Bede

You shall go upon your breast, and you shall eat dust all the days of your life. For indeed, the serpent goes on its breast because all the steps of the devil are wickedness and deceit: for in its breast is indicated the craftiness and deceptions of its thoughts, with which it creeps to those it wishes to deceive, for which the old translation has: You shall creep on your breast and belly. He creeps with his breast when he suggests earthly thoughts to men, whom he desires to make his members. He also creeps with his belly when he excites them, overcome by gluttony, into the heat of lust. For all that creep drag their body over the earth. The body of the devil, moreover, are all the reprobates; and he creeps with his breast and belly when he lowers them by wicked thoughts or the allurements of gluttony and luxury. He devours the earth when he is nourished and delighted by the error of sinners, and by deceiving them, he snatches them into destruction. For just as the saints are often signified by the name of heaven, so by the name of the earth those who savor earthly things are indicated, as it is said to Adam in the following: You are earth, and to earth you shall go, which our translation has: For you are dust, and to dust you shall return. As a sign of this spiritual devouring, the irrational serpent itself, with which the devil used as his instrument to deceive man, is now commanded to eat material earth, to which it previously, along with other animals of the earth, was granted to eat the herbs and fruits of the trees.

He also said to the woman: "I will greatly multiply your sorrows and your conceptions. In pain you will bring forth your children." These words, spoken figuratively and prophetically, are much more properly understood as referring to the woman of God. Nevertheless, since the woman had not yet given birth, and the pain and groaning of childbirth is only from the body of death, which was conceived by the transgression of the commandment, this punishment is also referred to in the proper sense of the literal word: for it is in what follows: "And you will be under the power of the man, and he will rule over you." It is right to believe that the woman was made otherwise even before sin, except that the man should rule her, and she should live under his power; this servitude, therefore, can be interpreted correctly as one of condition rather than affection, so that even this kind of servitude, by which humans began to be servants to other humans, is found to have arisen from the punishment of sin. Indeed, the Apostle said: "By love serve one another" (Gal. 5:13); but he by no means said: "Dominate one another." Therefore, spouses can serve one another through love, but the Apostle does not allow the woman to dominate the man. This sentence rather pertains to the man, and the husband has merited dominion over the woman, not by nature, but by fault: but if this is not observed, the fault would be further corrupted and increased. These words are figuratively applicable to the Church, the spouse of Christ, whose sorrows are multiplied in this life after the guilt of the first transgression, so that she may reach eternal life purified; and her conceptions are multiplied when she strives to beget spiritual offspring for God by preaching and living rightly; hence it is said to the same offspring through an excellent preacher: "My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you" (Gal. 4:19). She brings forth children in pain, when, being solicitous, she fears, lest, as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, their minds be corrupted, and they fall from the simplicity which is in Christ. She acts under the power of the man, because she serves the Lord in fear and exults before him not in security, but with trembling: to whom, if she had never sinned, she would be united in the embrace of secure love. And he will rule over her, restraining her carnal impulses, and continually advancing her to the perception of heavenly life by the exercise of higher instruction, from which if she had never departed, she would always reign with him in shared freedom.

But to Adam he said: Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten from the tree concerning which I commanded you not to eat, cursed is the ground because of you. In toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life, thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, and you shall eat the plants of the field, etc. Who is ignorant that these are the labors upon the earth of the human race, and that they would not be if the happiness that was in paradise had been maintained? For by the sin of man the earth was cursed, so that it would bring forth thorns, not that it itself would feel punishment because it is without sensation, but in order that the crime of human sin might always be placed before men’s eyes, so that they might be reminded to turn away from sins at some point, and turn towards God's commandments. Indeed, poisonous herbs were created for the punishment or the discipline of mortals. And this must be noted because of sin, for we became mortal after sin. We are also mocked through unfruitful trees, so that we may understand how shameful it is to be without the fruit of good works in the field of God, that is, in the Church, and so that we may fear lest God abandon us, because they themselves abandon unfruitful trees in their fields, nor do they apply any cultivation to them. Therefore, before the sin of man it is not written that the earth brought forth anything except herb for feeding and fruitful trees; but after sin we see many horrible and unfruitful things grow, for the reason we have mentioned. Mystically indeed, the earth which is said to have been cursed in the work of Adam's transgression is better understood as the flesh. For now it brings forth thorns and thistles for us, because propagated by the lust of the flesh, we suffer the stings and incitements of sins from the flesh itself.

