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ADAM
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ADAM , the conventional name of the first created See also:man according to the See also:Bible. 1. The Name.—The use of " Adam " (o,K) as a proper name is an See also:early See also:error. Properly the word adam designated man as a See also:species; with the See also:article prefixed (Geri. ii. 7, 8, 16, iv. 1; and doubtless ii. 20, iii. 17) it means the first man. Only in Gen. iv. 25 and v. 3-5 is adam a quasi-proper name, though LXX. and See also:Vulgate use " Adam " (Asap) in this way freely. Gen. ii. 7 suggests a popular See also:Hebrew derivation from cldamah, " the ground." Into the question whether the See also:original See also:story did not give a proper name which was afterwards modified into "Adam'--important as this question is —we cannot here epter.
2. Creation of Adam.—For convenience, we shall take" Adam
as a See also:symbol for " the first man," and inquire first, what does tradition say of his creation? In Gen. ii. 4b-8 we read thus:—"At the See also:time when Yahweh-Elohim' made See also:earth and See also:heaven,—earth was as yet without bushes, no herbage was as yet sprouting, because Yahweh-Elohim had not caused it to See also:rain upon the earth, and no men were there to till the ground, but a stream2 used to go up from the earth, and See also:water all the See also:face of the ground,—then Yahweh-Elohim formed the man of dust of the ground,3 and blew into his nostrils breath of See also:life,' and the man became a living being. And Yahweh-Elohim planted a gardens in See also:Eden, See also:east-See also: For no beast however mighty, no See also:bird however graceful, was a See also:fit See also:companion for God's masterpiece, and, apart from the See also:serpent, the animals had no See also:faculty of speech. All therefore that Adam could do, as 'they passed before him, was to name them, as a See also:lord names his vassals. But here arises a difficulty. How came Adam by the requisite insight and See also:power of observation? For as yet he had not snatched the perilous boon of See also:wisdom. Clearly the See also:Paradise story is not homogeneous. 3. How the Animals were named.—Some moderns, e.g. von Bohlen, See also:Ewald, See also:Driver (in See also:Genesis, p. 55, but cp. p. 42), have found in ii. 19, 20 an early explanation of the origin of See also:language. This is hardly right. The narrator assumes that Adam and Eve had an innate faculty of speech.° They spoke just as the birds sing, and their language was that of the See also:race or See also:people which descended from them. Most probably the See also:object of the story is, not to See also:answer any curious question (such as, how did human speech arise, or how came the animals by their names?), but to dehort its readers or hearers from the abominable See also:vice referred to in Lev. xviii. 23.7 There may have been stories in circulation like that of See also:Ea-bani (§ 8), and even such as those of the Skidi See also:Pawnee, in which " people " marry animals, or become animals. Against these it is said (ver. lob) that " for Adam he found no helper (qualified) to match him." 4. Three See also:Riddles.—Manifold are the problems suggested by the Eden-story (see EDEN; PARADISE). For instance, did the original story mention two trees, or only one, of which the See also:fruit was See also:taboo? In iii. 3(cp. vv. 6, 11) only " the See also:tree in the midst of the See also:garden " is spoken of, but in ii. 9 and iii. 22 two trees are referred to, the fruit of both of which would appear to be taboo. To this we must add that in ii. 17 " the tree of the knowledge of See also:good and evil " appears to have the qualities of a " tree of life," except indeed to Adam. This passage seems to give us the See also: Antiquities, i. 1, 4). Cheyne, Genesis and See also:Exodus, referring to Dorsey, Traditions of the Skidi Pawnee, pp. 2, 8o if. ° " Good and evil " may be a See also:late marginal See also:gloss. See further Ency. Bib. See also:col. 3578, and the commentaries (Driver leaves the ee~hrase}; also Jastrow, Relig. of Bab. and See also:Ass. p. 553; See also:Sayce, Hibberl Lectures, p. 242.