Kommentar zu Bereschit 3:14

כי עשית זאת BECAUSE THOU HAST DONE THIS — From here we infer that we should not occupy ourselves with what may be in favour of one who seduces people to idolatry, for had He asked it, “Why hast thou done this?”, it could have answered Him, “When the words of the teacher and those of the pupil are contradictory, whose orders should be obeyed?” (Sanhedrin 29a). (i. e. if You told them one thing and I another, should they not have obeyed You?).

FROM AMONG ALL CATTLE, AND FROM AMONG ALL BEASTS OF THE FIELD. From a study of this verse, Rabbi Yehoshua the son of Chananya derived the fact that a serpent gives birth once in seven years;³⁹⁴Bechoroth 8a. See my Hebrew commentary, p. 41. this they investigated and found to be so.³⁹⁵See Bereshith Rabbah 20:7. For the Midrashic interpretations of Scripture and their allusions are all traditional, and they found in them profound secrets on procreation and all matters, as I mentioned in my introduction.

Cursed be you from all the beasts and from all the animals of the field: This is according to the opinion that our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, said (Taanit 8a), "In the future, all the animals will gather together and come to the snake and say to him, 'A lion mauls its prey and eats it, etc. But you, what pleasure do you have, etc.'" That is why it is stated that it will be more cursed than all the beasts and animals. As they all have an aspect of pleasure from that which they maul and prey upon, whereas the snake has no pleasure, since 'the master of the tongue has no benefit.' Hence it will have no pleasure from its preying [upon other animals], as said. And if you want to say the mem of mikol (from all) is not a superlative mem, but rather explain it like this - that it will be cursed from the mouth of all - it is since all of the animals will gather together and disgrace it. And they will proclaim its evil to its face, saying, "What pleasure do you have."

ארור אתה מכל. The serpent was condemned henceforth to attain its needs as well as its desires only through experiencing more pain and greater lack of pleasure than all the other creatures. Compare Kidushin 82 ראית חיה ועוף שהם בני אומנות והם מתפרנסים שלא בצער, “Did you ever see a beast or bird practicing a vocation, and yet they find their livelihood without pain?” [the scholar makes the point that our parnassah lies in the hands of G’d and is not due to our professional level. Ed.] G’d’s curse is explained in detail by the words על גחונך תלך, “you will have to crawl on your belly.” This means that the serpent will find its sustenance only laboriously, experiencing frustration in doing so. Our sages (Berachot 58) mention how many laborious stages the kernel of wheat had to undergo until Adam finally was able to eat the bread that he made out of it.

ויאמר השם אלוקים אל הנחש. The Lord G'd said to the serpent. The serpent had caused three kinds of harm by its words. 1) It caused the withdrawal of the glory of G'd's light which had hovered over Adam and Eve as we explained previously. This is the real meaning of the כתנות אור, the garments of light. [this spelling is reported to have been found in the Torah scroll of Rabbi Meir. Ed.]. 2) It resulted in Adam and Eve both becoming mortal, losing their immortality in this world. This was the punishment G'd had threatened would result from eating of the tree of knowledge. 3) The serpent caused even man's limited life on this earth to be of an inferior quality, outside the confines of גן עדן.

ויאמר כי עשית זאת, he did not have an answer to this, no excuse whatsoever. Adam and Chavah, though their excuse was indeed feeble, at least had some sort of an excuse, whereas the serpent had no excuse whatsoever. This is why G’d immediately proceeded to curse the serpent, without even waiting if the serpent would try and come up with an excuse. This is what Solomon had in mind when he said in Kohelet 10,11: ואין יתרון לבעל הלשון, “a slanderer (the serpent) has nothing going for him at all (having bitten without provocation).” (compare Taanit 8) Our sages (Sanhedrin 29) say that the serpent did have an answer ready but that G’d did not give it a chance to use it seeing it had initiated this seduction. (The Talmud, quoting one of the possible excuses of the serpent, cites the well known phrase: “if the words of the student are at variance with those of the teacher, whose words does one have to heed?” Whatever excuse the serpent could have used, it had no answer to the accusation why it had engaged in seduction.)

