And why did God create a -talking- snake, but no other animal had the power of human speech?

Question

nancyjo: snakes eat dust? Read Gen. 3:14. God calls the serpent a "serpent" before the snake is cursed.

Answer 1

Most of these are from the English Standard Version

Satan is the original serpent

Rev 20:2 And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years,

Rev 12:9 And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world--he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

Second half of your second question-----Satan was an angel of importance at that time, until unrighteousness was found in him.
In Ezekiel, he is paralleled to the King of Tyre.

Eze 28:13 You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering, sardius, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, emerald, and carbuncle; and crafted in gold were your settings and your engravings. On the day that you were created they were prepared.
Eze 28:14 You were an anointed guardian cherub. I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God; in the midst of the stones of fire you walked.
Eze 28:15 You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created, till unrighteousness was found in you.

Now, back to your statements------Correct, God did not create a talking snake. Satan talked to Eve through the serpent like God talked to Moses through a burning bush.

Since animals cannot talk, Eve knew it was not the actual serpent talking to her. That is one of the little things that made this a serious situation.

Gota go to work, ----I'll try to edit some more scriptures in for you later. There is plenty more. Thanks. . . Hope this helps.

Answer 2

OK. Let's go back to the beginning of our world... back to the days when Adam was alone in the midst of the new creation... back to the days before Eve...

In Genesis 2, God created man: "And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." God commanded him: "..., saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." "And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him." Is it then that he created "woman"? No. "Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof."

We might wonder, if God brought the animals to Adam so that he might find a friend, might they all have been able to converse in some way? We know of another time in the Bible when an animal has spoken. Consider Numbers 22: Balaam and his donkey! http://bibleresources.bible.com/passagesearchresults.php?passage1=Numbers+22&version=31

Fast forward... woman... the fall...

In Genesis 3, the serpent beguiles Eve. "Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?" We aren't given a description of the serpent. We know only that he is crafty and convinces the woman to disobey. It is in verse 14 that the serpent is changed, as punishment for his part in the sequence of events: "And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."

What might the serpent have been like before the fall? He must have been quite beautiful and appealing. It is not until after the fall that he becomes the belly-crawling, dust-eating, scream-producing animal that we think of today. Always a "serpent," his form changed after the fall. Perhaps it is after the fall that we lost our ability to communicate with the things of nature.

I sometimes imagine this may be what actually happened to our dinosaurs! Suppose he had been a crafty, talking dinosaur? Suppose it was the magnificent dinosaur that was changed to a slithering snake?

You may read the story yourself. It is found in the Bible in Genesis 1 - 4.

Answer 3

Bob, look at the story again. He was not "cast down to crawl on his belly and eat dust the rest of his days" until He had done his evil work and was cursed by God.

I know, the art all shows it differently.

Well, I went back and read it. It still looks to me like God changed Satan's (the serpant's) form when He cursed him. He evidently hadn't been what we think of as a snake before that. And yeah, eat dust is in there.

Answer 4

God never did this Bob so no one is going to prove it to you. The snake is a metaphor for the ego, the false sense of self. The little voice in your mind that says try it when you know that you should not.

The whole Garden of Eden story is a metaphor for judgment. The fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is a metaphor for judgment. When we judge something we are assuming that we have the knowledge of what good is, and what evil is. The simple truth is what ever God gives us is, is given to us in our best interest. We simply don't like some of it so we call it evil and see it as coming from somewhere external to God.

The lesson this biblical passage was supposed to teach us is obscured in a cloud of nonsense about snakes and devils and an absurdly judgmental overly sensitive God. I realize that we do not agree on some things but I think we can agree that this absurd vision of a God who sets traps in the garden hoping to be able to punish our ancestors is little more than nonsense.

We need to use these verses and parables in the way they were intended to be used, as teaching or instructional aids. Not as factual accounts, or in other ways that the writer of ancient scripture never intended for us to be using them. Seeing them as literal accounts of things that actually happened is ignorant at best, but it also causes us to miss the message or intent of the writer completely. This is unfortunate because some of these passages can be very helpful if they are used in the way that they were intended to be used.

Again we thank you for your continuing efforts.

Love and blessings
don

Answer 5

Because it fit the story best. Snakes make a good nemesis because they are generally not liked by many people. It's not the first time snakes were used, nor the first "ejection from paradise" story, nor the last. Even now, the top selling movie is "Snakes on a Plane".

Answer 6

God did not create it, remember satan has many forms and I think the worst by far is the snake, it represents everything that is evil in the world today, every thing that is unholy, it is in the pure sense of the word EVIL

Answer 7

Did god create a talking snake or was the snake,as representing evil,an interpretation of the greek translator some 6oo years later

Answer 8

Maybe it was God! If God created all the Angels including St. Michael & Lucifer! Then God is a being of both good & evil!
God didn't want no free loader so he casted their lazy *** from his luxurious garden. To fend for themselves!!!
The author of the bible is so amazing talented. Talking snakes, talkin bush & talkin aparisions! I'm surprise the author didn't make talkin dog. It would have been my favorite story!!!! Truly amazing!

Answer 9

Why weren't people created with the ability of dolphin speech? or bee speech? the actuality different animals communicate - via sounds, smells, movements - WITH one yet another - seems to have thoroughly escaped you. Hell - they even taught a gorilla to chat in sign language.

Answer 10

Well he didn't create the garden of Eden or the snake, he however did create Adam and Eve in his image (self duplication of himself wouldn't that make them siblings?) Then told them not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. So what we are we supposed to do run around with a leaf over the twig and berries, dumb as bricks watching sis act retarded? Religion contradicts itself!