Serpent in the garden

[r4j]

Brother and sisters,
When I hear or read from Genesis ‘now the serpent was the most cunning of all the creatures that the Lord God had made…’ I wonder - did God make the serpent cunning or was this after the fall of the Angels and the serpent returned with cunning - it seems the ‘cunning’ quality is not a good thing.
I understand we are not to take the garden of Eve story as actual historical events but it is a mere mental curiosity on this point. Maybe God made the serpent cunning to test our first parents? I know God can’t create anything that isn’t good, so that’s where I’m struggling.

 

[pugdog]

The serpent as referred to in Genesis is of course, Satan who appeared as a serpent. Satan was cunning and the scripture speaks to this.
Satan had been banished from his position with God at the point at which he deceived Eve in the garden.

The Genesis 3:1 scripture gives us understanding on how the enemy of God comes to man to deceive us and lie about God’s Word.

 

[praise_Jesus_1]

Saint Jerome and some other early saints had the same question, and tried to propose some answers. A quick google search revealed the “Ophites, a Gnostic group worshiped the serpent as a god embodying supreme wisdom, and who drew on this text for support”. Saint Jerome wanted to show that the Scripture presented the serpent in a bad light.

It looks like whatever Hebrew word used that we translate to cunning could be debated whether or not this was a good or a bad quality. If it was a bad quality then the serpent would not have been created as such since all of God’s creation was good.

Personally I think the text is referring to cunning as someone who is skilled at deception. I think this type of quality was a perversion of all of the qualities that God had given Satan before the fall. We see this in ourselves, God has given us talents and poured abundant blessings out into our lives but it isn’t hard to pervert these to get something truly evil.

Neat question. I look forward to hearing what other people have to say about this.

 

[FrancisFan516]

My Douay Rheims translates the phrase: ** Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the earth…**.

To me it matters not,…I believe the bottom line is this; Satan, a fallen angel, is described as “the father of lies” and is depicted as a snake,…one of God’s creatures that as we all know is not welcome anywhere.

 

[r4j]

Thank you all.
pugdog, you mention that Satan was evicted at the time he deceived Eve. Although I don’t think it’s definitive, there is a school of thought that says that the fall of the angels happened before Adam and Eve. But you know someone said something that also makes you think - if Satan was banished from ‘heaven’ or God’s presence, how could he ‘get back’ in the ‘garden’ to tempt Eve? Then of course I think, God does permit us to be tested so we can grow in virtue, faith, etc. but would He permit tempting by evil? I have to think about that.
It is tough with the translation of terms, and the definition of terms is so important. I don’t lose sight of the big picture though - the father of lies got our first parents to buy into a lie and pride led to disobedience which led to death. And some things don’t change. That’s still going on today. ‘You should do what’s right for you’, ‘You should go with your feelings’, etc., etc. Translation - ‘You can be like gods’. Some things haven’t changed.