To the serpent: God did not speak to the serpent but rather to his constellation; and that is like [talking to] the serpent itself.

From here. You might ask: Why cannot every מסית exonerate himself with this claim? The answer is: The serpent was not forbidden to entice others to sin. He was punished only because of the sin that the others committed, due to him. Thus he could answer, “The words of the master...” But a מסית who is forbidden by the Torah to entice others to sin is transgressing Hashem’s command. This helps to answer Re’m’s question. (From my father’s manuscript. And Maharshal is quoted as saying the same.) You might ask: [Why was the serpent called a מסית?] It is stated in Sanhedrin 67a that a מסית is only someone who incites to idolatry! The answer is: The serpent said to Chavah, “You will become as gods,” — this is idolatry. (Chizkuni)

The serpent deceived (hishi) me. See Rashi. Hishi cannot be understood here in its usual meaning of “incited” because that would not have been an excuse for sinning.

15. ׳ד׳ א sprach zur Schlange, nicht nur als ׳אלקי, Schöpfer und Richter, sondern als die den Menschen zu seiner Bestimmung erziehende Waltung. Nicht daher als Strafe für die Schlange, sondern aus dem Gesichtspunkt der Menschenerziehung ist das über die Schlange Ausgesprochene zu erfassen. — ארר, (verwandt mit ערר, ver- einsamt, verödet, nicht in Gemeinsamkeit mit Andern, und ohne Verbindung mit der Zukunft: kinderlos) also: freudelos und blütelos, Gegensatz zu ברכה, dem Begriff der Ausbreitung und der Blüte. Zweifelhaft scheint das Verständnis des ארור מכל הבהמה ומכל חית השרה. Man versteht es gewöhnlich in der Bedeutung des Komparativs, du bist mehr als alles Vieh und alles Tier verflucht. Dies setzt aber einen das Vieh und das Tier treffenden Fluch voraus, der dem Anschein nach nicht motiviert ist. Möglich, dass es ebenso wie das ארור אתה מן האדמה Kap.4, 11 zu verstehen ist: dir wird von allem Vieh und allem Tier geflucht. So auch: מנשים באוהל תברך ,תברך מנשים יעל, alle Frauen segnen Jael (Richter 5, 24). — Wahrscheinlich ist es jedoch komparativ und steht dies in Zusammenhang mit einer Bemerkung, die wir zu Raw Hirsch on Genesis 3: 16 und 17 zu machen haben. Beide lauten nicht: ויאמר אל האדם ,ויאמר אל האשה, sondern: ,ולאדם אמר אל האשה אמר, und zeigt dies, dass der Anrede an die Schlange die Anrede an die Frau, und dieser die Anrede an den Mann vorangegangen war. Es war also bereits gesprochen: ארורה האדמה בעברך, somit die Erde bereits um des Menschen willen vom Fluche getroffen. Die ganze Erdwelt, also auch Vieh und Tier, hatten durch die Verirrung des Menschen um seinetwillen, d h. zu seiner Besserung, zu leiden, die Schlange aber am meisten. בהמה, das sich dem Menschen unterordnende Vieh, obgleich es mehr noch als das freie Waldtier an dem auf dem Menschen lastenden Unsegen Teil nimmt und in seinem Kampfe um die Existenz von ihm und durch ihn zu leiden hat, nimmt aber auch Teil an seinem Wirken, wird — vom Standpunkt des Menschen aus betrachtet — gehoben, veredelt und gewinnt gewissermaßen auch an Geist, an Verständigkeit. Das freie Waldtier genießt seine Freiheit und Kräftigkeit in ungebundener Freudigkeit. Beides ist der Schlange versagt. Dem freien Waldtier gegenüber schleicht sie auf ihrem Bauche und isst Erde. — גחון von גוח (wie זדון von זור) die am Boden sich hinwindende Bewegung von Flüssen יגיח ירדן (Hiob 40), daher auch wohl der גיחון; die sich windende Schmerzbewegung חולי וגוחי (Micha 4) und die der Schlange, die nur eine seitliche Bewegung hat und sich nicht aufrichten kann. Auch die Bewegung, in welcher die Kindesgeburt fortschreitet, ist eine Seitenbewegung; sie heißt auch speziell: ,גוח כי אתה גוחי מבטן (Ps 22, Raw Hirsch on Genesis 3: 10). — Dunkel ist das Staubessen. Die Schlange isst faktisch nicht Erde, vielmehr nichts als lebendige Tiere. Es scheint nur ein figürliches Ausmalen des auf dem Bauche Kriechens zu sein, wie ואויביו עפר ילחכו (Ps. 71, 9) und ילחכו עפר כנחש seine Feinde lecken, lecken Staub wie die Schlange ,(Micha 7, 17). Oder sollte vielleicht der Schlange, deren Zunge sich wenig zum Schmecken eignet, der Geschmacksinn versagt, ihr Essen daher nur ein Hungerstillen sein, ohne ihr Genuss zu gewähren, und darin die Erklärung der Weisen, "dass ihr die köstlichsten Speisen nur wie Erde schmecken" (Joma 75, 2.) ihre physiologische Wahrheit finden? — Dem sich dem Menschen anfügenden Vieh gegenüber ist Feindschaft zwischen ihr und dem Menschen. In der Tat ist unter den vier höheren Klassen nur das Amphibiengeschlecht, deren Repräsentant die Schlange ist, dem Menschen völlig fremd und feind, und durch die dem Menschen innewohnende Scheu und Widerwillen von ihm völlig getrennt.

