After the fall, Adam and Eve lie in the dust and the strange dress God makes for them out of animal skins is meant to lift them from that pitiful condition, is a symbol of adoption. Notwithstanding the rebellion, the two are forgiven and the woman, made stronger by the new name Adam gave to her, Eve, "mother of all living" (Gn 3:20), goes a step further and starts adopting herself, with this "formula": " I have created a man ('iš) equally with the Lord." (Gn 4:1; Katz 1954 [1]; Vattioni 1955 [2]; Hauret 1958 [3]; Humbert 1958 [4]: 166–174; Batto 1992 [5]: 218 n. 224; Bokovoy 2013 [6]). One possible interpretation of her words is that she says "man" because she bore "a male child", but 'iš means "husband" too. Besides, she says qānītī (literally "purchased") because "she has acquired (=adopted) a husband with God", in other words she imitates what God himself has already done to redeem the couple, she is already a "daughter of God", she brings to light her dignity of "royal daughter" according to a Hittite tradition, the so-called antiyant- marriage: the husband is adopted by the father of the bride. The pertinence of this interpretation is confirmed by the name that Eve gives to her son. She calls him "Cain", that is, kaina-, she makes him the adoptive son of the Creator, because the Hittite term indicates "the acquired relative" (EDHIL 427, s.v. LÚkaina; Pringle 1993 [7]: 214ff.). "I have adopted a man with my royal father, God himself". The man she has acquired, "purchased" or redeemed (Scarlata 2012 [8]: 35; Pinker 2017 [9]) is Adam, who entered his family as an antiyant husband, according to the literal meaning of the Hittite word (Brosch 2008 [10]: 60). As a matter of fact, it is God, as Eve's father, who made the acquisition, but Eve gives herself the credit. The "formula" used by Eve, "I bought (qanah) a man", is typical of the ransom made by the go'el, of the one who redeems the property, as in the case of Booz protecting the widow Rut, to prevent the alienation of her family assets (Rut 3:1-12), cf. (De Vaux 1964 [11]: 31, 174-176). The two verbs, qanah and ga'al are complementary in Es. 15:13.16, where the latter verb is a technical word for "redemption" (Lev 25:24-55). In a way Eve is just drawing the full consequences of a designation coming from the name invented by Adam for her. The Biblical God is the father of his people and he legitimately exercises a role of go'el, of "redeemer". As Eve has become "mother of all living", she is going to rescue her husband and her first child too. She is aware of her rank in the order of creation, she was not born from the earth like Adam, she was made out of his rib, which God himself shaped to create her, so she is entitled to claim some sort of a primacy that had already been designed in the scene of her "fabrication". As God created her out of a hero's bone, she is glorified according to a Hittite pattern, because *ḫaštali- -a Hittite denominal from "bone" - means "hero", "warrior". In Cuneiform Hittite we find the Sumeric logogram UR.SAG (Cotticelli-Kurras & Giusfredi 2017 [12]: 12; Rieken 1999 [13]: 47-49; Zgoll 2008 [14]) and in Hieroglyphic Luwian with HEROS-li- (Starke 1990 [15]: 120–124; Marazzi 1990 [16]: 103, 223-225). In the Hittite sources, the title is typical of kings, but also of female and warrior deities such as Ishtar (Inanna) (Van Dijk 1969 [17]: 197–200; Such-Gutiérrez 2005: 19; Groddek 2016 [18]: 151 n. 149) and is equivalent to the Hebrew gibbor while the feminine gebirah is used for queens in Israel (Ben-Barak 1991 [19]). Eve's self-awareness of being "daughter of God", because he "built" her (Gn 2:7) and the designation of Adam, who makes her "mother of all Hliving", candidate the first woman to be the mother the "children of God" mentioned in the sixth chapter of Genesis (Fockner 2008 [20]). These "famous men" of antiquity, guilty of taking as many wives as they wanted, have been viewed as "demigods" and their end in the flood, as the explicit revival of a Greek myth (Scodel 1982 [21]; Hendel 1987 [22]: 18; Hendel 2004 [23]: 30-32). In the Catalogue of women by Hesiod (Hesiod 1967 [24]: 104, frr. 96-100, 204; Van Seters 1992 [25]: 89ff.; Cingano 2003 [26]; Hesiod 2009 [27]: 83, 385 and 990; Clay 2005 [28]; Kennedy 2016 [29]), the Trojan War is a chance for Zeus to get rid of the annoying breed of heroes. Hesiod calls it the "race of women" (Theogony 1021; Hesiod 2002 [30]: 127, 158–159, 162, vv. 1019–1022; Loraux 1978 [31]) an expression equivalent to the "seed of the woman" in Genesis. For the Greek poet they are the demigods born from the union between mortal women and the gods of Olympus. Obviously, on the Biblical side, the "children of God" can have nothing divine, but be just "famous men", such as the descendants of Cain, initiators of occupations such as music, breeding, metallurgy, building. At most, they may be called "children of God", but only because he adopted them, allowing Eve to entrust them to Him, who will act as their go'el ("protector"). A shield which is clearly at work after Cain kills Abel. In fact, whoever slays Cain will be punished seven times.
Originally Published: April 21, 2021
Last Updated: May 5, 2021