Chapter 3:
| Calvin
| Darby
| Geneva
| Gill
| Jamieson Faussett Brown
| Matthew Henry
| Matthew Henry Concise
| Wesley
| Index
| Bible Gateway |
Introduction 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 Revelation Exodus
Genesis 3
III The general contents of this chapter we have Rom. v, 12. By
one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death
passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. More particularly,
we have here,
I. The innocent tempted, ver. 1-5.
II. The tempted transgressing, ver. 6, 7, 8.
III. The transgressors arraigned, ver. 9, 10.
IV. Upon their arraignment convicted, ver. 11-13.
V. Upon their conviction sentenced, ver. 14-19.
VI. After sentence, reprieved, ver. 20, 21.
VII. Notwithstanding their reprieve, execution in part done, ver.
22-24, and were it not for the gracious intimations of redemption,
they and all their race had been left to despair.
Verses 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. We have here an account of the temptation wherewith
Satan assaulted our first parents, and which proved fatal to them.
And here observe,
1. The tempter, the devil in the shape of a serpent. Multitudes of
them fell; but this that attacked our first parents, was surely the
prince of the devils. Whether it was only the appearance of a
serpent, or a real serpent, acted and possessed by the devil, is not
certain. The devil chose to act his part in a serpent, because it is a
subtle creature. It is not improbable, that reason and speech were
then the known properties of the serpent. And therefore Eve was
not surprised at his reasoning and speaking, which otherwise she
must have been.
2. That which the devil aimed at, was to persuade Eve to eat
forbidden fruit; and to do this, he took the same method that he
doth still.
(1.) He questions whether it were a sin or no, ver. 1,
(2.) He denies that there was any danger in it, ver. 4.
(3.) He suggests much advantage by it, ver. 5. And these are his
common topics. As to the advantage, he suits the temptation to the
pure state they were now in, proposing to them not any carnal
pleasure, but intellectual delights.
[1.] Your eyes shall be opened - You shall have much more of the
power and pleasure of contemplation than now you have; you
shall fetch a larger compass in your intellectual views, and see
farther into things than now you do.
[2.] You shall be as gods - As Elohim, mighty gods, not only
omniscient but omnipotent too:
[3.] You shall know good and evil - That is, everything that is
desirable to be known. To support this part of the temptation, he
abuseth the name given to this tree. 'Twas intended to teach the
practical knowledge of good and evil, that is, of duty and
disobedience, and it would prove the experimental knowledge of
good and evil, that is, of happiness and misery. But he perverts the
sense of it, and wrests it to their destruction, as if this tree would
give them a speculative notional knowledge of the natures, kinds,
and originals of good and evil. And,
[4.] All this presently, In the day you eat thereof - You will find a
sudden and immediate change for the better. See note at "ver. 1"
Verses 6, 7, 8. Here we see what Eve's parley with the tempter ended in:
Satan at length gains his point. God tried the obedience of our first
parents by forbidding them the tree of knowledge, and Satan doth
as it were join issue with God, and in that very thing undertakes to
seduce them into a transgression; and here we find how he
prevailed, God permitting it for wise and holy ends.
(1.) We have here the inducements that moved them to transgress.
The woman being deceived, was ring-leader in the transgression,
1 Tim. ii, 14
1. She saw that the tree was - It was said of all the rest of the fruit
trees wherewith the garden of Eden was planted, that they were
pleasant to the sight, and good for food.
2. She imagined a greater benefit by this tree than by any of the
rest, that it was a tree not only not to be dreaded, but to be desired
to make one wise, and therein excelling all the rest of the trees.
This she saw, that is, she perceived and understood it by what the
devil had said to her. She gave also to her husband with her - 'Tis
likely he was not with her when she was tempted; surely if he had,
he would have interposed to prevent the sin; but he came to her
when she had eaten, and was prevailed with by her to eat likewise.
She gave it to him; persuading him with the same arguements that
the serpent had used with her; adding this to the rest, that she
herself had eaten of it, and found it so far from being deadly that it
was extremely pleasant and grateful. And he did eat - This
implied the unbelief of God's word, and confidence in the devil's;
discontent with his present state, and an ambition of the honour
which comes not from God. He would be both his own carver,
and his own master, would have what he pleased, and do what he
pleased; his sin was in one word disobedience, Rom. v, 19,
disobedience to a plain, easy and express command, which he
knew to be a command of trial. He sins against light and love, the
clearest light and the dearest love that ever sinner sinned against.
