Verse 15. You shall lie in wait for his heel, and she shall crush your head.¹

VERS. 15. Tu insidiaberis calcaneo eius, & ipsa conteret caput tuum.

A learned and elegant interpretation, in the treatment of these words, is found in Rupert (book 3, On the Trinity, chapter 20): 'Great enmities are set between the woman and the serpent: on both sides, not so much the judgment of reason as the perpetual hatred of natural sense keeps [them]. For she, though not always in act, yet always by a certain power, shall crush his head; but he, being pressed to the ground and not lofty, lies in wait for her heel. For if the bare sole of the woman anticipates the serpent's tooth, and even lightly presses his most vivacious head, at once the whole body, together with the head, suddenly perishes — so that no motion at all, no sense, remains in any part; which cannot certainly be effected quickly or lightly with hammers or levers, nor with cutting swords, since [the serpent's] head, cut off with [a length of] two or three little fingers, is said to live and go away. That this too, which was said, is so, we have learned by the faithful report of those who explored it by diligence. Whence it is also related that [the woman] did not dare to touch his bare body. On the contrary, he, however small he be, if he fixes even a little tooth in the tip of the sole, kills; for by the bite the infused plague, increased by the vegetative force of the body, runs through the veins, and takes away life: so grave are the enmities set between the two natures, exhibiting a monument of the ancient evil upon the new. As soon as the poison injected by the bite touches the blood of man, it gradually creeps, and kills the animal inimical to its nature. Whence someone says thus: Harmful is the plague of serpents with the mingled blood; by the bite they hold venom, and threaten fate in the tooth. For all poison is cold, and therefore the soul, which is fiery, flees the cold poison. But of serpents, as many kinds, so many venoms; as many species, so many banes; as many colors, so many pains are found. For it is a cursed animal, from which...'²

Erudita & elegans apud Rupertum, lib. 3. de Trinitate cap. 20. horum in verborum tractatu interpretatio reperitur: Grandes, inquit, inter mulierem & serpentem inimicitiae positae sunt: Utrinque non tam rationis iudicium, quam sensus naturalis perpetuum servat odium. Haec enim etsi non semper actu, semper tamen potestate quadam conteret caput illius: Ille autem, ut pote humi depressus, & non arduus, calcaneo huius insidiatur. Nam si nuda mulieris planta dentem serpentis praevenerit, & vivacissimum caput eius vel leviter presserit, statim totum cum capite corpus repente interit, ita ut nullus omnino motus, nullus sensus in aliqua parte residuus sit, quod nec malleis aut vectibus certe, nec gladijs concidentibus, cito aut leviter effici potest, siquidem excisum caput cum duobus aut tribus digiticulis, vivere & abire perhibetur. Hoc quoque quod praedictum est, ita esse, ipsorum qui per industriam exploraverunt, fida relatione comperimus. Unde & fertur, quod nudum corpus eius contingere non ausus sit. E contrario, ille quamlibet exiguus sit, si vel extrema plantae dentulum infixerit, occidit, morsu namque infusa pestis, per venas vegetatione corporis aucta discurrit, animamque eximit: adeo graves inter utramque naturam inimicitiae positae sunt, antiqui mali super novum exhibentes monumentum. Mox ut venenum morsu iniectum sanguinem hominis tetigerit, paulatim serpit, & inimicum suae naturae animal interficit. Unde sic ait quidam: Noxia serpentum est admixto sanguine pestis, Morsu virus habent, & fatum in dente minantur. Omne enim venenum frigidum est, & idcirco anima quae ignea est, fugit venenum frigidum. Serpentum vero quot genera, tot venena: quot species, tot pernicies: quot colores, tot habentur & dolores. Maledictum quippe animal est, ex quo...

'...from which [cursed animal] it has, by its own cunning, favored the devil for the ministry of death, and thence is naturally inimical to man. But what wonder that this evil is permitted to man by God — since man himself, for the killing of his neighbor, arms himself with the venoms of serpents, and the venom which nature does not have, acquires by obstinacy, procures by money? For this the same Author as above [Lucan] declaims with such an execration: But what shame of gain will there be to us? Thence are sought hither the Libyan deaths: we have made the asp a merchandise. Accordingly, because men themselves in a way become serpents, when they suffer the venom of asps not only spiritually under their lips, but really too in their [purses], and they neither murmur that they are poisoned, and so many men perish by the plagues of serpents.'³

ex quo diabolo ad ministerium mortis propria calliditate suffragatum est, & exinde homini naturaliter inimicum est. Sed quid mirum hoc malum a Deo permitti homini: cum & ipse homo ad interfectionem proximi, serpentum sese armet venenis, & quod non habet natura virus, acquirat pervicacia, comparet pecunia? Hoc enim Auctor idem qui supra, tali execratione declamat: Sed quis erit lucri nobis pudor? inde petuntur Huc Libycae mortes: effecimus aspida mercem. Proinde quia homines ipsi quodammodo serpentes fiunt, dum non tantum spiritualiter venenum aspidum sub labijs eorum, sed realiter quoque venenum aspidum in fistarcijs eorum patiantur, & ipsi nec murmurent quod venenantur, & intereunt tot homines pestibus serpentum.

The same Rupert (book 2, On the Victory of the Word of God, chapter 18) teaches that, on account of these continual and implacable enmities between the woman and the serpent, and between her seed and his seed, sacred Scripture is called 'the book of the wars of the Lord' (Numbers 21) and 'the book of the Just' (2 Samuel, chapter 1). For what else is contained or done in the sacred Scriptures, but the war and contest of the Word for the destruction of sin and death? From this beginning, then, of the book of the Just and the book of the wars of the Lord — where it was said, I will put enmities between you and the woman, etc. — let us contemplate, as from a high mountain, the power of the Word of God, descending as it were into the plain of a field, [and see] how it fought against the malice or the lie of the devil, the ancient serpent, how it conquered and triumphed; so that, his purpose being completed — in which he blessed the first humans at the constitution of the world — at its end he may say to the elect, the victors over the serpent: Come, blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the constitution of the world.⁴

Idem Rupert. lib. 2. de Victoria verbi Dei, c. 18. ob has inter mulierem & serpentem, & inter semen illius & semen huius continuas & implacabiles inimicitias docet, sacram Scripturam appellari librum bellorum Domini. Num. 21. & lib. Iustorum. 2. Reg. c. 1. Quid enim aliud continetur vel agitur in Scripturis sanctis, nisi bellum & certamen verbi ad destructionem peccati & mortis? Ab hoc igitur initio libri Iustorum & libri bellorum Domini, ubi dictum est, Inimicitias ponam inter te, & mulierem, &c. tanquam de monte excelso virtutem contemplemur verbi Dei, descendentem velut in campi planiciem, adversus malitiam sive mendacium diaboli serpentis antiqui, qualiter pugnaverit, qualiter vicerit, atque triumphaverit, ut completo proposito suo, in quo benedixit primis hominibus in constitutione mundi, in fine eius dicat electis, & serpentis victoribus: Venite benedicti Patris mei, possidete paratum vobis regnum a constitutione mundi.