Adam is the name given in Genesis 1–5 to the first human. Adam is the first human being aware of God, and features as such in various belief systems (including Judaism, Christianity, Gnosticism, Islam, and the Baháʼí Faith).Chipman, Leigh NB. "Mythic Aspects of the Process of Adam's Creation in Judaism and Islam." Studia Islamica (2001): 5-25.
According to Christianity, Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This action introduced death and sin into the world. This sinful nature infected all his descendants, and led humanity to be expelled from the Garden. Only through the crucifixion of Jesus can humanity be redeemed.
In Islam, Adam is considered Khalifa (خليفة) (successor) on earth. This is understood to mean either that he is God's deputy, the initiation of a new cycle of sentient life on earth, or both.Mahmoud Ayoub The Qur'an and Its Interpreters, Volume 1 SUNY Press, 1984 p. 73 Similar to the biblical account, the Quran has Adam placed in a garden where he sins by taking from the Tree of Immortality, so loses his abode in the garden. When Adam repents from his sin, he is forgiven by God. This is seen as a guidance for humanity, who sin, become aware of their mistake, and repent.Stieglecker, H. (1962). Die Glaubenslehren des Islam. Deutschland: F. Schöningh
In Gnostic belief systems, the bodily creation of Adam is viewed in a negative light. Due to the underlying demonization of matter, Gnostic cosmologies depict the body as a form of prison of Adam's soul. This soul would have been transferred by Sophia (wisdom) onto the creator (Demiurge) of the material world, who in turn is tricked into blowing the soul into a body.
Narrative
In Genesis, the name "Adam" is given to the first human. Beyond its use as the name of the first man, the Hebrew word adam is also used in the Bible as a pronoun, individually as "a human" and in a collective sense as "humankind". tells of God's creation of the world and its creatures, including the Hebrew word adam, meaning humankind. In God forms "Adam", this time meaning a single male human, out of "the dust of the ground", places him in the Garden of Eden, and forms a woman, Eve, as his companion. In Adam and Eve eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge, and God condemns Adam to labour on the earth for his food and to return to it on his death. deals with the birth of Adam's sons, and lists his descendants from Seth to Noah.
In the Hebrew bible
Genesis 1 tells of God's creation of the world and its creatures, with humankind as the last of his creatures: "Male and female created He them, and blessed them, and called their name Adam ...". God blesses mankind, commands them to "be fruitful and multiply", and gives them "dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth". KJV
In Genesis 2, God forms "Adam", this time meaning a single male human, out of "the dust of the ground" and "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life". KJV God then places this first man in the Garden of Eden, telling him that "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" (). God notes that "It is not good that the man should be alone" () and brings the animals to Adam, who gives them their names, but among all the animals there was not found a companion for him (). God causes a deep sleep to fall upon Adam and forms a woman (), and Adam awakes and greets her as his helpmate.
Genesis 3, the account of the Fall: A serpent persuades the woman to disobey God's command and eat of the tree of knowledge, which gives wisdom. Woman convinces Adam to do likewise, whereupon they become conscious of their nakedness, cover themselves, and hide from the sight of God. God questions Adam, who blames the woman. God passes judgment, first upon the serpent, condemned to go on his belly, then the woman, condemned to pain in childbirth and subordination to her husband, and finally Adam, who is condemned to labour on the earth for his food and to return to it on his death. God then expels the man and woman from the garden, lest they eat of the Tree of Life and become immortal.
The chiastic structure of the death oracle given to Adam in forms a link between man's creation from "dust" () to the "return" of his beginnings. A you return B to the ground C since (kî ) from it you were taken C for (kî ) dust you are B and to dust A you will return
deals with the birth of Adam's sons Cain and Abel and the story of the first murder, followed by the birth of a third son, Seth. , the Book of the Generations of Adam, lists the descendants of Adam from Seth to Noah with their ages at the birth of their first sons (except Adam himself, for whom his age at the birth of Seth, his third son, is given) and their ages at death (Adam lives 930 years, up to the 56th year of Lamech, father of Noah). The chapter notes that Adam had other sons and daughters after Seth, but does not name them.
Historicity
While a traditional view was that the Book of Genesis was authored by Moses and has been considered historical and metaphorical, modern scholars consider the Genesis creation narrative as one of various ancient origin myths.
Analysis like the documentary hypothesis also suggests that the text is a result of the compilation of multiple previous traditions, explaining apparent contradictions. In the entire Hebrew Bible, Adam appears only in chapters 1–5 of the Book of Genesis, with the exception of a mention at the beginning of the Books of Chronicles where, as in Genesis, he heads the list of Israel's ancestors. The majority view among scholars is that the final text of Genesis dates from the Persian period (the 5th century BCE), but the absence of all the other characters and incidents mentioned in chapters 1–11 of Genesis from the rest of the Hebrew Bible has led a sizeable minority to the conclusion that these chapters were composed much later than those that follow, possibly in the 3rd century BCE.
