Feb 4, 2010
Be honest now: How would you respond if an animal talked to you?
The serpent asked Eve, “Did God say don’t eat….” She responded, “We can eat….”
I would’ve expected: “What the—?! A talking snake!”
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My Heb prof said that was where things first went wrong. “What should Eve have done? She should have said ‘Why are you talking?’ What should Adam have done? He should have grabbed the biggest stick he could find and bashed that snake over the head.”
I dunno, maybe animals talked as a matter of course back then… Eve’s lack of surprise seems to indicate that it wasn’t out of the ordinary. Things were pretty different in the antedeluvian world (not to mention pre-fall).
Just last week Dr. Tom Schreiner (SBTS prof) said, “The Jewish people reading the Genesis account know that animals don’t ordinarily talk. Therefore there must be something extraordinary going on here. This is not an ordinary occurance.”
how does he know that? i mean, Adam and Eve weren’t Jewish.
I’m thinking that the animals talked as well, all the way up to Genesis 11 and the Tower of Babel. Would have made things a lot easier for Noah if the animals could speak (Genesis 6-7).
That’s interesting. I’ve never heard that before. It makes me think of Lewis’ Chronicles. So that means that animals will obviously talk (and sing) in Heaven too.
hmmm..maybe animals talked right then?
that should have been weird…
it was a magical, magical world…
Yup, maybe CS Lewis wasn’t too far off the mark…
I’d probably curse and run away.
Perhaps Adam and Eve were trippin on some LSD.
Okay, here’s what I didn’t think this morning: “I wonder if philthecarl will use the phrase ‘trippin on some LSD’” today.”
Then you don’t know PhiltheCarl very well.
Oh, like you thought that!
I have very strange thoughts every morning.
reminds me that comment susan makes in the first narnia movie – “it’s a BEAVER. it should be SAYING ANYthing!”
Since Eve did not seem surprised that the snake spoke, could be due to maybe animals spoke back then and she was use to hearing animals speak.
Maybe she was surprised, but then they had a long conversation. That would probably be my reaction. But if the animal kept talking for a long time, I’d get to know it as a person and not so much as a “talking animal.”
Actually we really do not know one way or another, maybe she was surprised, but the Bible does not say that she was, so you just don’t really know.
so you guys don’t hear animals talk? not even just to tell you to do things?
With all the mind blowing things that had happened to me (being created, falling asleep and getting a wife, and being encouraged to name all the animals) I’d probably just roll with it.
“Okay, here’s one more weird thing.”
That’s closer to what I’ve always figured. Adam & Eve were probably still finding new stuff that they didn’t know about all the time, and taking things as the came.
“Huh. A talking snake. Didn’t think of that. I wander what the next thing we’ll find talking will be? The brook kind of babbles, I wander if it’s saying anything interesting?”
Jamsco… but even then by your wording you’re presupposing things.
I don’t even think they’d call it “weird” because that would mean there’s some standard that isn’t “weird”
Okay, how about:
“Okay, here’s one more thing I didn’t expect.”
I am honestly praying that animals can talk in Heaven. And I pray that my dog Molly will be there. I want her to break down for me how in the world she can manage to eat her own barf. Unreal.
z
she must have been a parselmouth
If I thought an animal was talking to me (and was sure it wasn’t a trick), I’d check myself into a mental health facility, since animals don’t have the biological ability nor the cognitive capacity to speak.
UNLESS trustworthy people verified the animal could talk as well. Then I would think it was really cool and be relived I wasn’t crazy.
My husband and I are always debating this. I really want animals to talk on the new earth. I think Lewis had a great idea! My argument is, “The snake talked in the garden and no one thought that was strange.” We’ll see. :)
Let’s not forget that God opened the mouth of Balaam’s donkey in Numbers and Balaam was not shocked that the donkey spoke to him. Balaam responded as though he were having a conversation with a fellow human.
I know people who talk to their pets as if they can understand them.
…and? :)
This may sound weird, but I’ve always wondered if Adam and Eve could talk to all the animals and that communication with them was lost as a result of the fall.
Maybe Genesis just doesn’t record Eve’s shock and the conversation related to it because it isn’t relevant to what the story is getting at. I’m pretty sure the people in Genesis said a lot of things that didn’t make it into the book. Maybe her answer came after a long (and crafty) explanation by the serpent.
There is a whole faction of Christians who believe in “animal sentience” and that animals could talk pre-fall or pre-Babel. While I don’t necessarily “believe” it, I don’t NOT believe it, either. We weren’t allowed to eat animals before the flood; maybe it’s because they were sentient and we kinda ruined that. Who knows? God’s done weirder things. Have you ever seen a blobfish?! It looks like a creature from Never Ending Story! Sometimes I wonder if he was just messing with us…
The whole passage seems to imply some level of ignorance on Adam & Eve’s part.
Even Eve’s statement to the serpent seems to give off a “well God said…” as if she didn’t really believe it or didn’t understand why.
I think “jamsco” was right about them just rolling with it.
What I wonder is why we always assume that reality is limited to what we have personally experienced? Why do we not stand before a mountain, or a sunset, or the ancient Scriptures and instead assume that life must be more richly nuanced, more profoundly conceived, more mysterious than our limited finite experience of it? Jesus once said that even stones could burst into song under the right conditions.
It’s true that hearing animals speak can be a symptom of mental breakdown, but then in a fallen world everything, even blessings, can be perverted into curses.
When I think about it, I certainly have no desire to have an animal talk to me (now, in this in-between time), but I’d hate to live in a world where it was somehow impossible.
I totally agree. Somehow, i don’t think the author of genesis thought that important… we don’t know she didn’t say it, right?
Even if my own pet dog talked to me I’d freak! I’m terrified of snakes so if a snake talked to me I’d think my worst nightmare was coming to get me. (Then… I suppose it did turn out that way for them and for us).
i dont think all the conversations that people had were written out word for word in the Bible. im sure people said a lot of other random, unnecessary things that are not recorded in the Bible.
Just had another thought. maybe they were not speaking? maybe just communicating somehow but not using words.
kick, dive, roll, jump, run, stop, breath. Then, “Who, said that?”
vision of dwight schrute with this one…
Look at the text, that animal(was it truly an animal?) was called serpent and charcterized as a beast of the field.I think it may have had some human qualities… I don’t know if the animals spoke, God doesn’t tell us. But clearly, Eve had no problem with it, and since it was the devil, could he have possibly taken a human form, and “serpent” is only there to show us his evil nature?
Maybe it wasn’t a serpent at all, but The Serpent… as in Jake the Snake… as in… an angel that was nicknamed The Serpent because no one liked him…
Revelation 12:9.
:)
Unless all animals talked pre-Fall. Randy Alcorn makes the case for that in his book, “Heaven.”