But the greatest aggravation of his sin was, that he involved all his
posterity in sin and ruin by it. He could not but know that he stood
as a public person, and that his disobedience would be fatal to all
his seed; and if so, it was certainly both the greatest treachery and
the greatest cruelty that ever was. Shame and fear seized the
criminals, these came into the world along with sin, and still
attend it. The Eyes of them both were opened - The eyes of their
consciences; their hearts smote them for what they had done Now,
when it was too late, they saw the happiness they were fallen
from, and the misery they were fallen into. They saw God
provoked, his favour forfeited, his image lost; they felt a disorder
in their own spirits, which they had never before been conscious
of; they saw a law in their members warring against the law of
their minds, and captivating them both to sin and wrath; they saw
that they were naked, that is, that they were stripped, deprived of
all the honours and joys of their paradise state, and exposed to all
the miseries that might justly be expected from an angry God; laid
open to the contempt and reproach of heaven and earth, and their
own consciences. And they sewed or platted fig leaves together,
and, to cover, at least, part of their shame one from another, made
themselves aprons. See here what is commonly the folly of those
that have sinned: they are more solicitous to save their credit
before men, than to obtain their pardon from God. And they heard
the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the
day - Tis supposed he came in a human shape; in no other
similitude than that wherein they had seen him when he put them
into paradise; for he came to convince and humble them, not to
amaze and terrify them. He came not immediately from heaven in
their view as afterwards on mount Sinai, but he came in the
garden, as one that was still willing to be familiar with them. He
came walking, not riding upon the wings of the wind, but walking
deliberately, as one slow to anger. He came in the cool of the day,
not in the night, when all fears are doubly fearful; nor did he come
suddenly upon them, but they heard his voice at some distance,
giving them notice of his coming; and probably it was a still small
voice, like that in which he came to inquire after Elijah. And they
hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God - A sad
change! Before they had sinned, if they heard the voice of the
Lord God coming towards them, they would have run to meet
him, but now God was become a terror to them, and then no
marvel they were become a terror to themselves. See note at "ver.
6"
Verse 9. Where art thou? - This enquiry after Adam may be looked upon
as a gracious pursuit in order to his recovery. If God had not
called to him to reduce him, his condition had been as desperate
as that of fallen angels.
Verse10. I heard thy voice in the garden: and I was afraid - Adam was
afraid because he was naked; not only unarmed, and therefore
afraid to contend with God, but unclothed and therefore afraid so
much as to appear before him.
Verse
11. Who told thee that thou wast naked? - That is, how camest
thou to be sensible of thy nakedness as thy shame? Hast thou
eaten of the tree? - Tho' God knows all our sins, yet he will know
them from us, and requires from us an ingenuous confession of
them, not that he may be informed, but that we may be humbled.
Whereof I commanded thee not to eat of it, I thy maker, I thy
master, I thy benefactor, I commanded thee to the contrary. Sin
appears most plain and most sinful in the glass of the
commandment.
Verse
13. What is this that thou hast done? - Wilt thou own thy fault?
Neither of them does this fully. Adam lays all the blame upon his
wife: She gave me of the tree - Nay, he not only lays the blame
upon his wife, but tacitly on God himself. The woman thou gavest
me, and gavest to be with me as my companion, she gave me of
the tree. Eve lays all the blame upon the serpent; the serpent
beguiled me. The prisoners being found guilty by their own
confession, besides the infallible knowledge of the Judge, and
nothing material being offered in arrest of judgment, God
immediately proceeds to pass sentence, and in these verses he
begins (where the sin began) with the serpent. God did not
examine the serpent, nor ask him what he had done, but
immediately sentenced him, (a.) Because he was already convicted of rebellion against God.
(b.) Because he was to be for ever excluded from pardon; and why
should any thing be said to convince and humble him, who was to
find no place for repentance?