(so See also:primitive man believed) would enable any being to See also:escape See also:death (an See also:idea spiritualized in Prov. iii. 18). Next, which of the trees is the " tree of life "? Various sacred trees were known to the Semitic peoples, such as the fig-tree (cp. iii. 7), which sometimes appears, conventionalized, as a sacred tree.° But clearly the tree referred to was more than a " sacred tree "; it was a tree from whose fruit or juice, as culture advanced, some intoxicating drink was produced. The Gaokerena of the Iranians 10 is exactly parallel. At the resurrection, those who drink of the life-giving juice of this plant will obtain perfect welfare," including deathlessness. It is not, however, either from See also:Iran or from See also:India that the Hebrew tree of life is derived, but from See also:Arabia and Babylonia, where date See also:wine (cp. See also:Enoch See also:xxiv. 4) is the earliest intoxicant. Of this drink it may well have been said in primitive times (cp. Rig Veda, ix. go. 5, of See also:Soma) that it " cheers the See also:heart of gods " (in the speech of the See also:vine, Juclg. ix. 13). Later writers spoke of a " tree of See also:mercy," distilling the " oil of life,"" i.e. the oil that heals, but 4 Esdr. ii. 12 (cp. viii. 53) speaks of the " tree of life," and Rev. xxii. 2 (virtually) of " trees of life," whose'leaves have a healing virtue (cp. Ezek. xlvii. 12). The oil-tree should doubtless be grouped with the See also:river of oil in later writings (see PARADISE). Originally it was enough that there should be one tree of life, i.e. that heightened and preserved vitality. A third enigma—why no " See also:fountain of life "? The references to such a fountain in See also:Proverbs (xiii. 14, &c.) prove that the idea was See also:familiar,12 and in Rev. xxii. 1 we are told that the river of Paradise was a " river of water of life " (see PARADISE). ' The serpent, too, in See also:mythology is a See also:regular symbol of water. Possibly the narrator, or redactor, desired to See also:tone down the traces of mythology. Just as the Gathas (the See also:ancient Zoroastrian See also:hymns) omit Gaokerena, and the Hebrew prophets on the whole avoid mythological phrases, so this old Hebrew thinker prunes the primitive exuberance of the traditional myth.
5. The Serpent.—The keen-witted, fluently speaking serpent gives rise to fresh riddles. How comes it that Adam's ruin is effected by one of those very " beasts of the See also: Hence perhaps his See also:strange boldness. For some unknown See also:reason he was See also:ill disposed towards Yahweh-Elohim (see iii. 3b), which has suggested to some that he may be akin to the See also:great enemy of Creation. To Adam and Eve, how-ever, he is not unkind. He bids them raise themselves in the See also:scale of being by eating the forbidden fruit, which he declares to be not fatal to life but an opener of the eyes, and capable of equalizing men with gods (iii. 4, 5). To the phrase " ye shall be as gods " a later writer may have added " knowing good and evil," but " to be as gods " originally meant " to live the life of gods—wise, powerful, happy." The serpent was in the See also:main right, but there is one point which he did not mention, viz. that for any being to retain this intensified vitality the eating of the
° See illustration in See also:Toy's See also:Ezekiel (Sacred Books of the Old Testament), p. 182.
i° Gaokerena is the mythic See also: 6-1o). It corresponds to the soma plant (Asclepias acida) of the ancient See also:Aryans of India. On the illustrative value of Gaokerena see Cheyne, Origin of the Psalter, pp. 400-439. " See Life of Adam and Eve (apocryphal), §§ 36, 4o; Apocal. Mos. § 9; Secrets of Enoch, viii. 7, xxii. 8;9. ` Oil of life," in a Bab. hymn, See also:Die Keilinschriften and das Alte Testament, ed. 3, p. 526.
ii Cp. the Bab. myths of Adapa and of the Descent of See also:Ishtar.
