In the Beginning: A Study in Genesis 1-14Sýnishorn

Were Adam and Eve the First Human Beings?

When we are kids in school, we are asked to put together our family tree as an assignment to understand who we come from. As we get older, many people choose to go further in their research and learn as much as they can about their ancestors. Something in us wants to know who and where we come from, and all the variables that make us who we are. If we were able to trace our ancestry back to the very beginning, we would all find ourselves as part of the same human family with Adam and Eve as our first mother and father.

Genesis 2:4-25 further elaborates upon Genesis 1:26-2:4 by giving greater details about the creation of Adam and Eve. There are four vital concepts that we learn from this section of Scripture that have significant implications for issues that rage in our day around: sex (our God-given male or female biological status), gender (male and female traits and conduct), sexuality (allowed only in heterosexual marriage by God), and marriage (only for one man and one woman according to God).

The only thing in all of creation which was declared to be “not good” is Adam’s state as an unmarried single man. Simply, Adam could not reflect the image of God that he was created in by himself and he needed a wife as his equal to represent the Trinitarian nature of God upon the earth. This fact is inferred in the text as the man and woman were declared to be “one” which is echoed in Deuteronomy 6:4 and I Corinthians 11:7-9. Adam’s response to God’s beautiful handiwork of making his bride was to burst out in poetic praise.

We also learn that God’s governance has singular headship and plural leadership. That the man was made before the woman and appointed as the head, is a fact that Paul builds upon in 1 Timothy 2:11-13, and also serves as the beginning of male headship in the family. Both the husband and wife serve as plural leaders as they are supposed to live as “one”, and in the family children are repeatedly exhorted to honor and obey both their mother and father who are both family leaders.

In addition to the making of the man and the woman, a number of additional facts are given about the environment God had spent five days preparing. First, a beautiful garden cultivated by God was given as a home to our first parents and the prototype for the man and his descendants to cultivate the rest of creation to resemble through their work. Second, in the garden was the tree of life which sustained Adam and Eve’s existence and may indicate that mankind was not made eternal but rather kept alive as long as they obeyed God and had access to this tree which appears again in Heaven in the text of the last book of the Bible, Revelation. Third, also in the garden was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil which was in the middle of the garden and was forbidden for consumption by God under penalty of death and used by God to test their faith in Him.

Question:

What does God’s creation of human life reveal about His loving care for us?