And the Lord God made for Adam and his wife tunics of skins, and clothed them. And this was done for the sake of significance, yet it was indeed done. For by this kind of garment, the Lord indicates that they had already been made mortal; for skins, which are not stripped from animals unless they are dead, contain the figure of death. Thus, when man sought to be God against the commandment, not by legitimate imitation, but by illicit pride, he was cast down to the mortality of beasts. And indeed, they had made for themselves girdles of fig leaves, to cover their shame: but God made for them tunics of skins, to cover their whole body: because they, having lost the glory of innocence through transgression, provided for themselves the covering of excuse, by which they transferred their guilt to the Creator: and the Creator himself, by the sentence of a just judgment, punished them with the penalty of mortality in both soul and flesh, having taken away the state of immutable life. Moreover, the Gospel parable narrates that the merciful father, among other gifts, ordered the first robe to be brought and put on his prodigal son returning to him through repentance, mystically signifying that the elect are to receive the habit of immortality, which they lost in Adam at the beginning of the world, at the end of the world in Christ, and indeed with greater grace. For Adam was made immortal in such a way that he could not die, if he kept the commandment: but the children of the resurrection will be so immortal that they can neither die ever, nor be affected by the fear of death. Regarding the reception of this robe, the Apostle says: For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality (I Cor. XV, 53): where "put on" signifies the removal of the nakedness, which Adam and Eve recognized and blushed for after sin.

And He said: Behold, Adam has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. On this St. Augustine comments: "Since, he says, it is said in any manner and in any way, God nevertheless declared, it should not be understood otherwise, that He said 'one of us,' except that the plural number is taken on account of the Trinity, just as it was said 'Let us make man,' just as also the Lord about Himself and the Father said: 'We will come to him and make our abode with him' (John 14). Therefore it was repeated upon the head of the proud one by which outcome he desired what was suggested by the serpent 'You will be like gods.' Behold, he says, Adam has become like one of us. For these words are of God, not so much insulting him, as deterring others from being proud in that way; for the sake of those for whom these words were written: He has become, he says, like one of us, knowing good and evil. What else should be understood except that an example of instilling fear was proposed? because not only did he not become as he wanted to become, but he did not even maintain what he had become. On this point elsewhere: 'Nor are they the words of God confessing,' he says, 'but rather reproaching.' Behold, Adam has become like one of us, just as the Apostle says: 'Grant me this wrong' (II Cor. 12:13), surely he wants it to be understood from the contrary."

And he drove Adam out and placed before the paradise of delight the cherubim and the flaming sword, which turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life. The ancient translation has it thus: "And he drove Adam out and placed him opposite the paradise of delight, and appointed the cherubim and the flaming sword, etc." If we follow this, we must believe that this was done for the sake of signification, but still done, so that the sinner, indeed, would dwell in misery against the paradise, where blessed life was also spiritually signified. But what is said that God placed cherubim and the flaming sword before the paradise of delight, this must surely be believed to have been done by heavenly powers in the visible paradise, so that there would be a fiery guard there through angelic ministry, not done in vain, unless it also signifies something of the spiritual paradise, which is surely not to be doubted: and that this guard is well testified to be versatile for the reason that a time would come when it could also be removed. Indeed, it was removed for Enoch, who was translated not to die; it was removed for Elijah, who was taken up in a fiery chariot; it was removed for all the elect, when, after the Lord was baptized, the heavens were opened to him; it is likewise removed for each of the elect when they are washed in the font of baptism; it is more perfectly removed for the same, when loosed from their chains, they ascend to the glory of the heavenly paradise at their own time. Likewise, because cherubim is interpreted as a multitude of knowledge, or multiplied knowledge, it is well testified that the cherubim and the flaming sword were appointed to guard the way to the tree of life: because obviously, through the discipline of heavenly knowledge and the labor of temporal afflictions, the return to the high homeland from which we departed through the folly of transgression and the desire for carnal pleasures is open to us. And it is well said not simply a flame, but a flaming sword was placed before the paradise, to hint that the allurements of temporal desire should be struck in us by the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God if we desire to penetrate to the tree of life, who is Christ the Lord. And it is well reported that this sword is versatile, to indicate mystically that this sword is not always necessary to us, but, as it is written, there is a time for war, a time for peace: war, evidently when in the course of this life we struggle against aerial powers or even against the vices of our mind or body; but peace, when with perfect victory we are crowned, and are perpetually satisfied with the fruit of the tree of life without weariness. The adversary of the law and prophets, however, seeking, says this: "What use was the tree in paradise that bore the fruit of life?" To which Saint Augustine, answering, says: "For whom," he says, "except for those first humans who were placed in paradise? Then, after they were cast out of paradise for the merit of their iniquity, it remained to signify the memory of the spiritual tree of life, which is the wisdom of the blessed and the immortal food of the souls. However, whether anyone now partakes of that food, except perhaps Enoch and Elijah, I do not think it is to be rashly asserted. If, however, the souls of the blessed were not nourished by that tree of life, which is in the spiritual paradise, we would not read that the paradise was granted to the soul of the thief, believing in Christ, on the same day for the merit of piety and the most faithful confession. Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise (Luke 23:43). But to be there with Christ, this is to be with the tree of life, for he himself is indeed the Wisdom, of which it is written: "She is a tree of life to those who embrace her" (Proverbs 3:18) Amen.