1° W. R. See also: 6). The consequence (ver. 7) may seem to us rather slight: " they knew (became sensible) that they were naked, and sewed fig-leaves together, and made themselves girdles (aprons)." But the real meaning is not slight; the sexual distinction has been discovered, and a new sense of shame sends the human pair into the thickest shades, when Yahweh-Elohim walks abroad. The God of these primitive men is surprised: " Where See also:art See also:thou? " By degrees, he obtains a full confession—not from the serpent, whose speech might not have been edifying, but from Adam and Eve. The sentences which he passes are decisive, not only for the human pair and the serpent, but for their respective races. Painful toil shall be the See also:lot of man; subjection and pangs that of woman? The serpent too (whose unique form preoccupied the early men) shall be humiliated, as a perpetual warning to man—who is henceforth his enemy—of the danger of reasoning on and disobeying the will of God. 7. Versions of the Adam-story.—Theologians in all ages have allegorized this strange narrative.' The serpent becomes the inner See also:voice of temptation, and the saying in iii. 15 becomes an anticipation of the final victory of good over evil—a view which probably arose in Jewish circles directly or indirectly affected by the Zoroastrian See also:eschatology. . But See also:allegory was far from the thoughts of the original narrators. Another version of the Adam-story is given by Ezekiel (xxviii. 11-1g), for underneath the See also: 25) and " See also:drew wisdom to him-self " by " hearkening in the See also:council of Elohim." No reference is made in Job to this See also:hero's fall. The omission, however, is re-paired, not only in Ezek. xxviii. 16, but also in Isa. xiv. 12-15, where the king, whose name is given in the English Bible as " See also:Lucifer " (or margin, " See also:day-See also:star "), " son of the See also:morning, and who, like the other king in Ezekiel, is threatened with death, is a copy of the mythical Adam. The two conceptions of the first man are widely different. The !passages last referred to harmonize with the account given in Gen. i. 26, for " in our See also:image " certainly suggests a being equal in brightness and in capacities to the angels—a view which, as we know, became the favourite one in apocryphal and Haggadic descriptions of the Adam before the Fall. And though the priestly writer, to whom the first Creation-story in its See also:present form is due, says nothing about a sacred mountain as the dwelling-See also:place of the first-created man, yet this mountain belongs to the type of tradition which the passage, Gen. i. 26-28, imperfectly but truly represents. The glorious first man of Ezekiel, and the god-like first men of the cosmogony (cp. Ps. viii. 5) who held the regency of the earth,' require a dwelling-place as far above the See also:common level of the earth as they are themselves above the See also:child- like Adam of the second creation-narrative (Gen. ii.). 
On this sacred mountain, see COSMOGONY. ' See also:Note the See also:food and drink of the gods in the Babylonian Adapa (or Adamu?) myth. 2 The mortality of man forms no See also:part of the curse (cp. iii. 19, " dust thou art "). ' See H. See also:Schultz, Alttest. Theologie, ed. 4, pp. 679 if., 720 ; Driver, Genesis, p. 44. ' See Cheyne, Genesis and Exodus. ' Cp. the " See also:fair shepherd " Yima of the Avesta (Vend. ii.), the first man and the founder of See also:civilization to the Iranians, though not like the See also:Yama of the Vedas.169 8. Origin of the Adam-story.—That the Hebrew story of the first man in both its forms is no mere recast of a Babylonian myth, is generally admitted. The See also:holy mountain is no doubt Babylonian, and the plantations of sacred trees; one of which at least has magic virtue, can be paralleled from the monuments (see EDEN). But there is no See also:complete parallel to the description of Paradise in Gen. ii., or to the story of the See also:rib, or to that of the serpent. The first part of the latter has definite Arabian affinities; the second is as definitely Hebrew. We may now add that the insertion of iii. 7 (from " were opened") to 19—a passage which has probably supplanted a more archaic and definitely mythological passage—may well have been the consequence of the See also:change in the conception of the first man referred to above. Still there are