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Library / Commentaries and Disputations on Genesis, Volume I

Book Six — the temptation and fall

And Adam called the name of his wife Eve, because she was the mother of all the living

LatineEnglish

And Adam called the name of his wife Eve, because she was the mother of all the living.1

Et vocavit Adam nomen uxoris suae Eva, eo quod mater esset cunctorum viventium.

Nomen Evae tam apud Graecos, quam apud Latinos corrupte legitur: nec ea vox capit etymologiam quam tradit hoc loco divina Scriptura. Quapropter dicendum esset pro Eva, חוה Chavah: ducitur enim a חי Chai, quod significat viventem vel animalem. Ponitur autem, חוה Chavah, pro חיה Chaiah: nam ratio nominis est, quia ipsa erat futura mater omnium viventium: חוה Chavah autem non significat vivere, sed nunciare: חיה Chaiah, vero significat vivere, & litterae, א ה ו י (A, E, V, I), sunt ad invicem permutabiles, ut ex grammatica constat. Atque huius nominis corruptela apud Latinos fecit, ut multi dixerint, Ave dictum esse ab, Eva, per inversionem litterarum: ob idque Gabrielem archangelum, Deiparam virginem salutando, dixisse ei, Ave, quasi ea mundo latura esset bona plane contraria iis malis, quae invexerat Eva.
The name of Eve is read corruptly both among the Greeks and among the Latins: nor does that word contain the etymology which divine Scripture hands down in this place. Wherefore, for 'Eva,' it ought to be said חוה Chavah; for it is derived from חי Chai, which signifies living or animate. But חוה Chavah is put for חיה Chaiah: for the reason of the name is that she was to be the future mother of all the living. Now חוה Chavah does not signify 'to live,' but 'to announce'; whereas חיה Chaiah signifies 'to live'; and the letters א ה ו י (A, E, V, I) are mutually interchangeable, as is clear from grammar. And the corruption of this name among the Latins brought it about that many said 'Ave' was said from 'Eva' by inversion of the letters; and on that account that Gabriel the archangel, in saluting the Virgin Mother of God, said to her 'Ave,' as if she were to bring to the world goods plainly contrary to those evils which Eve had brought in.2
Non satis liquet an haec impositio nominis praepostero ordine narretur a Mose, sitque id nominis impositum uxori ab Adamo vel ante peccatum, vel postquam e paradiso sunt eiecti: non enim verisimile fit, cum Adamus iudicio Dei vehementer premeretur, inter medias poenas & flagella, amarissimamque mortis denunciationem, quasi tranquillo & vacuo animo, de imponendo nomine uxori cogitasse. Nec desunt qui existiment, Adamum ingenti dolore obstupefactum, quod tantis bonis spoliatus esset, tantisque malis mortique malorum omnium extremo addictus, uxorem suam eorum malorum auctorem & mortis causam, ceu per amarum quemdam iocum acerbamque ironiam appellasse Matrem viventium: quemadmodum Graeci furias infernales appellant Eumenides, id est, faciles ac mites, a contrario nempe, quippe cum sint durae & inexorabiles. Illa verba, Quod esset Mater cunctorum viventium, sunt ipsius Mosis: & illud, Esset dictum est, pro futura esset. Eugubinus ridet Lyranum, interpretantem nomen Evae tanquam significans matrem omnium, non simpliciter, sed aerumnose ac misere viventium. Sunt qui opinentur, sic uxorem suam appellasse Adamum, habito respectu ad venturum Messiam, a quo solo peccati sui remedium expectabat, qui nasciturus erat ex sola muliere sine commixtione viri: & iccirco mulier dicta est Mater omnium viventium, non autem Adam dictus est Pater omnium viventium.
It is not sufficiently clear whether this imposition of the name is narrated by Moses in inverted order, and whether that name was imposed on the wife by Adam either before sin, or after they were cast out of paradise: for it is not likely that Adam, when he was vehemently pressed by God's judgment, amid penalties and scourges and the most bitter announcement of death, should, as if with tranquil and empty mind, have thought about imposing a name on his wife. Nor are there lacking those who think that Adam, stupefied with immense grief because he had been stripped of such goods, and consigned to such evils and to death, the last of all evils, called his wife — the author of those evils and the cause of death — 'Mother of the living' as if by a bitter jest and harsh irony: just as the Greeks call the infernal Furies 'Eumenides,' that is, 'the kindly and mild,' by contraries, since they are hard and inexorable. Those words, 'That she was the Mother of all the living,' are Moses's own; and that 'she was' is said for 'she would be.' Eugubinus laughs at Lyranus, who interprets the name of Eve as signifying the mother of all — not simply, but of those living wretchedly and miserably. There are those who think that Adam so called his wife with regard to the coming Messiah, from whom alone he awaited the remedy of his sin, who was to be born from a woman alone without the intercourse of a man; and for that reason the woman was called Mother of all the living, but Adam was not called Father of all the living.3
Ergo plus meo iudicio novitatis & admirationis habet quam fidei quae est apud Rupertum, in capite 26. libri tertii de Trinitate & eius operibus, horum verborum interpretatio & sententia. Censet enim Rupertus, Adamum ex ingenti superbia, animique pervicacia, hanc divinam sententiam mortis adversum se pronuntiatam aut minime credentem, aut parvipendentem, appellasse uxorem suam matrem viventium: quasi diceret, Nec timeo mortem, quinimo & me victurum credo nihilominus, quam si non peccassem: & idcirco uxorem meam appellari Evam volo, quod futura sit mater viventium. Sed audiat Lector Rupertum suis ipsum verbis sententiam hanc explicantem:
Therefore, in my judgment, the interpretation and opinion of these words which is in Rupert (in chapter 26 of the third book On the Trinity and its Works) has more of novelty and wonder than of credibility. For Rupert thinks that Adam, out of immense pride and obstinacy of mind, either not at all believing or making light of this divine sentence of death pronounced against himself, called his wife 'mother of the living': as if he said, 'I do not fear death; nay rather, I believe I shall live nonetheless, just as if I had not sinned; and therefore I wish my wife to be called Eve, because she will be the mother of the living.' But let the reader hear Rupert himself explaining this opinion in his own words:4

