Blessing Precedes Cursing: Philosophical Reading of Genesis 3:16

Abstract

Additional interpretations of Genesis 3:16 have often translated God’s words to the woman as a punishment, even a curse, brought upon the woman as the result of her disobedience. Moreover, this so-called curse of the woman has been read by many interpreters as final and irreversible, given that God himself had decreed it. Interestingly, however, no curse is uttered at all in this passage. Moreover, Genesis 3:16 is itself preceded by a divine blessing, given in Genesis 1 to the human couple. As a blessing, it constitutes a divine decree that can neither be overturned nor challenged. The purpose of this essay will be to go back to this divine blessing in Genesis 1, knowing that such a decree will be irrevocable no matter what the future holds for the human couple. This will in turn shed a revealing light on how we are to read and interpret Genesis 3:16. Not only do the words of God to the woman in Genesis 3:16 not constitute a curse, but Genesis 3:16 must be read against the backdrop of the blessing given in Genesis 1. This of course radically alters how this passage has hereto been interpreted as well as profoundly nuances its teaching on gender relations.

1. Introduction

Interpretations of Genesis 3:16 have often made it seem as though the woman were here being punished, or even cursed, because of her disobedience. The pain of childbirth, coupled with her need to submit to her husband, seem to come as the legitimate consequences of her actions, to punish her or discipline her. Moreover, this so-called curse of the woman has been read by many interpreters as inevitable, final and irrevocable, given that God himself had decreed it.1 The Biblical text itself seems to show the finality of divine blessings or curses. For instance, in Genesis 27:37, after Isaac wrongly blesses, Jacob thinking he was Esau, he explains to Esau that he cannot take his blessing back in order to give it back to him instead of Jacob. Likewise, in the Biblical text, when a curse is uttered, it also seems impossible for the person who receives it to get rid of it in the future. The curse on Levi, in Genesis 49:5–7, that his descendants will remain scattered among his brothers, for instance, endures even when his tribe has been promoted to the priesthood. The tribe of Levi must still remain scattered among Israel, even though their priesthood enables them to receive support from their brothers. In light of the Biblical irrevocability of the divine blessing or cursing, Genesis 3:16, when interpreted as a curse, receives thus the immutability of a divine decree.

What these interpretations of Genesis 3:16 fail to see, however, is that no curse is uttered at all in this passage. Moreover, Genesis 3:16 is itself preceded by a divine blessing, given in Genesis 1 to the human couple. As a blessing, it therefore constitutes a word which cannot be overturned or erased. The purpose of this essay will be to go back to this divine blessing in Genesis 1 and ask ourselves what God is decreeing there for the human couple, knowing that such a decree will be irrevocable, no matter what the human couple does, says or thinks in the future. This will in turn shed a powerful light on how we are to read and interpret Genesis 3:16. Not only do the words of God to the woman in Genesis 3:16 not constitute a curse and therefore remain subservient to the powerful and irrefutable blessing uttered in Genesis 1, but Genesis 3:16 must be read against the backdrop of the blessing given in Genesis 1. This of course changes everything, from how we interpret this passage to how we understand the blueprint for gender relations given in both of these passages.

Our explorations will begin with an exploration of the Hebrew etymologies of “blessing” and “cursing”. We will then begin to elucidate what the blessing given in Genesis 1 entails. This blessing is progressively forgotten, however, in the narrative of Genesis 2, and we will unravel the problems that result from this forgetfulness when it comes to gender relationships. Finally, we will attempt to read the Genesis 3:16 text in light of the primordial blessing given in Genesis, and explore the redemptive light that this original blessing sheds on this passage.

2. The Hebrew Etymologies of Blessing and Cursing

To bless, in the Jewish context, is to call for goodness over a life; it is also to express thankfulness for something that happens to us, and sometimes even for something bad, even death. Such is the case when a mourner, according to the Jewish ritual, says “The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away, blessed be the Name of the Lord”. This person forces himself or herself to bless the name of the Lord in spite of his/her sadness, and to utter words of gratitude that will prevail over dereliction and despair, even over anger. On the other hand, in the Jewish context, to curse is to summon evil to fall upon a life. This verb is also used to pervert a gratitude one owed to someone else, to taunt gratitude and to mock kindness or generosity. This is referred to as returning evil for good.