four Babylonian stories which may serve as partial illustrations of the Hebrew Adam-story. The first is contained in a fragment of a cosmogony in See also:Berossus, now confirmed in the main by the See also:sixth tablet of the Creation-epic. It represents the creation of man as due to one of the inferior gods who (at See also:Bel's command) mingled with clay the See also:blood which flowed from the severed See also:head of Bel (see COSMOGONY). The three others are the myths of Adapa,' Ea-bani and Etana. As to Adapa, it may be mentioned here that Fossey has shown reason for holding that the true See also:reading of the name is Adamu. It thus becomes plausible to hold that " Adam " in Gen. ii.-iii. was originally a proper name, and that it was derived from Babylonia. More probably, however, this is but .an accidental coincidence; both adam and adamu may come from the same Semitic See also:root meaning " to make." Certainly Adamu (if it is nc* more convenient to write "Adapa ") was not regarded as the progenitor of the human race, like the Hebrew Adam. He was, however, certainly a man—one of those men who were not, of course, See also:rival first-men, but were specially created and endowed. Adamu or Adapa, we are told, received from his divine See also:father the See also:gift of wisdom,' but not that of See also:everlasting life. He had a See also:chance, however, of obtaining the gift, or at least of eating the food and drinking the water which makes the gods ageless and immortal. But through a deceit practised upon him by his divine father Ea, he supposed the food and drink offered to him on a certain occasion by the gods to be " food of death," " water of death," just as Adam and Eve at first believed that the fruit of the magic tree would produce death (Gen. iii. 4, 5). The second story is that of Ea-bani,8 who was formed by the goddess Arusu (=the See also:mother-goddess Ishtar) of a lump of clay (cp. Gen. ii. 7). This human creature, See also:long-haired and sensual, was See also:drawn away from a See also:savage mode of life by a harlot, and Jastrow, followed by G. A. See also:Barton, See also:Worcester and See also:Tennant, considers this to be parallel to the story which may underlie the account of the failure of the beasts, and the success of the woman Eve, as a " help-meet " for Adam. This, however, is most uncertain. The third is that of Etana.' Here the main points are that Etana is induced by an See also:eagle to See also:mount up to heaven, that he may win a boon from the kindly goddess Ishtar., See also:Borne by the eagle, he soared high up into the See also:ether, but became afraid. Downward the eagle and his See also:burden See also:fell, and in the epic of Gilgamesh we find Etana in the nether See also:world. According to Jastrow, this attempted See also:ascension was an offence against the gods, and his fall was his See also:punishment. We are not told, however, that Etana had the impious See also:desire of Ezekiel's first man, and if he fell, it was through his own timidity (contrast Ezek. xxviii. 16). But certainly the myth does help us to imagine a story in which, for some See also:sin against the gods, some favoured hero was hurled down from the divine See also:abode, and such a story may some day be discovered. To these illustrations it is unsafe to add the See also:scene on a See also:cylinder preserved in the See also:British Museum, representing two figures, a 6 See Jastrow, Rel. of Bab. and Ass. pp. 548-554; R.' J. Harper, in See also:Academy, May 3o, 1891; See also:Jensen, Keilinschr. Bibliothek, vi. 93 if. ' The wisdom was probably to qualify him as a ruler. It is too much to say with Hommel that "'Adapa is the archetype of the Johannine See also:Logos." 6 Jastrow, op. cit. p. 474 ff. ; Jensen, Kell. Bibl. vi. 120 if. Jastrow, p. 522 f.; Jensen, vi. 112 ff. man (with horns) and perhaps a woman, both clothed, on either See also:side of a fruit-tree, towards which they stretch out their hands.' For the meaning of this is extremely problematical.. Some better monumental illustration may some day be found, for it is clear that the Babylonian sacred literature had much to tell of offences against the gods in the primeval See also:age. The student may naturally ask, Whence did the Israelites (a comparatively See also:young people) obtain the original myth ? It is most probable that they obtained it through the See also:mediation either of the Canaanites or of the See