On your belly shall you crawl: It is the way for people that give evil counsel to each other, to have them separated from one another. Hence He said to the serpent, "'On your belly shall you crawl' - such that your mouth be placed on the land, whereas she will be erect, so that you will not have a place in which to take counsel with her. And dust shall you eat all the days of your life: Given that your mouth will be on the land, you will eat it against your will. And enmity will I put (Genesis 3:15):" This too is a distancing.

כי עשית זאת, (G-d speaking to the serpent) “because this is what you have done, etc;” Rashi comments that we learn from here that seducers are not given an opportunity to defend their actions, as if G-d had asked the serpent why it had acted as it did, the serpent would have answered: ”since when does one follow the instructions of the pupil when they contradict the instructions of the teacher, i.e. G-d?” Since the Torah had expressly forbidden the seducer to practice his trade, this will never be accepted as his excuse, i.e. that he only wanted to “test” the victim of his seduction. If the seducer himself does not use this argument, we (the court) certainly must not use it on his behalf. If you were to ask: the Torah’s legislation about this subject only deals with someone who seduces others to commit idolatry, not other sins!? (Compare Deuteronomy 13,712) The answer is that the serpent had held out the hope to the woman that by eating from the tree of knowledge they would be just as great as G-d, והייתם כאלוהים, i.e. the seduction was based on leading them into worshipping themselves as deities.

מכל הבהמה ומכל חית השדה FROM AMONG (or, MORE THAN) ALL CATTLE AND ALL THE BEASTS OF THE FIELD — If it was cursed more than the cattle whose period of gestation is longer than that of beasts does it not necessarily follow that it was cursed more than the beasts? Our Rabbis have definitely established the correctness of the following deduction in treatise Bekhorot 8a, that it (viz., the use of these apparently superfluous words “and more than all the beasts of the field”) teaches that the period of gestation of the serpent is seven years.

ועפר תאכל, you will not enjoy the food (or other earthly pleasures) previously enjoyable. The Talmud Sotah 49 describes something similar happening to the Jewish people as a whole after the destruction of the Temple, saying: הטהרה נטלה את הטעם ואת הריח, והמעשרות נטלו את שומן הדגן, [the subject being the negative fallout for the entire nation of the destruction of the Temple, Ed.] “previously pleasant tasting and fragrant foods no longer tasted as well with the exception of food which needed to be consumed in a state of ritual purity, and the tithes now assumed the richness of cereals.”