The Hebrew etymology of these words opens up some interesting and additional perspectives on the notions of “blessing” and “cursing”. It allows us to better perceive how a real asymmetry complicates the common understanding of the acts of blessing and of cursing. The word blessing in Hebrew, berakha, comes from a root that means “knee”. The gesture of bending the knee to someone is traditionally linked to humility, and this humility is therefore implied in the act of blessing. But is the humble one the one who blesses or the one who receives the blessing? Probably both, if (and only if) the one who blesses realizes that he or she can never force someone to receive his or her blessing; the other person’s consent remains paramount. Thus, when the beneficiaries of a blessing give their consent, it means that they agree to receive what they cannot give to themselves. One cannot bless oneself! Or, if one pretends to do so, one is confusing the blessing, either with the belief in one’s own lucky star, or with an inordinate pride, assured once and for all of one’s ability to fight obstacles without ever faltering. If in the Bible God is the One per excellence who blesses, and even transforms a human curse into a blessing, how can we understand this implication of humility? The Talmud does not hesitate to say that the greatness of God is always combined with His humility2, meaning that divine blessings are also given under the aegis of this double seal. God cannot force anyone to accept His blessing. This is most important for the subject of this special issue. Can God force a curse on a given group of people? On women for instance?

In Hebrew, the etymology of the word curse, qelala, is different from its popular use in the Jewish context, and very interesting. It comes from a root that means “light” or “unimportant” (qal). From this point of view to curse is not only to wish a person to suffer from harm or disease, but to deprive him or her of any weight in society, meaning that this person should become completely unimportant and sink into oblivion. One should not speak to him or her or about him or her. The curse is therefore a decree of insignificance. The misfortune of the one who is the object of a curse is combined with the fact that he/she can no longer answer to anyone because no one really speaks to him/her anymore. The cursed person thus misses the grace of finding any real interlocutor. Indeed, this curse can even be transmitted through underground channels to the next generation. The fear of ghosts comes from this curse, and not only in so-called archaic cultures, as the assurance of the moderns would like us to believe in order to get rid of them once and for all by ridiculing them.

Yet, to pronounce a verdict of a curse, “cursed be he/she”, the Torah also uses the word arour, translated in the Greek language of the Septuagint as epikataratos, which comes from the verb epikataraomai, meaning “to utter imprecations against someone”. This term emphasizes the idea of praying against someone. Such a prayer is made by sinister and merciless words, cries and gestures, in the name of God or in the name of human beings. This prayer obligates someone or a group of people to suffer misfortunes and punishments, for a real or imaginary fault, but also for the simple fact of not submitting to this or that order, divine or human. The effectiveness of imprecation requires that the words be explicitly spoken, even written, and often also signified by precise gestures, so that they become embedded in the destiny of those targeted by the imprecation, for as long as possible, if not forever. The question remains as to whether blessing and curse statements are symmetrical. In other words, do they set a destiny? And what about our story in Genesis? Are Adam and Eve ever blessed at some point in the story? And is this blessing overturned when they disobey? Let us now turn to our story.

3. The Priority of the Blessing: Genesis 1

In the first chapter of the book of Genesis, after each stage of His creation God looks at what He has done and declares that it is “good” (tov) (Gen. 1:4, 10, 12, 19, 21 and 25), and even “very good” (tov meod) (Gen. 1:31). He blesses the fish and birds (Gen. 1:22), saying “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth”. He blesses Adam made in His own image and after His likeness; “male and female” He created them (Gen. 1:28). The blessing is linked to fecundity and as regards Adam, it also requires from him/her to look after the entire creation. Adam—male and female—is responsible for the well-being of the creation. In this first chapter, blessing precedes any human response. The animal psyche and the human psyche are inhabited by these words of blessing without having shown that they deserve to receive them, without having chosen them and without having agreed to them.

Such a blessing makes its way into those psyches, anticipating their freedom, presenting itself as an imperative which has no negative counterpart. Moreover, the blessing does not amount to ratifying a natural tendency, for if such were the case, it would not be necessary to command it. This “grasping by the good”, this “passivity of ‘suffering the good’”, as Levinas would describe it, does not depend on any consent on the part of the human creatures. At the same time, the impossibility of escaping this “grasping by the good” does not mean dependence or alienation, nor does it mean strict determinism or irrevocable fatality. In fact, as we know, this “grasping” does not mean the habitation of the psyche by a force that would drag it immediately towards the good. Moreover, in this inaugural chapter of the Bible, good (tov) and blessing (berakha) are in no way thought of as symmetrical poles of a possible evil, or of a possible curse. Blessing and goodness have a precedence that cannot be measured against anything else. Creatures bear their immemorial traces in their psyche, even when they refuse such an idea. Of course, as Levinas argues: “there is, in the midst of the submission to the Good, the seduction of irresponsibility, the probability of egoism…the temptation to separate oneself from the Good”. It “is the very incarnation of the subject or his presence in being”. Yet, evil is incapable of breaking this priority of goodness. Levinas concludes that Evil, and by extension the act of cursing, “is neither alongside of nor in front of the Good, but in the second place, beneath, lower than, the Good”,3 and as such, lower than the act of blessing and subsumed under it.

