Genesis 3:17 - Exposition

And unto Adam he said . The noun here used for the first time without the article is explained as a proper name (Keil, Lunge, Speaker's 'Commentary'), though perhaps it is rather designed to express the man's representative character (Macdonald). Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife. Preceding his sentence with a declaration of his guilt, which culminated in this, that instead of acting as his wife's protector prior to her disobedience, or as her mentor subsequent to that act, in the hope of brining her to repentance, he became her guilty coadjutor through yielding himself to her persuasions. And hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it . For which a twofold judgment is likewise pronounced upon Adam. Cursed is the ground. Ha adamah , out of which man was taken ( Genesis 2:7 ); i.e. the soil outside of the garden. The language does not necessarily imply that now, for the first time, in consequence of the fall, the physical glebe underwent a change, "becoming from that point onward a realm of deformity and discord, as before it was not, and displaying in all its sceneries and combinations the tokens of a broken constitution'' ( vide Bushnell, 'Nature and the Supernatural,' Genesis 7:1-24 .); simply it announces the fact that, because of the transgression of which he had been guilty, he would find the land beyond the confines of Eden lying under a doom of sterility (cf. Romans 8:20 ). For thy sake . בַּעֲבוּרֶךָ .

1. Because of thy sin it required to be such a world.

2. For thy good it was better that such a curse should lie upon the ground. Reading ד instead of ר , the LXX . translate ε ̓ ν τοι ͂ ς ε ̓ ì ργοις ; and the Vulgate, In operetuo . In sorrow . Literally, painful labor (cf. Genesis 3:16 ; Proverbs 5:10 ). Shalt thou eat of it. I .e. of its fruits (cf. Isaiah 1:7 ; Isaiah 36:16 ; Isaiah 37:30 ). " Bread of sorrow" ( Psalms 127:2 ) is bread procured and eaten amidst hard labor. All the days of thy life .