Verse
14. To testify a displeasure against sin, God fastens a curse upon
the serpent, Thou art cursed above all cattle - Even the creeping
things, when God made them, were blessed of him, chap. i, 22,
but sin turned the blessing into a curse. Upon thy belly shalt thou
go - No longer upon feet, or half erect, but thou shalt crawl along,
thy belly cleaving to the earth. Dust thou shalt eat - Which
signifies a base and despicable condition.
Verse
15. And I will put enmity between thee and the woman - The
inferior creatures being made for man, it was a curse upon any of
them to be turned against man, and man against them. And this is
part of the serpent's curse.
1. A perpetual reproach is fastened upon him. Under the cover of
the serpent he is here sentenced to be,
(1.) Degraded and accursed of God. It is supposed, pride was the
sin that turned angels into devils, which is here justly punished by
a great variety of mortifications couched under the mean
circumstances of a serpent, crawling on his belly, and licking the
dust.
(2.) Detested and abhorred of all mankind: even those that are
really seduced into his interest, yet profess a hatred of him.
(3.) Destroyed and ruined at last by the great Redeemer, signified
by the bruising of his head; his subtle politics shall be all baffled,
his usurped power entirely crushed.
2. A perpetual quarrel is here commenced between the kingdom
of God, and the kingdom of the devil among men; war proclaimed
between the seed of the woman, and the seed of the serpent, Rev.
xii, 7. It is the fruit of this enmity,
(1.) That there is a continual conflict between God's people and
him. Heaven and hell can never be reconciled, no more can Satan
and a sanctified soul.
(2.) That there is likewise a continual struggle between the wicked
and the good. And all the malice of persecutors against the people
of God is the fruit of this enmity, which will continue while there
is a godly man on this side heaven, and a wicked man on this side
hell.
3. A gracious promise is here made of Christ as the deliverer of
fallen man from the power of Satan. By faith in this promise, our
first parents, and the patriarchs before the flood, were justified
and saved; and to this promise, and the benefit of it, instantly
serving God day and night they hoped to come. Notice is here
given them of three things concerning Christ.
(1.) His incarnation, that he should be the seed of the woman.
(2.) His sufferings and death, pointed at in Satan's bruising his
heel, that is, his human nature.
(3.) His victory over Satan thereby. Satan had now trampled upon
the woman, and insulted over her; but the seed of the woman
should be raised up in the fulness of time to avenge her quarrel,
and to trample upon him, to spoil him, to lead him captive, and to
triumph over him, Colossians ii, 15.
Verse 16. We have here the sentence past upon the woman; she is
condemned to a state of sorrow and a state of subjection: proper
punishments of a sin in which she had gratified her pleasure and
her pride.
(1.) She is here put into a state of sorrow; one particular of which
only is instanced in, that in bringing forth children, but it includes
all those impressions of grief and fear which the mind of that
tender sex is most apt to receive, and all the common calamities
which they are liable to. It is God that multiplies our sorrows, I
will do it: God, as a righteous Judge, doth it, which ought to
silence us under all our sorrows; as many as they are we have
deserved them all, and more: nay, God as a tender Father doth it
for our necessary correction, that we may be humbled for sin, and
weaned from it.
(2.) She is here put into a state of subjection: the whole sex, which
by creation was equal with man, is for sin made inferior.
Verse 17. Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife - He
excused the fault, by laying it on his wife, but God doth not admit
the excuse; tho' it was her fault to persuade him to eat it, it was his
fault to hearken to her. Cursed is the ground for thy sake - And the
effect of that curse is, Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth unto
thee - The ground or earth, by the sin of man, is made subject to
vanity, the several parts of it being not so serviceable to man's
comfort and happiness, as they were when they were made.
Fruitfulness was its blessing for man's service, chap. i, 11-29, and
now barrenness was its curse for man's punishment.
Verse
19. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread - His business
before he sinned was a constant pleasure to him; but now his
labour shall be a weariness. Unto dust shalt thou return - Thy
body shall be forsaken by thy soul, and become itself a lump of
dust, and then it shall be lodged in the grave, and mingle with the
dust of the earth.