'What,' he says, 'is more insane than, in the judgment of such a cause, to name her Eve, that is, life — she who did not have life in herself; and to call her mother of all the living, who is rather the mother of all the dying? For all die in her sin, and none of her children lives, except those who are made alive through the one man Christ. It is therefore marvelous that, where the sentence of bodily death was being pronounced, he — already dead by spiritual death, and afterward about to die bodily too — there called his wife Eve, that is, life. Therefore, when Moses narrated this, that Adam, having received the sentence of death, called his wife by the name of life, he doubtless wished to signify this: just as, when God said above, On whatever day you eat of this tree, you shall die the death, he did not believe, but ate — because he saw that the woman who had first eaten did not immediately die bodily — so now too, when God says, Because you are dust, and to dust you shall return, he so far did not believe, that on the contrary he called his wife's name Eve, that is, life, because she was the mother of all the living.' Thus Rupert.5

Quid, ait, insanius, quam in illo talis causae iudicio illam nuncupare Evam, id est, vitam quae vitam in se non habebat: eamque dicere matrem cunctorum viventium, quae potius mater est cunctorum morientium? omnes enim in peccato eius moriuntur, & nemo filiorum vivit, nisi qui per unum hominem Christum vivificantur. Mirabile itaque est, quod ubi mortis corporeae sententia ferebatur, iam spirituali morte mortuus, & postea corporali etiam moriturus, illic uxorem suam Evam, id est, vitam appellavit. Igitur cum hoc narravit Moses, Adamum accepta mortis sententia uxorem suam appellasse nomine vitae, hoc proculdubio significare voluit. Quemadmodum superius dicenti Deo, In quocumque die comederis ex hoc ligno, morte morieris; non credidit, sed comedit: quia mulierem quae prior comederat, non statim corporaliter mortuam esse vidit: Sic & nunc dicenti Deo, Quia pulvis es, & in pulverem reverteris, adeo non credidit, ut e contrario vocaret nomen uxoris suae Evam, id est, vitam, eo quod mater esset cunctorum viventium. Sic Rupertus.

Translator’s notes

  1. New lemma: Genesis 3:20 (set off and centered). ↩
  2. The etymology of 'Eve' (Gen 3:20). HEBREW GLYPHS verified by magnification: חוה (Chavah, 'Eve'; chet-vav-he) appears three times; חי (Chai, 'living'; chet-yod) once; חיה (Chaiah, 'to live'; chet-yod-he) once; and the four permutable/quiescent letters א ה ו י (aleph-he-vav-yod = the transliterated 'A, E, V, I'). Pererius: the name should be Chavah, from Chai/Chaiah ('living'); the letters are interchangeable; whence the Latin corruption made many derive the angelic 'Ave' from 'Eva' by inversion (Gabriel's salutation of Mary bringing goods contrary to Eve's evils). Marginal gloss: 'De Etymologia nominis Evae.' ↩
  3. When and how the name was imposed: unclear whether before sin or after expulsion (unlikely amid God's judgment). Some hold Adam, grief-stricken, called her 'Mother of the living' by bitter irony (as the Greeks call the Furies 'Eumenides,' the kindly ones, by contraries). 'That she was the mother of all living' is Moses's own gloss ('was' for 'would be'). Eugubinus mocks Lyra (Nicholas of Lyra), who took it as mother of those living wretchedly. A Messianic reading: Adam named her with regard to the coming Messiah, to be born of a woman alone without a man — hence she, not Adam, is called parent of all the living. Marginal glosses: 'Quando nomen Evae sit impositum primae mulieri'; 'Cur Eva non Adamus mater omnium viventium dicta sit.' Page footer signature 'TTT'; catchword 'ERGO.' ↩
  4. Pererius introduces (and finds 'more wondrous than probable') Rupert's reading (De Trinitate et operibus 3.26) of the naming of Eve: that Adam, from pride and disbelief in the death-sentence, named his wife 'mother of the living' as a defiant boast ('I do not fear death... I wish her called Eve'). Marginal gloss: 'Mirabilis, sed non probabilis Ruperti sententia.' Running head '688'; true printed page 698. ↩
  5. Rupert's own words (De Trin. 3.26): it is 'insane' that Adam named her 'life' (mother of the living) when she is rather mother of all the dying — all die in her sin, none lives but through Christ; Adam, dead in soul and doomed to bodily death, still disbelieved the sentence 'you are dust' (as he had disbelieved 'you shall die the death,' seeing Eve not die at once), and so defiantly called her Eve = life. ↩