Before God cursed the snake to crawl on its belly, how does the snake move around, walk???

Question

The snake was cursed by God because she tricked the woman to eat the fruit at the center of the garden...

Answer 1

a. The snake would be a forever symbolic reminder of the Fall.

Everytime man would see a serpent he would be reminded that it was the instrument by which he fell into sin. Man was to have dominion and rule over the animal kingdom and yet it was through an animal that he was led astray! That tells man something about the seriousness of the original Fall and also about how culpable he really is.
b. The snake would be a symbolic reminder of Satan’s future destruction.

The snake imagery is picked up in Genesis 3:15 when the snake is told: ‘he [the woman’s seed] will crush your head and you will strike his heel.’ The snake was cursed to crawl on the ground and therefore susceptible to man’s heel crushing its head (this vulnerability is a direct result of Satan’s sin). This is a foreshadowing of what will really happen to Satan someday. The seed (Jesus Christ) of the woman will crush the head of Satan and His heel will be struck (the crucifixion) in the process.

In addition, the curse upon the physical snake was reflective of the actual curse upon Satan himself: crawling low on the belly was a mark of deep degradation (Lev 11:42) and eating dust was also a sign of despair (Micah 7:17). All these factors combine to form very vivid symbolism of what awaits Satan in the end.
Now, it is very difficult (and perhaps impossible) for us to reconstruct what the snake looked like originally with the amount of information Genesis gives us. It would simply be speculation. However, it need not be an intellectual difficulty to imagine physical changes in creation as a result of sin. In fact, real physical change took place in the woman’s body so that she produced pain in child birth (3:16); physical change took place in the land so that it was more difficult to cultivate (3:17-18), and physical change took place in plants so that they produced thorns (3:18).

It must be remembered that imagining a world not cursed by sin is a very difficult thing. Can you imagine a world with no death, thorns, pain, disease, difficulty, struggle for survival? The world before the Fall was radically different. So, there is no difficulty in imagining the serpent as changing to crawl on its belly even though we are not totally sure what he was like before.

Now, it is very difficult (and perhaps impossible) for us to reconstruct what the snake looked like originally with the amount of information Genesis gives us. It would simply be speculation. However, it need not be an intellectual difficulty to imagine physical changes in creation as a result of sin. In fact, real physical change took place in the woman’s body so that she produced pain in child birth (3:16); physical change took place in the land so that it was more difficult to cultivate (3:17-18), and physical change took place in plants so that they produced thorns (3:18).

Answer 2

I'm not sure, I've wondered the same thing. You have to also consider how many other things were altered after the fall too and how they must have been before it! Things were not tainted at all, no death, no destruction and no ageing, so it's hard to contemplate and imagine.

The snake may well have been in a form that we'd be very surprised at. We can try and imagine it might have been more in the form of a lizard appearance, but again, this is only because we can't conceive something when we've not witnessed it as it was.

This is why many will try and say it's symbolic, yet the bible is clear on the literal and the symbolic and the creation account for a believer, has to either be accepted, or they may as well ditch the bible altogether, as throughout the bible there are references to the story of creation, to that very event. Christ's whole point is because of the fall of man. So certainly if one believes in Christ, they must also believe in the first two humans who stuffed it up from the word go.

Answer 3

This is interesting. If you look closely at the particular verse you are referring to (quoted below) you will see that by inferance, crawling on its belly was something that the snake was not accustomed to nor was eating dust.

Another thing to consider is the fact that God cursed it "above all cattle and above every beast" - this could possibly mean that it once roamed about just like cattle and other beasts - which could then possibly mean that it had legs.

Answer 4

I saw this on the Discovery Channel a few weeks ago, they had a series on the dinosaurs and one species included in the series was essentially a snake with tiny legs, I believe four legs but I'm not positive, and eventually it lost them and became the ancestor of the snakes.

Answer 5

When the world was created God created animals. Snakes in that time they don't walk but in the Bible it says that snakes fly. Like Satan. Satan transform to a snake to insist Eve to eat the apple.

Answer 6

I believe the snake had legs like a lizard.

Answer 7

I read somewhere that God wore the snake around his neck, so he didn't need to walk.

Answer 8

(Revelation 12:7-9) And war broke out in heaven: Mi′cha·el and his angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon and its angels battled 8 but it did not prevail, neither was a place found for them any longer in heaven. 9 So down the great dragon was hurled, the original serpent, the one called Devil and Satan, who is misleading the entire inhabited earth; he was hurled down to the earth, and his angels were hurled down with him.

THE ORIGINAL SERPENT.

It is Satan walking about.
(Job 1:6-8) Now it came to be the day when the sons of the [true] God entered to take their station before Jehovah, and even Satan proceeded to enter right among them. 7 Then Jehovah said to Satan: “Where do you come from?” At that Satan answered Jehovah and said: “From roving about in the earth and from walking about in it.” 8 And Jehovah went on to say to Satan: “Have you set your heart upon my servant Job, that there is no one like him in the earth, a man blameless and upright, fearing God and turning aside from bad?”

WALKING ABOUT IN IT.

PUT THE TWO SCRIPTURES TOGETHER AND IT IS CLEAR IT IS A DESCRIPTION OF SATAN.

Answer 9

it used to walk on a set of legs like a lizard or if it had no legs then it may float through water like a newt...OR through the air like an esteban sausage. who knows for sure?

Answer 10

The snake had really sexy legs before...