From all the beasts and from all the animals of the field: As a beast, which is domesticated; and an animal, which is wild - are different in their sustenance: What is good for this type is lacking for that type, and what is good for that type is lacking for this type. The food of domesticated beasts is the responsibility of its owners, so the owners prepare everything that is tasty and useful for it. Whereas the main pleasures of the animals are prey and meat, which it only scarcely and occasionally attains And when it does not have [such food], it perforce nourishes itself with that which is disagreeable to it. In exchange for this, the animal moves with its head raised, according to its worth. For it does not have a yoke upon it, which is not the case with a beast - its head is bent and subservient to man. So the Holy One, blessed be He, cursed the serpent - that it should have both of the disadvantages together; and even the disadvantage itself be worse than with the two of them. So the explanation of, on your belly you shall crawl, is that it is the disadvantage in the beast, but much worse than with the beast. And dust you shall eat all the days of your life. The serpent also has a food it desires. As it is found in Avodah Zarah 29a - that it is prepared to give its life for wine, water and milk. But it does not attain this pleasure, so its food is perforce only dirt. So it is worse than the animal, because when [an animal] does not attain prey, it eats grasses and leaves - as I wrote above 1:30 - whereas the serpent's default food is dirt. This is the straightforward meaning of the thing. But in the Gemara, Yoma 75a, the Sages, may their memory be blessed, additionally explained what is included from, all the days of your life - since it is superfluous. So they explained that even when it does attain its delicacies, it tastes the taste of dirt, which spoils the taste of the food that is most tasty to it. And another [opinion there is] that it is not satisfied until it eats dirt. And with this, it is worse than an animal - for if it has prey, it is not forced to eat something that is not tasty to it.

ארור אתה, the serpent would be deprived of the legs with which it had been created. The meaning of the words על גחונך תלך is that this will be the practical result of this curse. Whenever the Torah speaks of a curse it involves the loss of something, being deprived of something. On the other hand, every time a blessing is mentioned in the Torah it implies that the recipient will experience additional goodness, spiritually or materially. G’d cursed the serpent first, seeing it had been the cause for Adam and Chavah being punished. Our sages (Berachot 61) learn from here that one always begins with cursing the least important party deserving to be cursed, for instance the sages in Bereshit Rabbah 20,4 point out that the period of gestation of a large pure animal, such as a cow, one fit for consumption by Jews lasts 9 months, whereas their impure counterparts require 12 months before they are born after the mother animal has been fertilized. Smaller mammals require 5 months in the case of pure animals and dogs 50 days, cats 52 days, pigs 60 days, marten 70 days, deer and fox 6 months, whereas all the other creeping animals require 6 months before their embryos are ready for birth. Lions, elephants, cougars, etc., require 3 years, whereas the serpent requires 4 years to reproduce. Some animals require even 70 years according to that text.
Furthermore, in the same section of Bereshit Rabbah we are told that the dog in line with other impure animals requires 50 days whereas the larger impure mammals require 12 months. Basing ourselves on the wordingארור אתה מכל הבהמה ומכל חית השדה would mean therefore that the snake’s disadvantage vis a vis other impure animals will be proportionate to that of other impure animals vis a vis the pure beasts. [the ratio supposedly is 7 to 1. If an impure large mammal requires a gestation period of 12 months, then the snake being cursed requires a period of 7 years, i.e. seven times 12 months. There are inconsistencies in that Midrash, as well as inaccuracies which I cannot account for. Ed.]

If he was cursed more than the animal... [The curse refers to] the length of the serpent’s gestation period, that it be longer than the gestation period of domesticated animals. The gestation period of domesticated animals is longer than the gestation period of wild beasts.

