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 solved, as is well known, by the doctrine that the serpent of Eden was the mouthpiece or impersonation of the devil. The idea appears first in Alexandrian Judaism in Wisd. 2$24$ ('by the envy of the devil, death entered into the world'): possibly earlier is the allusion in En. lxix. 6, where the seduction of Eve is ascribed to a Satan called Gadreel. Cf. Secrets of En. xxxi. 3 ff., Ps. Sol. 4$9$; also ''Ber. R.'' 29, the name (Sifrê 138 b), and in the NT Jn. 8$44$, 2 Co. 11$3$, Ro. 16$20$, Ap. 12$9$ 20$2$ (see Whitehouse, DB, iv. 408 ff.). Similarly in Persian mythology the serpent Dahâka, to whose power Yima, the ruler of the golden age, succumbs, is a creature and incarnation of the evil spirit Angro-Mainyo (Vend. i. 8, xxii. 5, 6, 24; Yaçna ix. 27; cf. Di. 70). The Jewish and Christian doctrine is a natural and legitimate extension of the teaching of Gn. 3, when the problem of evil came to be apprehended in its real magnitude; but it is foreign to the thought of the writer, although it cannot be denied that it may have some affinity with the mythological background of his narrative. The religious teaching of the passage knows nothing of an evil principle external to the serpent, but regards himself as the subject of whatever occult powers he displays: he is simply a creature of Yahwe distinguished from the rest by his superior subtlety. The Yahwistic author does not speculate on the ultimate origin of evil; it was enough for his purpose to have so analysed the process of temptation that the beginning of sin could be assigned to a source which is neither in the nature of man nor in God. The personality of the Satan (the Adversary) does not appear in the OT till after the Exile (Zec. Jb. Ch.).

The serpent shows his subtlety by addressing his first temptation to the more mobile temperament of the woman (Ra. al.), and by the skilful innuendo with which he at once invites conversation and masks his ultimate design.—Ay, and so God has said, etc.!] Something like this seems to be the force of (v.i.). It is a half-interrogative, half-reflective exclamation, as if the serpent had brooded long over the paradox, and had been driven to an unwelcome conclusion.—Ye shall not eat of any tree] The range of the prohibition is purposely exaggerated in order to provoke inquiry and criticism. The use of the name is

1. ] The usual order of words when a new subject is introduced, G-K. § 142 d; Dav. § 105.—] G, Aq. Θ , Σ. V callidior. The good sense (which appears to be secondary, cf. Ar. 'arama = 'be ill-natured') is confined to Prov.; elsewhere (Jb. 5$12$ 15$5$) it means 'crafty,' 'wily.' The same distinction is observed in all forms of the [root] except that in Jb. 5$13$ has the good sense. The resemblance to in 2$25$ is perhaps accidental.— GS + .—] as a compound part, generally means 'much more