The book of Genesis begins with God taking disorder and darkness and creating out of it order, beauty, and goodness. He creates a world where life can flourish, as well as creatures to inhabit that world.
God makes humans, oradam in Hebrew, in "his image," a concept that has to do with their role in God’s world. They are made to be reflections of God’s character out in the world, and they are appointed representatives to rule God’s good world on his behalf. They are to harness this world’s potential, to care for it, and to make it a place where they can multiply and flourish. God blesses the humans—a key theme in this book—and gives them a garden from which they can begin their task of building the world.
It is important to note that these humans have a choice as to how they are going to build this world, represented neatly in the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Up until now, God has provided and defined for them what is good and what is not good, but at this point, God gives them the freedom and dignity to choose. Will they trust his definition of good and evil, or will they seize autonomy and define good and evil for themselves? The stakes are high here. To rebel against God is to embrace death by turning away from the tree of life, which represents the gift of life itself.
All of a sudden a mysterious figure, a snake, enters the story. It is given no introduction other than it is a creature that God made. It becomes clear, however, that the snake is in rebellion against God and wants to lead the humans into rebellion also, so that they’ll die. The snake tells them a different story about this tree of knowledge and the choice it represents. Seizing the knowledge of good and evil won’t bring death. On the contrary, it’s actually the way to life and to becoming like God himself.
The tragic irony, of course, is that the humans are already like God, as they are a reflection of his image. But instead of trusting God, they seize autonomy and take the knowledge of good and evil for themselves. In an instant, the whole story spirals downward.
The first casualty is in human relationships. The man and woman suddenly realize how vulnerable they are now; can they even trust each other? They make clothes to hide their bodies from each other. The second casualty is that the original intimacy between God and the humans is lost. The humans run and hide from God and start a game of blame-shifting about who rebelled against him first. At this point, the storytelling shifts into a series of short poems in which God declares to the snake and the humans the tragic consequences of their actions.
God first announces that, despite the snake’s apparent victory, it is destined for defeat and is cursed to eat dust. God promises that one day a "seed" or descendant will come from the woman and will deliver a lethal strike to the snake’s head. While this sounds like good news, the victory will come with a cost. While its head is crushed, the snake will deliver its own lethal strike to the descendant’s heel.
This mysterious promise of a wounded victor is an act of God’s grace. Although the humans have rebelled, God promises to rescue them, but it doesn’t erase the consequences of their choice. God informs them that every aspect of their life together, in the home and in the field, will be fraught with grief and pain as a result of their rebellion, ultimately leading to death.