Having this idea in mind, we can now turn to the first blessing given in Genesis 1. The first question that arises is the following: Who is this adam that receives the first blessing in Genesis chapter 1? “God (Elohim) created adam in his own image, in the image of God created He him; masculine and feminine (zakhar veneqeva) created He them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply”. (Gen. 1:27–28). The word adam should be translated as “human being” (and not man, as is usually the case). Elohim decides to create a special creature that will recapitulate all the forces that animate His work. This image of Elohim will certainly have to multiply afterwards, but for the moment it is unique, like its Creator. The word Elohim, a plural, designates God as the master of the forces He has created above and below. All the verbs of which He is the subject, however, are in the singular. This is how Elohim realizes His last creature, the one that resembles Him: “Masculine and feminine He created them”.

The image of Elohim, the image of the divine unity, is thus from the onset twofold: realized in both the masculine and the feminine. The masculine alone, or the feminine alone, would not suffice to sustain the presence in oneself of the image of Elohim.4 The masculine and the feminine are thus not opposed, they are not symmetrical to each other, they do not complement each other such as to constitute a totality—contrary to the dream of the androgynous5—nor is it said that one must dominate and subjugate the other. Yet this masculine and feminine duality, intrinsic to Adam, to the one who is created unique and not as an individual of a species, seems from the onset to be realized in two persons who are going to be blessed and destined to unite, since they are enjoined to multiply themselves by Elohim of whom they are the image. This also means that together the masculine and the feminine will have to watch over the image of Elohim in the creation. Not one at the expense of the other, or one in contempt of the other. The narrative here does not assign an exclusive task to one or to the other.

The human creature is in the image (betsel) of its Creator, this image inhabits the creature and illuminates it. Commentators often interpret the expression “in the image” in terms of various philosophical postulates: it would be a sign of free will, or of rational capacities specific to humans and so on. Yet, the image of Elohim in Adam, the image of His unity, cannot be reduced to this or that concept. It is that of the nearness of the life of Elohim within oneself, inasmuch as the image cannot separate itself from the one it accompanies. This life unifies Adam internally. It unifies the body (guf), the vital soul (nefech) and the intelligence (sekhel).6 But the source of this intimate unification remains in the shadows. It is not directly perceived, and it does not resemble the images that Adam and his descendants will often want to give of themselves.

4. The Forgetting of the Blessing: Genesis 2

The symbols of the first narrative do not fix the meaning of the masculine or feminine in an essence or in a nature (even if the religions that interpret this narrative feed the temptation to do so). Indeed, to fix the meaning of the masculine and of the feminine would amount to freezing life and end up causing it to flow back into the undifferentiated tumult (tohu bohu) that precedes the event of creation. But let us take a look at what happens to the feminine and the masculine in the second narrative of creation in Genesis 2. Adonai Elohim does not think it is good (lo tov) for Adam to be alone (this observation is made for the first time). He then puts a torpor (tardema) on him and then takes one of his ribs (erad mistalotav), which he builds up as a woman (isha), and He presents it to Adam (Gen 2:21–22). Then, Adam recognizes himself in this creature facing him, as in a mirror, and he says that she is “A bone of my bones and a flesh of my flesh”. This creature that looks so much like him will therefore be “named isha because it was taken from ish. A man (ish) will therefore leave his father and mother and unite himself to his wife (ishto) and they become one flesh (basar ehad)” (Gen. 2:23–24). The feminine that Adam had carried within him is now both externalized and deprived of its coefficient of asymmetry.7 In the woman facing him Adam believes that he sees himself, she is him in a feminine form (isha).8 He does not discover any otherness in this creature. He thinks that he recognizes himself in that inverted image of himself (as it is the case in any mirror). But is this symmetry not illusory and a source of the misunderstandings that will come? Indeed, the reciprocal is not mentioned. Isha remains mute.