also:North Arabians. Babylonian See also:influence, as is now well known, was strongly See also:felt for many centuries in See also:Canaan, and even the See also:cuneiform script was in common use among the high officials of the See also:country. When the Israelites entered Canaan, they would learn myths partly of Babylonian origin. North Arabian influence must also have been strong among the Israelites, at least while they sojourned in North Arabia. From the See also:Kenites, at any See also:rate, they may have received, not only a strong religious impulse, but a See also:store of tales of the primitive age, and these stories too may have been partly influenced by Babylonian traditions. We must allow for stages of development both among the Israelites and among their tutors. 9. Biblical References to the Adam-story.—It is remarkable how little influence the Adam-story has had on the earlier parts of the Old Testament. The garden of Eden is referred to in Isa. li. 3, Ezek. See also:xxxvi. 3,5, See also:Joel ii. 5; cp. Ezek. xxviii. 13, xxxi. 8, 9, 16, 18, all of which are later. And it is mostly in the " humanistic " See also:hook of Proverbs that we find allusions to the " tree of life " (Prov. iii. 18, xi. 30, xiii. 12, XV. 4), and to the " fountain of life "—perhaps (see § 4) an omitted portion of the old Paradise-story (Prov. x. II, xiii. 14, X1V. 27, xvi. 22),—the only other Biblical reference (apart from Rev. xxi. 6) being in that exquisite passage, Ps. xxxvi. 9. One can hardly be surprised at this. The Adam-story is plainly of See also:foreign origin, and could not please the greater pre-exilic prophets. In late See also:post-exilic times, how-ever, foreign tales, even if of mythical origin, naturally came into favour, especially as religions symbols. If even now philosophers and theologians cannot resist the temptation to allegorize, how inevitable was it that this course should be pursued by early Jewish theologians! ro. Incipient Reflexion on the Story.—Let us give some instances of this. In Enoch Ixix. 6 we find the story of Eve's temptation read in the light of that of the fallen angels (Gen. vi. 1, 2, 4) who conveyed an evil knowledge to men, and so subjected mankind to mortality. Evidently the writer fears culture. Elsewhere eating the fruit of the " tree of wisdom " is given as the cause of the See also:expulsion of the human pair. In the Wisdom of See also:Solomon (x. 1, 2) we find another view. Here, as in Ezekiel, the first man is pre-eminently See also:wise and strong; though he transgressed, wisdom rescued him, i.e. taught him repentance (cp. Life of Adam and Eve, §§ 1-8). Elsewhere (ii. 24; cp. Jos. See also:Ant. i. 1, 4) death is traced to the envy of the See also:devil, still implying an exalted view of Adam. It is held that, but for his sin, Adam would have been immortal. Clearly the Jewish mind is exposed to some fresh foreign influences. As in the See also:Talmud and the See also:Jerusalem See also:Targum, the serpent has even become the devil, i.e. Satan. The See also:period of See also:syncretism has fully come, and Zoroastrianism in particular, more indirectly than directly, is exercising an attractive power upon the Jews. For all that, the theological thinking is characteristically Jewish, and such guidance as Jewish thinkers required was mainly given by See also:Greek culture. On this subject see further EVE, § 5. 11. Growth of a See also:Theology.—Let us now turn to the Apocalypses of See also:Baruch and of See also:Ezra (both about 70 A.D.). Different views are here expressed. According to one (xvii. 3, xix. 8, See also:xxiii. 4) the sin of Adam was the cause of See also:physical death; according to another (liv. 15, Ivi. 6), only of premature physical death, while according to a third (xlviii. 42, 43) it is spiritual death which is to be laid to his account. Of these three views, it is only the ' See Smith and Sayce, Chaldaean Genesis, p. 88 ; See also:Delitzsch, Wo lag das Paradies? p. 90; See also:Babel and Bible, Eng. trans., p. 56, with note on pp. 114-118; Zimmern, Die Keilinschr. and das A.T., ed. 3, p. 529 ; Jeremias, Das Alte Test. See also:im Lichte d. See also:Allen Orient. pp. Io4-1o6.second which harmonizes with Gen. ii.