Verse
20. God having named the man, and called him Adam, which
signifies red earth, he in farther token of dominion named the
woman, and called her Eve - That is, life. Adam bears the name of
the dying body, Eve of the living soul. The reason of the name is
here given, some think by Moses the historian, others by Adam
himself, because she was - That is, was to be the mother of all
living. He had called her Isha, woman, before, as a wife; here he
calls her Evah, life, as a mother. Now,
1. If this was done by divine direction, it was an instance of God's
favour, and, like the new naming of Abraham and Sarah, it was a
seal of the covenant, and an assurance to them, that
notwithstanding their sin, he had not reversed that blessing
wherewith he had blessed them, Be fruitful and multiply: it was
likewise a confirmation of the promise now made, that the seed of
the woman, of this woman, should break the serpent's head.
2. If Adam did of himself, it was an instance of his faith in the
word of God.
Verse
21. These coats of skin had a significancy. The beasts whose skins
they were, must be slain; slain before their eyes to shew them
what death is. And probably 'tis supposed they were slain for
sacrifice, to typify the great sacrifice which in the latter end of the
world should be offered once for all. Thus the first thing that died
was a sacrifice, or Christ in a figure.
Verse
22. Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and
evil - See what he has got, what advantages, by eating forbidden
fruit! This is said to humble them, and to bring them to a sense of
their sin and folly, that seeing themselves thus wretchedly
deceived by following the devil's counsel, they might henceforth
pursue the happiness God offers, in the way he prescribes.
Verse
23. He sent him forth - Bid him go out, told him he should no
longer occupy and enjoy that garden; but he was not willing to
part with it.
Verse
24. God drove him out - This signified the exclusion of him and
his guilty race from that communion with God which was the
bliss and glory of paradise. But whether did he send him when he
turned him out of Eden? He might justly have chased him out of
the world, Job xviii, 18, but he only chased him out of the garden:
he might justly have cast him down to hell, as the angels that
sinned were, when they were shut out from the heavenly paradise,
2 Pet. ii, 4, but man was only sent to till the ground out of which
he was taken. He was only sent to a place of toil, not to a place of
torment. He was sent to the ground, not to the grave; to the work-
house, not to the dungeon, not to the prison-house; to hold the
plough, not to drag the chain: his tilling the ground would be
recompensed by his eating its fruits; and his converse with the
earth, whence he was taken, was improveable to good purposes, to
keep him humble, and to mind him of his latter end. Observe then,
That though our first parents were excluded from the privileges of
their state of innocency, yet they were not abandoned to despair;
God's thoughts of love designing them for a second state of
probation upon new terms. And he placed at the east of the garden
of Eden, a detachment of cherubim, armed with a dreadful and
irresistible power, represented by flaming swords which turned
every way, on that side the garden which lay next to the place
whither Adam was sent, to keep the way that led to the tree of life.
Chapter 3:
| Calvin
| Darby
| Geneva
| Gill
| Jamieson Faussett Brown
| Matthew Henry
| Matthew Henry Concise
| Wesley
| Index
| Bible Gateway |
Introduction 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 Revelation Exodus
This version of Wesley's Notes on the Bible is a derivative of an electronic version, Copyright 1997, by Sulu D. Kelley. All rights reserved. Used by permission. It may not be modified or used commercially without permission of Wesleyan Heritage Publishing and Sulu Kelley. A special thanks to Mr. Kelley and Wesleyan Heritage Publishing for permission to create and post this version of Wesley's Notes on the Bible.
Genesis
Exodus
Leviticus
Numbers
Deuteronomy
Joshua
Judges
Ruth
1 Samuel
2 Samuel
1 Kings
2 Kings
1 Chronicles
2 Chronicles
Ezra
Nehemiah
Esther
Job
Psalm
Proverbs
Ecclesiastes
Song of Solomon
Isaiah
Jeremiah
Lamentations
Ezekiel
Daniel
Hosea
Joel
Amos
Obadiah
Jonah
Micah
Nahum
Habakkuk
Zephaniah
Haggai
Zechariah
Malachi
Matthew
Mark
Luke
John
Acts
Romans
1 Corinthians
2 Corinthians
Galatians
Ephesians
Philippians
Colossians
1 Thessalonians
2 Thessalonians
1 Timothy
2 Timothy
Titus
Philemon
Hebrews
James
1 Peter
2 Peter
1 John
2 John
3 John
Jude
Revelation
