Genesis 3:16-18
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
16 To the woman he said:
I will intensify your toil in childbearing;
in pain[a] you shall bring forth children.
Yet your urge shall be for your husband,
and he shall rule over you.
17 To the man he said: Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, You shall not eat from it,
Cursed is the ground[b] because of you!
In toil you shall eat its yield
all the days of your life.(A)
18 Thorns and thistles it shall bear for you,
and you shall eat the grass of the field.
Footnotes
- 3:16 Toil…pain: the punishment affects the woman directly by increasing the toil and pain of having children. He shall rule over you: the punishment also affects the woman’s relationship with her husband. A tension is set up in which her urge (either sexual urge or, more generally, dependence for sustenance) is for her husband but he rules over her. But see Sg 7:11.
- 3:17–19 Cursed is the ground: the punishment affects the man’s relationship to the ground (’adam and ’adamah). You are dust: the punishment also affects the man directly insofar as he is now mortal.
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