-iii. In one of the two passages which See also:express it we are also told that each member of the human race is the Adam of his own soul." Adam, like Satan in Ecclus. xxi. 27, has become a psychological symbol. Truly, a worthy development of the See also:seed-thoughts of the original narrator, and (must we not add'?) entirely opposed to any See also:doctrine of Original Sin. In 4 Ezra, too, we find no real endorsement of such a doctrine. It is true, not only physical death (iii. 7), but spiritual, is traced to the See also:act of Adam (iii. 21, 22, iV. 30, 31, Vii. 118—121). But two modifying facts should be noticed. One is that Adam is said to have had from the first a wicked heart, owing to which he fell, and his posterity likewise, into sin and See also:guilt. All men have the same seed of evil in them that Adam had; they sin and die, like him. The other is that, according to iii. 7-12, there are at least two ages of the world. The first ended with the See also:Flood, so that any consequences of Adam's sin were, strictly speaking, of limited duration. The second began with righteous See also:Noah and his See also:household, " of whom came all righteous men." It was the descendants of these who " began again to do ungodliness more than the former ones." Doubtless the problem of evil is most imperfectly treated, even from the writer's point of view. But it would be cruel to pick holes in a writer whose thinking, like that of St See also:Paul, is coloured by emotion. At this point we might well make more than a passing reference to St Paul (Rom. v. 14; I See also:Cor. XV. 22, 45, 47), whose doctrine of sin is evidently of mixed origin. But we cannot find space for this here. In See also:compensation let it be mentioned that in Rev. xii. 9 (cp. xx. 2) the great dragon," who persecuted the woman " clothed with the See also:sun," is identified with " the old serpent, that is called the Devil and Satan." The See also:identification is incorrect. But it may be noticed here that the phrase " the old serpent " sheds some light on the Pauline phrases " the first man Adam " and " the last Adam " (1 Cor. xv. 45, 47)• The underlying idea is that the new age (that of the new heaven and earth) will be opened by events parallel to those which opened the first age. As the old serpent deceived man of old, so shall it be again. And as at the head of the first age stands the first Adam, whose doings affected all"his descendants to their harm, so at the head of the second shall stand the second Adam, whose actions shall be potent for good. There is reason to suspect that the expression " the second Adam " is the coinage either of St Paul or of some one closely connected with him (as Prof. G. F. See also:Moore has shown), for there is no See also:proof that such terms as " the last," or " the second Adam," were generally current among the Jews. 12. Jewish Legends.—The See also:parallelism between the first and second Adam in 1 See also:Con xv. 45 is a parallelism of contrast. Jewish legends, however, suggest another sort of parallelism. The Haggadah gives the most extravagant descriptions of the See also:glory of Adam before his fall. The most prominent idea is that being in the image of God—the God whose essence is light—he must have had a luminous See also:body (like the angels). " I made thee of the light," says God in the Book of Adam and Eve (Malan, p. 16), " and I willed to bring See also:children of light from thee." Similarly in Baba batra, 58a, we read, " he was of extraordinary beauty and sun-like brightness." So glorious was he that even the angels were commanded through See also:Michael to pay See also:homage to Adam. Satan, disobeying, was See also:cast out of heaven; hence his ill-will towards Adam. (Life of Adam and Eve, §§ 13-17; Cp. See also:Koran, xvii. 63, xx. 115, xxxviii. 74). It only remains to give due See also:honour to one of the most beautiful of legends, that of the deliverance of Adam's spirit from the nether world by the See also:Christ, the earliest form of which is a Christian See also:interpolation inApoc. See also:Moses, § 42 (cp. Malan, Adam and Eve, iv. 15, end). We may compare a partly parallel passage in § 37, where the See also:agent is Michael, and See also:notice that such legendary developments were equally popular among Jews and Christians. See also:des See also:jud. Volkes, ed. 3, iii. 288 f. On Jewish and See also:Mahommedan legends, see Jewish Cyclopaedia, " Adam." On the belief in the Fall, see Tennant, The See also:Sources of the Doctrine of the Fall and Original Sin (1903). (T. K. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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