The Fate of the Serpent
“ ‘And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and
between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you
will strike his heel’ ” (Gen. 3:15, NIV).
What did the Lord say to the serpent here, and what hope is implied
in these verses?
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God begins His judgment with the serpent because he is the one who
initiated the whole drama. The serpent, too, is the only being who is
cursed in this narrative.
We reach here a kind of “reversal” of Creation. While Creation led
to life, the appreciation of good, and blessings, judgment leads to
death, evil, and curses—but also to the hope and promise of salva-
tion. Attached to the somber picture of the crushed serpent eating the
dust (Gen. 3:14) shines the hope of the salvation of humankind, which
appears in the form of a prophecy. Even before the condemnations of
Adam and Eve, which will follow, the Lord gives them the hope of
redemption (Gen. 3:15). Yes, they have sinned; yes, they will suffer
because of their sin; and, yes, they will die, too, because of the sins.
But despite all that, there is the ultimate hope, the hope of salvation.
Compare Genesis 3:15 with Romans 16:20, Hebrews 2:14, and
Revelation 12:17. How is the plan of salvation, as well as the great
controversy, revealed in these texts?
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Notice the parallels between Genesis 3:15 and Revelation 12:17:
the dragon (serpent), enraged (enmity); the seed (offspring); and the
woman in Eden and the woman in Revelation 12:17. The battle (the
great controversy) that moved to Eden, with the Fall, will continue to
the end of time. However, the promise of Satan’s defeat already was
given in Eden, in that his head will be crushed, a theme more explicitly
revealed in Revelation, which depicts his final demise (Rev. 20:10).
That is, right from the start, humanity was given hope that there will be
a way out of the terrible mess that came from the knowledge of evil, a
hope that we all can share in right now.
Why is it so comforting to see that in Eden itself, where sin and evil
on earth began, the Lord started to reveal the plan of salvation?