G'd therefore punished the serpent separately concerning each one of these losses it had caused man. 1) G'd cursed the serpent because it deprived man of his blessing, i.e. the presence of G'd's glorious light. 2) G'd deprived the serpent of the legs it used to walk on because the serpent had deprived man of eternal life on earth. Prior to the sin the serpent possessed the kind of stature that enabled it to share all the advantages of the world with Adam. It would have been an honoured houseguest at Adam's all its life. As a result of its sin, co-existence of man and the serpent in this world became almost impossible. 3) The serpent was condemned to eat dust for having deprived Adam and Eve of the enjoyment of life in גן עדן. Our sages explain this to mean that the serpent does not enjoy any of its food, just as one does not enjoy eating dust (Yuma 75). G'd's words: כי עשית זאת, "because you have done this," which introduces the serpent's punishment, are a reminder that the serpent's words were considered its deeds.

Aus dem Gesichtspunkt der erziehenden Fürsorge für den Menschen dürfte die איבה, die feste, dem Menschen eingepflanzte Antipathie und Feindschaft zur Schlange, ihm, den die Tierweisheit verführt hatte, doch die Kluft vergegenwärtigen, die den Menschen vom Tiere scheidet, zugleich aber auch in einem konkreten Beispiele stets die Wahrheit vor Augen halten, dass es denn doch einen anderen Maßstab für Gut und Bös, als das Diktat des blinden Triebes geben müsse. Die Schlange beißt in Folge ihres Triebes, und doch ist dem Menschen der Schlangenbiss ein Übel. So kann auch das sittlich Schlechte der Sinnlichkeit des Menschen Befriedigung gewähren, und doch für höhere und andere Beziehungen verderblich sein; das bloße Diktat seiner Sinnlichkeit darf daher dem Menschen nicht sagen, was gut und böse ist. Dürfen wir annehmen, dass fortan der Anblick der Schlange den Menschen an die von ihm zu bekämpfende Begierde erinnern soll, so wäre das: הוא ישופך ראש ואתה תשופנו עקב, bedeutsam: dem Menschen ist mehr Macht über die Begierde als dieser über ihn eingeräumt. Der Mensch kann der Begierde auf den Kopf treten, sie soll ihn höchstens nur an die Ferse treffen. Ferner שוף (— rabb.: von der Stelle rücken — scheint das rasche Hervorspringen, Heraushuschen der Schlangen, das Kriechen usw. zu bedeuten, daher שפן und unversehens treffen, wenn der Andere sorglos ist. Nur wenn der Mensch — (שפיפון nicht auf seiner Hut ist, fasst ihn die Schlange und die Begierde an der Ferse. Durch stete Wach- und Achtsamkeit kann er beiden entgehen. Und eben so, nur wenn der Mensch die Begierde nicht wach werden, nicht Leidenschaft werden lässt, so lange Schlangen und Begierden noch schlummern, kann er beiden aufs Haupt treten, nicht aber, wenn er sie erst weckt und reizt.

ארור אתה, “you are cursed;” G-d began the series of curses, in the same sequence as the seduction had begun, i.e. the serpent was punished first. The woman was punished next, and Adam was punished last.

על גחנך תלך UPON THY BELLY SHALT THOU GO — It had feet but they were cut off (Genesis Rabbah 20:5).

על גחונך¸ as the Targum says, i,e. “on your belly.” This is also the way the Targum renders Leviticus 11,42 הולך על גחון. This is all very similar to the Talmud Baba Metzia 59. Basically, the curse consisted of the serpent which had been the most superior of the animals, haughty because of its height and its ability to walk upright, was now reduced to move in the way lowly worms move on earth. The fact that the serpent had bragged about its superior status, caused it to be dealt with especially harshly, seeing it had exploited its position by plotting to cause havoc.

