Our First Biblical Leader: Eve!

Yes, Eve.  The woman God created from Adam's rib in Genesis, Chapter 2.

To many, Eve is a patsy whom the serpent duped into eating the forbidden fruit.  Then she conned Adam into eating it and lied to God about the whole episode, causing God to cast the First Couple out of the Garden of Eden. 

Yet the text is much more nuanced.  When we take a closer look at the Hebrew Bible, we see that the story of Adam and Eve in Genesis reveals something quite different.  We see that she chose to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.  She chose to give the fruit to Adam.  She chose, therefore, to forsake the false utopia of the Garden of Eden and journey instead into the uncertain future that awaited the couple outside the protected barriers of God's worldly centerpiece.

In other words, without Eve, we would not exist in our society today.  Ever since Eve, we human beings have yearned to return to the Garden of Eden as described in the Book of Genesis - only to intentionally sabotage that dream at the same time.  For we well know that utopia will kill us; we are wired to evolve and utopia is the end of evolution: physical and especially spiritual.

So go back to Genesis, Chapter 2 of your Hebrew Bible and re-read the story.  This time, look at it as if Eve was your hero, a Biblical leader, striving to release humanity from the shackles of Divine servitude.  I know that sounds almost blasphemous but by doing so, Eve taught God - and us - how to live as human beings.

And to me, that is the essence of Biblical leadership.

Thank you, Eve, the mother of all humanity.

I'd love to see your comments.

Rabbi Jordan Parr
rabbiparr@gmail.com