Other stories of the same canonical book, like the Genesis flood narrative, are also understood as having been influenced by older literature, with parallels in the older Epic of Gilgamesh.
Possible Canaanite parallels By studying late-13th-century BCE clay tablets from Ugarit, Hebrew Bible scholars M.J.A. Korpel and J.C. de Moor reconstructed close Canaanite parallels, which they posit as being the origin of the biblical creation myth from the first chapters of Genesis including the Garden of Eden and Adam narrative. Their reconstructed texts talk about the creator deity El, who lived in a vineyard or garden together with his wife Asherah on Mount Ararat.
Another god, Horon, tries to depose El and when thrown down from the mountain, he transforms the Tree of Life from the garden into a Tree of Death. Horon also spreads around a poisonous fog, Adam is sent from the mountain to restore life on earth, Horon takes the shape of a large serpent and bites him, which leads to Adam and his wife losing their immortality. Several Ugaritic epithets of Hauron were also found to be identical to the Arabic designation for the Devil, Iblis in Islam.Adam, Eve and the Devil
However, John Day argues that these stories are not explicitly attested in the Ugaritic texts but are reconstructed on the basis of speculative and dubious suppositions.
Religious traditions
Rabbinical Judaism
Body Louis Ginzberg retells a midrash that God himself took dust from all four corners of the earth, and with each color (red for the blood, black for the bowels, white for the bones and veins, and green for the pale skin), created Adam. The soul of Adam is the image of God, and as God fills the world, so the soul fills the human body: "as God sees all things, and is seen by none, so the soul sees, but cannot be seen; as God guides the world, so the soul guides the body; as God in His holiness is pure, so is the soul; and as God dwells in secret, so doth the soul."Citation: "God had fashioned his (Adam's) soul with particular care. She is the image of God, According to Jewish literature, Adam possessed a body of light, identical to the light created by God on the first day, and the original glory of Adam can be regained through mystical contemplation of God.
Adam, Lilith and Eve The rabbis, puzzled by fact that Genesis 1 states that God created man and woman together while Genesis 2 describes them being created separately, told that when God created Adam he also created a woman from the dust, as he had created Adam, and named her Lilith; but the two could not agree, for Adam wanted Lilith to lie under him, and Lilith insisted that Adam should lie under her, and so she fled from him, and Eve was created from Adam's rib. Her story was greatly developed, during the Middle Ages, in the tradition of Aggadic midrashim, the Zohar and Jewish mysticism. Other rabbis explained the same verse as meaning that Adam was created with two faces, male and female, or as a single androgynos being, male and female joined back to back, but God saw that this made walking and conversing difficult, and so split them apart.
Eve's fault in the Fall The serpent approached Eve rather than Adam because Adam had heard the word of God with his own ears, whereas Eve had only his report; Eve tasted the fruit and knew at once that she was doomed to death, and said to herself that it was better she trick Adam into eating so that he too would die, and not take another woman in her place. Adam ate the fruit unaware of what he was doing, and was filled with grief. When Adam blamed Eve after eating the forbidden fruit, God rebuked him that Adam as a man should not have obeyed his wife, for he is the head, not her.
Adam and the winter solstice An Aggadic legend found in tractate Avodah Zarah 8a has observations regarding Roman midwinter holidays, and the talmudic hypothesis that Adam instituted the custom of fasting before the winter solstice and rejoicing afterwards – an observance that devolved into Saturnalia and the Calends.
Children of Adam and Eve Adam withdrew from Eve for 130 years after their expulsion from Eden, and in this time both he and Eve had sex with demons, until at length they reunited and Eve gave birth to Seth. A 2nd-century BCE Jewish religious work, the Book of Jubilees, tells how Adam had a daughter, Awân, born after Cain and Abel,Jubilees 4:1. and another daughter, Azura, born after Seth,Jubilees 4:9 and they had nine other sons;Jubilees 4:10 Cain married Awân and Seth married Azûrâ, thus accounting for their descendants. The Life of Adam and Eve and its Greek version the Apocalypse of Moses recount how Adam repented his sin in exile and was rewarded by being transported to the heavenly paradise, foreshadowing the destiny of all the righteous at the end of time.
Adam's death and burial The Archangel Michael attended Adam's death, together with Eve and his son Seth, still living at that time, and he was buried together with his murdered son Abel. Because they repented, God gave Adam and Eve garments of light, and similar garments will clothe the Messiah when he comes.
According to the Apocalypse of Moses, which probably originates in first-century CE Jewish literature, the altar of the Temple of Solomon was the centre of the world and the gateway to God's Garden of Eden, and it was here that Adam was both created and buried.
Attitude towards Adam In the 17th-century book Kav ha-Yashar, the author warns not to talk negatively about Adam, and writes that those who talk positively about Adam will be blessed with a long life.Parshat Chukat A similar warning can be found in The Zohar.Zohar Chadash Parshat Beresheit 24a or in older versions 19
Adam and the angel Raziel