there was an earlier form of the legend in which he figured as a god or a demon.
The ascription of supernatural characters to the serpent presents
little difficulty even to the modern mind. The marvellous agility of the
snake, in spite of the absence of visible motor organs, its stealthy movements,
its rapid death-dealing stroke, and its mysterious power of
fascinating other animals and even men, sufficiently account for the
superstitious regard of which it has been the object amongst all peoples.[1]
Accordingly, among the Arabs every snake is the abode of a spirit,
sometimes bad and sometimes good, so that ǧānn and ġūl and even
Shaitān are given as designations of the serpent (We. Heid. 152 f.; cf.
Rob. Sm. RS2, 1201, 129 f., 442).[2] What is more surprising to us is the
fact that in the sphere of religion the serpent was usually worshipped as
a good demon. Traces of this conception can be detected in the narrative
before us. The demonic character of the serpent appears in his possession
of occult divine knowledge of the properties of the tree in the
middle of the garden, and in his use of that knowledge to seduce man
from his allegiance to his Creator. The enmity between the race of
men and the race of serpents is explained as a punishment for his
successful temptation; originally he must have been represented as a
being hostile, indeed, to God, but friendly to the woman, who tells her
the truth which the Deity withheld from man (see Gres. l.c. 357). All
this belongs to the background of heathen mythology from which the
materials of the narrative were drawn; and it is the incomplete elimination
of the mythological element, under the influence of a monotheistic
and ethical religion, which makes the function of the serpent in Gn. 3
so difficult to understand. In later Jewish theology the difficulty was
- ↑ Comp. the interesting sequel to the sentence from Sanchuniathon
quoted above: . . . (
Greek characters) . . . (Greek characters). (Orelli, p. 44).]
- ↑ Cf. Nö. ZVP, i. 413: "Das geheimnissvolle, dämonische Wesen der Schlange, das sie vor allen grösseren Thieren auszeichnet, die tückische, verderbenbringende Natur vieler Arten, konnte in dem einfachen semitischen Hirten leicht den Glauben erzeugen, in ihr wohne etwas Göttliches, den Menschen Bannendes und Bezauberndes. So finden wir die Schlange im Eingang des alten Testaments, so ist sie im Alterthum, wie noch jetzt, ein Hauptgegenstand orientalischer Zauberei. So glaubte auch der Araber, die Schlange (wie einige andere schädliche Thiere) sei kein gewöhnliches Geschöpf, sondern ein Dschinn, ein Geist. Schon die Sprache drückt dies dadurch aus, dass sie mit Džānn, einem Worte welches mit Džinn eng verwandt ist, eine Schlangenart bezeichnet, etc."
