Immerse: Beginnings Full Volume - Flipbook - Page 18
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IMMERSE
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BEGINNINGS
2:24–3:15
This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to
his wife, and the two are united into one.
Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.
The serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild animals the Lord God had
made. One day he asked the woman, “Did God really say you must not eat
the fruit from any of the trees in the garden?”
“Of course we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,” the woman
replied. “It’s only the fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden that
we are not allowed to eat. God said, ‘You must not eat it or even touch it;
if you do, you will die.’”
“You won’t die!” the serpent replied to the woman. “God knows that
your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God,
knowing both good and evil.”
The woman was convinced. She saw that the tree was beautiful and
its fruit looked delicious, and she wanted the wisdom it would give her.
So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it, too. At that moment their eyes were
opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed
fig leaves together to cover themselves.
When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife
heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the
Lord God among the trees. Then the Lord God called to the man,
“Where are you?”
He replied, “I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid
because I was naked.”
“Who told you that you were naked?” the Lord God asked. “Have you
eaten from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat?”
The man replied, “It was the woman you gave me who gave me the fruit,
and I ate it.”
Then the Lord God asked the woman, “What have you done?”
“The serpent deceived me,” she replied. “That’s why I ate it.”
Then the Lord God said to the serpent,
“Because you have done this, you are cursed
more than all animals, domestic and wild.
You will crawl on your belly,
groveling in the dust as long as you live.
And I will cause hostility between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring.
He will strike your head,
and you will strike his heel.”
