Cheryl Schatz

Lin,
You asked:

If she had stayed close to God how could Adam have ruled over her unless God commanded it?

He could rule over her by force. This is the sad thing about patriarchy. It is a self appointed rule and it is a rule by the force of one person’s will over another.

Did she have a choice to leave or not? I gather from your teaching she had a choice.

Yes, Eve had a choice. She could have stayed in the garden and died there. The Messiah still could come through her without the need for a human male.

Did she make a wise choice?

Without her choice to leave none of us would be here. I believe that not only did God predict that she would leave (He prophesied that she would have pain in giving birth to children – plural), but he planned for all of the consequences that happened after the fall. God is able to work all things together for good for them that love Him.

As far as being a wise choice, she was in a one-flesh union with her husband. Even though he was now a committed sinner with a sin nature, she was still in love with him and his mate for life. She could have had a better life being alone in the garden without him, but perhaps that would have been the selfish choice. She was willing to continue a loving relationship with him so that they could together fulfill God’s command to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

Lin, the questions that you are asking are excellent questions and should help to push us all back into the text.

I just cannot seperate the physical from the spiritual.

The physical is much easier to control and dominate than the spiritual. The reason is because our spirits can not be taken captive without our choice. We can pray to God and communicate with Him and no one can stop us because our spiritual intimacy with God is not something physical that can be controlled.

I do know that many men after Adam have forced a spiritual control on women by restricting the physical service that a woman gives. While they cannot force themselves as a mediator between her and her God, they can do a lot to hold her back. And some women have fallen for the teaching that all that God has for her must be passed on down through the man.

But the issue here is Eve not all sinful women. Eve walked with God in the garden and Adam could not control her intimacy with God. Her words about God giving her a son from Himself is there in the Scriptures without being held back by Adam. While God predicted the truth about Eve’s life with Adam and that he would rule over her, there is no indication that Adam took away her intimacy with God. The same cannot always be said of the human sons and daughters of Adam.

If the desire was good then why bring it up after the fall?

Another great question! The answer is in the text. She would experience great pain in giving birth yet God predicts the unexpected – that she would desire him in spite of the pain. While desire is to be taken for granted in he original creation account where both were without sin and both were in unity together, it is not to be taken for granted after Adam became a committed sinner. Here is where her desire is important to know and understand and where his rule over her is also unexpected.

It would have been part of the good of creation and natural. God would have simply said: “He will now try to rule over you”.

The problem is that Adam did not “try” to rule over her but it was prophesied that he would take dominion over her. If he ruled over her merely by her own consent, then any consequence would have been her own fault. But the text does not show her consent. The text shows a connection done with a “but” or “yet” result. He has no reason to rule over her. God did not give him this rule and Eve did not give her rule away to him. Adam continued his life of sin by taking something for himself that did not belong to him. More on that shortly in the next post.

But Eve had to do something for that to happen the way it did. She had to turn toward/desire Adam more than her relationship with God.

This is a faulty conclusion. It is the way that we have been trained to think as if it is always her fault. No, it is not her fault. Adam did this sin on his own. Adam in his sinful male ability to overpower and dominate, chose to do so over her.

If we look at Israel in the OT, we will see that there were times when God gave them over to their enemies. Even those who did not sin with Israel had a consequence of being given over and ruled by the enemies, although God kept them safe throughout their trial. There are times when the innocent ones will have to suffer alongside the guilty. It is a result of the fallen state of humanity and this world.

I really appreciate the way that you have thought through these questions. It shows to me that you are thinking and reasoning and trying hard to work this all out with the Scriptures. This is so commendable!