Troublesome Topic: Changes Suffered by the Serpent

Changes Suffered by the Serpent

God gave most animals legs so they could live and move above the ground, and not have constant contact of their entire bodies with the ground. But after the deception, the snake’s body was changed so that it now travels right along the ground. It seems from this that there was something “wrong” with eating dust. The word dust meant “rubbish, rubble, ashes, and dust.” All of them were by products of something else and were of no value. So the message is that Satan would not be involved in anything good, he would constantly focus on things that are worthless and therefore we should reject him.

We all know that snakes don’t really eat dust, but they do stick their tongues out often and that means their tongues will get dusty simply because they are so close to the dust. Most snakes catch and eat things that are close to the dirt.

We can surmise that the snake originally walked either on four legs, or somewhat upright. The way the easily-domesticated animals are mentioned first in the statement of the curse seems to imply that such was the category the snake originally belonged to. This makes sense; it was an animal that seemed friendly and got along well with humans. It happened to also be very intelligent. Maybe it was the animal that was most like humans in physical ways too, but to go into descriptions of this point would involve a level of speculation I am not comfortable with. I will go into speculative things if there seems to be a good foundation for them, but we all need to be careful and not go too far in that direction.

I said in conjunction with Gen 3:1 that it is hard to tell from the text how much of what was said was coming from the serpent itself, and how much was coming from Satan. Where does one stop and the other start? That question is also relevant for us when we sin, and it is equally difficult to answer. However, the fact that there was a consequence for the serpent indicates that it was not all Satan. Notice that the consequence was quite strong, implying that the level of responsibility was quite high. This would also assume that the snake, and other animals, had volition, a will. The serpent was punished because it chose to do this.

Do animals still have a will? Do they possess some level of understanding of morality? I suggest that the answer to both questions is yes, but in a limited fashion compared to man.

The next lesson is: What Is Meant by “Knowing Good and Evil”?