The image of God—male and female—of the first narrative has thus been forgotten. The word adam, the human being—masculine and feminine—of the first narrative, now only means “man”. Adam’s satisfaction when he discovers this woman expresses his feeling of facing someone in his likeness. The resemblance of both of them to Elohim is no longer mentioned. In the following chapters of Genesis, we discover that the alliance with such a “double” (my wife is my double!) provokes many dangers: violent or subtle domination of one by the other; submission of one to the other, etc. As it is the case in a mirror, a double has indeed no initiative of its own; it is content to duplicate the model’s actions and gestures, to repeat his words in echo or to show him what he looks like or wants to look like. But what happens when the double ceases to consent to playing the role of a double? Or when it refuses to complete the model, meaning to adjust itself to its desire? What happens when the so-called double breaks the tacit pact of complacency or submission that binds it to the model? When this so-called double becomes aware of the violence it suffers? It sometimes happens that such a “double” discovers that an irreducible otherness inhabits each person. This so called “double” rediscovers the profound truth of the first Genesis account. And she feels her intimate exile far from this image. Otherness does not condemn one to be a double, or to be a mere complement, but to live in a creative asymmetry. This sometimes happens when a woman utters unexpected words that weaken the self, that challenges the psyche of those men who refuse any feeling of exile from themselves and seek only recognition and symmetrical wholeness. In this second account of Genesis, no such words are spoken.

5. No Curse Can Erase a Previous Blessing: Genesis 3

One of the interesting questions that arises when reading the Genesis 3 narrative is why Adam seems so ready to consent to taste of the fruit that the woman presents to him without showing the slightest reluctance? (Gen. 3:6). Was he not the one who was specifically given the warning from Adonai Elohim not to eat it (Gen 2:17)? A midrash claims that he had passed this warning on to his wife and, knowing that she was more prone to stumbling than he was, he took the initiative to add that the fruit should not be touched either in order to “make a hedge around this order.”9 But, in its misogynistic a priori, the midrash forgets to question the possible ulterior motives of Adam. Is he not, in the act of modifying the divine command, setting himself up as the giver of commands, a prerogative that is God’s only? Is he not, in usurping this authority and uttering commands to his wife, taking the place of Elohim? Is he not himself succumbing to the temptation of becoming an Elohim—which was precisely what the serpent had promised to the woman—rather than remain grateful for his human status? Kafka argues10 that the ulterior motives with which one welcomes evil are those of evil itself, and not one’s own. He underlines that these motives belong neither to the masculine nor to the feminine (or to the idea we have of them), but to evil itself. Evil is therefore not inherent to a given gender. It remains external to humanity. Yet it is nevertheless within human beings that this evil begins to grow. Let us now turn to the heart of our passage: Genesis 3:16.

According to the verses in discussion, neither the woman nor Adam are cursed (Gen. 3:15–19). The word “curse” is not pronounced,11 and as such, both the woman and Adam remain creatures in the image of Elohim. The inaugural blessing is therefore not altered by our passage. The serpent is in fact the only one that is cursed (Gen. 3:14–15). Thus, when Adonai Elohim adds that, from now on, man and woman will toil in their respective tasks and that their intimate bond will lack harmony, it need not be read as a curse at all.12 When Adonai Elohim says to the woman that her desire will not be in tune with Adam’s, and that his desire will prevail over her own desire13, it does not mean—contrary to a whole tradition of Jewish and Christian interpretations—that men must dominate women in all areas, and especially in their sexual relations. Is it even a punishment?

To answer this, we must first underline that, in spite of a widespread tradition, the word “sin” does not appear in this chapter, which makes the word punishment questionable.14 Adonai Elohim does not impose the suffering of childbirth on the woman as a punishment; He does not condemn Adam to work the earth with effort. Nowhere is it said that, had they not tasted the forbidden fruit, giving birth or working the earth would have been carried out with ease, or that their intimate and sexual ties would have always been harmonious.15 Yet, having tasted the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, rather than the fruit of the tree of life, they will now describe everything that they experience according to this double perspective of good and evil, without being able to discern clearly how, when and where life really manifests its goodness, the tov that saturated the creation story in Genesis 1. They will experience that “bad” is associated with suffering, with everything that costs them effort or dissent, and “good” with the moments when the fruit of their suffering—a child, the result of labor, the joy of being together—prevails. But is this ordeal—which is still going on—a punishment, or is it waiting for reparation (tikkun)?