The gestation period of a snake [lasts] seven years. The calculation is as follows: The gestation period of a [wild] cat is fifty-two days, and that of a [domesticated] donkey is one year. Thus, animals are cursed seven times more than beasts [7 x 52 days = 364 days.] Thus the snake, was cursed seven times more than animals, and has a gestation period of seven years. But “From all the beasts” cannot mean more than a lion or viper, whose gestation is three years and seventy years, for if so the Torah should have written: “From all the beasts,” and not mention, “From all the animals.” [Since it mentions both, it means as explained.] (Re’m)

מכל הבהמה ומכל חית השדה, “more than any mammal or beast of the field;” Rashi asks the rhetorical question: “if G-d punished the serpent more than any mammal, is it not understood that it also punished it more than any beast of the field?” The sages in Bechorot 8 explain that a female cat gives birth after 52 days of pregnancy, whereas domesticated mammals such as donkeys require 49 weeks, i.e. about seven times as long. The serpent was condemned to a pregnancy of seven years instead. The Torah had only used this opportunity to inform us that the pregnancy of large mammals had already been longer than that of smaller mammals. The duration of a snake’s pregnancy would be so much longer.[This editor may be forgiven when he fails to understand that snakes which do not produce live young, but lay eggs, like birds, “suffer” pregnancy pains at all. I have found in Google that there are some snakes which reside in cool climates that do produce live young. This still does not mean that they have carried them for seven years? Ed.] A different exegesis: seeing that there is no other beast that is forced to crawl on its belly, not even having many short legs, it is quite obvious that the snake, in order to secure its food, labours under greater difficulties than any other type of living creature. Besides, the manner in which a snake has to eat the grass of the field makes it impossible that its mouth does not also swallow some of the earth that the grass grew out of.

ועפר תאכל כל ימי חייך, the punishment fitted the crime. “You, the serpent were jealous of the human beings seeing they were allowed to eat the fruit of the trees in Gan Eden, and you schemed in order to seduce the woman into eating something forbidden; as a result you yourself will feed on the lowest kind of nutrient and the least tasty food on earth, i.e. dust.” If you were to argue that the very curse with which the serpent had now been afflicted was, in fact, a blessing in disguise, seeing that its food supply could be found all over, and it would never have to go hungry, Rabbi Chilfai in Bereshit Rabbah 20,5 has already explained that this is not as simple as it appears. The supply of earth is quite limited, what appears on the surface of the earth as a sort of powder is so only superficially, whereas lower down there are many ingredients which are quite inedible even for snakes. In fact, due to its ignorance of this, the snakes may inadvertently eat things which are harmful to their intestines.

He had legs... For if he never had legs, why is crawling on his belly a curse? (Re’m)

ועפר תאכל, “and you will be forced to eat dust.” The reference is to virgin earth. The meaning of the whole verse is: ”as long as you live you will search for virgin earth from which to secure your food; this is the penalty that has been decreed for you.”

כל ימיך, these apparently superfluous words teach that even in the Messianic era this curse will not be lifted. This is what Isaiah 65,25 had in mind when he described that future and mentioned that the snake will eat dust as its bread. As long as the species snakes, serpents, will not become extinct this will be its diet.

כל ימי חייך, ”all the days of your life.” The Torah tells us here that this curse would continue throughout the serpent’s lifetime. It would continue even during the messianic era when the enmity between man and beast would subside and, according to Isaiah 11,8 “an infant would play over a viper’s hole”, the serpent would still not become rehabilitated. The punishment of having to eat dust also continues beyond the messianic era as we read in Isaiah 65,25 זאב וטלה ירעו כאחד ואריה כבקר יאכל תבן ונחש עפר לחמו, “the wolf and the lamb shall graze together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox; but the serpent’s food shall be earth.” This is the reason the Torah stresses here that the serpent will eat dust כל ימי חייך, “for all the days of your life.” This expression alludes to messianic times. It is similar to Deut 16,3 למען תזכור את יום צאתך ממצרים כל ימי חייך, “in order that you may remember the day that you went out of Egypt all the days of your life.” Our sages interpreted that expression as also applicable to the time of the arrival of the Messiah and beyond, by stressing that if the Torah had not included the word כל “all,” the messianic period would not have been included (Berachot 12).

על גחונך תלך, “you will have to move by using your belly.” This part of the penalty would commence forthwith and would continue indefinitely.