Cheryl Schatz

Lin,
Your quote says:

Before Cain could have been born (Genesis 4:1) either Adam must have repented and become again the child of God, or Eve must have turned from God and followed Adam out of Eden. The fact that Cain was a murderer certainly argues that Eve followed Adam.

I do not agree with this at all. It is once again blaming the woman for what others did. I think that it is unhelpful to state that the woman turned her back on God when she left with her husband as if she couldn’t have both her God and her husband. The text doesn’t say this and if we add to the Scriptures we can have serious problems with what we believe.

Then there is this quote:

123. Eve was, then, the first woman to forsake her (heavenly) kindred for her husband. She reversed God’s marriage law,—”Therefore shall a man forsake his father and his mother, and cleave to his wife.” Had Eve remained steadfast with God, Adam might through the double influence of God and Eve, have returned to God.

Not only is this again putting the blame for Adam’s continued sinning onto Eve, but the text never says that Eve did not remain steadfast with God when her eyes were opened to the truth. I may respect Bushnell a lot for her work, but these statements have no basis in the text.

This is also not true:

124. God spoke warningly to Eve at this time, telling her that she was inclining to turn away from Himself to her husband, and telling her that if she did so her husband would rule over her.

God did not warn Eve that she should not leave the garden because it would be a turning away from Him. He warned her about what life would be like with her one-flesh husband. Was God actually telling her that she had to stay in the garden and keep away from her one-flesh union? Was he telling her that she was no longer to fill the earth? Or was He merely warning her of life outside the garden when she kept her one-flesh union with her husband? I believe that the latter is the truth and I see no other words in the text that would add an either/or warning from God. Where is this extra warning in the text if it truly is there?

In fact there is no variety in the three sentences, excepting in the proper nouns implied in the pronouns used. The sense of the three passages must be similar.

If what Eve did is sinful, (her desire or turning) then by implication all the three passages must have sin as a result. This would make the passage about Christ’s desire to be sinful too. It just doesn’t fit.

If this be a commandment of God, and man must rule woman, the more carnally-minded a man is the better he keeps that sort of “law!” But the Apostle Paul says: “The carnal mind . . . is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Romans 8:7). Thus we see that the context does not prove that this “shall be” of the sentence translated, “thy desire shall be to thy husband” is imperative. We can assert positively that this sentence is a simple future or present, warning woman of the consequences of her action.

This I can agree with, however just because she will desire her husband does not mean that the desire is automatically a sinful thing. It is not a warning by God not to desire him. It is warning her about what will befall her with her one-flesh union will be like with a sinful natured husband.

But Jesus Christ said, as much of women as of men: “NO ONE can serve two masters.”

This is true, but it is not recorded in the Scripture that Eve set herself out to serve Adam as her master.

In my opinion Bushnell fails in this part of her teaching because she assumes a sin on the woman’s part by her leaving God as if He is restricted to the garden. The text gives not even one word towards Eve turning her back on God as none of the Hebrew words says this. If we want to make Eve a habitual sinner, we are in danger of having no human parent that the Messiah could come through and have no inherited sin nature. There is reason why Jesus could not have a human father. If we make Eve out to be a rebellious sinner like Adam, then how could God justify restricting the male from being a human father?

Let’s think these things through carefully.