Adam, once in ecstasy over his feminine double (Gen. 2:23), now gives her the name of Eve (hava). In Hebrew, this name is based on the root of the word “alive” (hay). Adam has taken note of the hardship which, according to the previous verse, will henceforth permeate both of them. Yet through this name given to the woman, he nevertheless places the task imposed on his wife at the service of life. If such is the case, it paves the way, admittedly still in its infancy, to a promise of “reparation” (tikkun) for the sufferings endured, through words that alleviate them. The many misogynistic comments associated with the name Eve all fail to hear that name this way.

The tunics of skin with which Adonai Elohim then clothes both Adam and Eve as to protect them against external attacks, can be interpreted as a protective act of benevolence, shielding them from the raw and abrasive elements of nature. However, the thickness of this new skin does not allow the inner light from which they both live to pass through.16 Sometimes one gets the impression that this light—which is the trace of the inaugural benediction—has disappeared. It is especially the case when one looks at one’s neighbor with hostile eyes. R. Tzaddik ha-Kohen of Lublin explains that only the eyes of the righteous person continue to perceive this original light of creation when looking at other people. In the present case, these tunics announce a departure: Adonai Elohim wants Adam and Eve’s nakedness to be protected by their tunics of skin when they leave the Garden of Eden. It is indeed necessary because, having eaten the fruit of good and bad before having tasted the tree of life, they will now be in danger.

6. Conclusions: Tikkun

This chapter, like the two preceding chapters and those that will follow, does not describe merely a series of past events. There is no before or after in the Torah, say the Sages, which means that what these chapters describe is happening now, in each and every one of us. Meaning that each of us has to get out of the tohu bohu in order to become a creature in the image of Elohim. Each of us has to go out of the Garden of Eden so as to repair what impatience has ruined and to start experiencing how “goodness” (tov) is associated with the tree of life. But it remains difficult. This is probably what Kafka sensed when he wrote “We are sinners, not only because we have eaten from the tree of knowledge, but also because we have not yet eaten from the tree of life. To remain a sinner is the state in which we find ourselves, without any question of guilt.” He adds “We were made to live in Paradise, Paradise was made to serve us. Our destination has been changed; Is the same true as regards the destination of Paradise itself, this is not said” 17. This is a good question! Without Adam and Eve, without the human being created in the image of Elohim, masculine and feminine, and in their long absence, what has become of this Garden of Eden that Adonai Elohim walked through at the first breath of day?

A culture can legitimately be judged by the quality of the relationship between men and women that manifests itself in it. The relationship with women, as Éliane Amado Lévy-Valensi notes, is “the point where the relationship with the others is most inescapable, where hatred and fear due to ‘difference’ have the most immediate need to make a pact with love.”18 The harmony of the world depends on this first relationship but, unfortunately, such a harmony has long been understood as requiring the subordination of women. Many theologians have interpretated Genesis 3 as such without paying attention to the beautiful first chapter of Genesis. Now we have to understand this chapter as requiring a tikkun (repair) from us. From both men and women. The verses are not a curse that would prevent us from using our freedom to overcome the so often violent relationship between men and women.

In a patriarchal society, the hatred and fear which inhabit each and every one of us disappears from the field of men’s consciousness when they interact with those women who, accepting their inferiority and their lack of freedom, do not challenge their power over them. But since this hatred and fear are not confronted by men, they remain prey to an intimate psychic, spiritual and intellectual battle, with these passions resurfacing at the slightest opportunity: first when facing disobedient women, and more generally, when facing other men who, believing themselves to be exempt from such an intimate inner work, do not hesitate to be violent. This is evident in the interminable wars that punctuate all of human history. Fear and hatred also resurface in women’s psyche and conduct, especially when they have embraced the role assigned by men and have buried their own feelings of hatred within themselves, sometimes disguising them as a hold on their children. These feelings of hatred and fear erupt violently when other women challenge their vision of a world that would be ordered once and for all. The thin layer of love that does exist between men and women is easily degraded when the intimate tikkun of our own passions has not yet taken place. Yet it is indeed the task of every one of us since we have left the garden and since we have forgotten the beautiful first narrative of the first chapter of Genesis that tells us that the original blessing has not disappeared. It remains deeply hidden within our psyche.