod and ring.40 The book of Proverbs also depicts intimacy with Woman Wisdom as a prerequisite for the king’s successful reign: “She is a tree of life to those who embrace her, those who lay hold of her will be blessed” (Prov. 3:17). Just as the Sumerian king must have intercourse with the goddess to be given the authority of a king, the Hebrew king is here commanded to “embrace”, and “lay hold” of Woman Wisdom in a language saturated with eroticism.

But the most powerful passage for our argument is the following, with Woman Wisdom decreeing: “Through me kings reign (malach) and rulers decree (haqaq) just laws. Through me, princes rule (yasar), great men and all the righteous judges” (Prov. 8:15–16). Again, we have here a powerful allusion to the sacred marriage trope saturating Ancient Near Eastern/Egyptian cultic literature: kings, rulers, princes and nobles owe their governance, their authority to a powerful feminine figure, in our text, Woman Wisdom. But it is to the preposition “through me” that I want to call the reader’s attention. This “through me” translates precisely the preposition b- that is in use in Genesis 3:16b, this time with the clear meaning of “through” or “by means of”. Not only then do we have a precedent of the preposition b- being translated as “through” in the Hebrew Bible in general. as already noted, but we have here a precedent that takes place precisely in the context of royal rule. Although the Proverbs text does not include mashal in its list of verbs signifying rulership, we have here verbs otherwise closely associated with it, such as malach (to reign), haqaq (to decree), and yasar (to rule). Thus, there exists a definite semantic field of rulership, of royal rule, in which the preposition b- is aptly translated as “through”. This text in the book of Proverbs thus sheds a revealing new light on Genesis 3:16b, one which lends a powerful plausibility to it being translated as we have proposed: “Her desire for the man and he shall rule through/by her” (Gen. 3:16b).

5. Conclusions

For centuries, rabbis and church fathers alike have interpreted Genesis 3:16b in a negative light, as a punishment, as a curse, or a consequence for the woman’s moral failure and inability to resist temptation. To prevent her from failing again and throwing the world into chaos, these same commentators argue, man has found himself granted a God-given mandate to rule over her. Such has been the narrative up until now. Striking are the similarities between such a narrative and the teachings of Aristotle! One wonders to what degree the philosopher might have influenced the history of interpretation.41 Even more striking, however, are the ways that a closer reading of Genesis 3:16b, one that is attentive to its intertextual Ancient Near Eastern context and sensitive to its intra-textual resonances, overturns this interpretation!!! In lieu of the woman throwing the world into chaos, we find that it is the man who has done so, in his forfeiting of his God-given cosmic rule for the sake of the woman. In lieu of the woman seducing the man with her love, luring him into the lower depths of materiality, we find that her love in fact elevates him, restores him, and gives him back his crown and his throne. This throne, far from becoming the tool of the oppression of woman, becomes the means of her liberation! For the first thing that man does with his newly-found authority and crown is to overturn the divine decree of death, turn to the woman, and elevate her to the status of Mother of Life!

The man named his wife Eve

Because she was the mother of all the living42

Centuries of interpretation have depicted the woman as the one who ushered death in the world43. Adam, in one breath, forgives her everything and restores her as the one who will, from now on, usher life into the world.

Far from witnessing a curse and a tragic consequence of sin, might we not be witnessing a sacred marriage wherein the woman finds herself re-oriented towards her forgotten destiny as the ezer kenegdo of man, as healer, lover and protector, and the man finds himself given back his throne, not the throne of oppression and domination, but the cosmic throne of justice and liberation—the throne of the Ancient Near Eastern/Egyptian kings, the throne of justice, of the guardians and protectors of the cosmic law, of the me, or the ma’at which protects and sustains the creatures of the world rather than oppresses them. A sacred marriage which arises out of the ashes of the profound betrayal that precedes it: first and foremost the betrayal of woman, her betrayal of her destiny as the protector, the sustainer of the man; but also the betrayal of man, his betrayal not only of the woman, but of the whole world which depended on his reign for harmony and protection from chaos and, as such, a sacred marriage which only God, in his creative and restorative power, can bring about! And a sacred marriage which inaugurates their rule together, as prescribed by Genesis 1, she as the protector of man, he as the protector of the cosmos. For only once the balance is mended between the man and the woman can the world be restored in its cosmic harmony.44 The sacred marriage between man and the woman thus holds the key to the restoration and redeeming of the world from the chaos that entered it with the transgression of the divine command. Perhaps this is why our author has situated our verse, Genesis 3:16b at the very center of the divine judgment! Read as such, the divine judgment, although profoundly painful and punitive in its expulsion of the guilty pair out of Paradise, holds, at its center, a gateway back into Eden.