Again, she bore his brother Abel. Abel is interpreted as grief or miserable, by which name from the earliest age was foreshadowed the condition of his lamentable untimely death. For, although precious is the death of his saints in the sight of the Lord, having tasted the cup of saving suffering, yet, as far as human view is concerned, it is sufficiently mournful, since we have so far departed from the innocence of the first condition that not even those who were first born on earth as brothers could have peace and concord between themselves, but one envied the other and killed him, while they still existed alone with their parents as masters of the whole world; already clearly foreshadowing that saints in this life would be oppressed by the reprobate and suffer deaths: in this also to be noted that Cain was born first in this life, but Abel was taken away first from this life, because indeed this life is properly the life of the wicked, from which they are precipitated into eternal death; but truly the life of the elect is properly the future life, to which that they may come more happily, they are daily put to death in this life and are considered as sheep for the slaughter.

It came to pass after many days that Cain brought an offering to the Lord of the fruit of the ground: Abel also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. It is clearly shown that both brothers had faith in God, both either naturally admonished or taught by their parents, knew that gifts should be offered to God, and that the guilt of their father's transgression should be washed away by sacrifices offered to Him: but because they did not offer with an equal mind, their offerings were not equally accepted. For I do not think that Cain sinned in that he either worked the work of a farmer or offered gifts to God from the fruits of the ground, but that he worked with less perfect piety in the care of the flesh, and approached the offering of gifts to God with less perfect devotion. Finally, Noah, a farmer, also worked the land and planted a vineyard: and Melchizedek, the priest of the Most High God, offered bread and wine from the fruits of the land. Therefore, Cain was not rejected because of the kind of offering. He indeed offered to God from what he himself was accustomed to live by; but he was rejected along with his gifts by Him who looks into the hearts, because of the impious mind of the offerer, as the following words show when it is said:

Abel also offered from the firstborn of his flock and their fat. For the Lord, interceding with the Father on behalf of the saints, offers their vows to Him according to the form of the assumed humanity, that is, good works and the fat of inner love. For these are indeed the firstborn of his flock and their fat. The Lord looks upon Abel, saying: This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased (Matt. XVII, 5). He looks also upon his gifts, because the life of the elect which he offers to Him gratefully, God the Father accepts, and as if by fire from heaven He ignites his sacrifice, because He inflames with the power of His spirit those who have taken care to mortify themselves for the Lord, so that they may more abundantly burn in the heavenly regions, indeed so that they may become wholly heavenly. But to Cain and his gifts, He does not look, because rebuking the carnal works of the Jews, He says through the prophet: To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me? says the Lord: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of goats (Isa. I, 11). And a little later: Your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, be clean, that is, through faith in the grace of Christ. Cain is enraged against his brother's piety, nor does he, rebuked by the Lord, repent from his fury conceived out of envy. How much the Jews raged against the Lord and the grace of the New Testament out of jealousy, how many times they persisted malignantly in their undertakings when corrected or admonished by Him, is sufficiently revealed by the Gospel history. They fittingly correspond to what is said of Cain, for their countenance fell: for they could not gaze upon the glory of the Lord with unveiled face. For they had lost that joy of divine grace, of which the righteous, glorying, say: The light of your countenance has been signed upon us, O Lord; You have put gladness in my heart (Ps. IV, 7).