EVE - meaning “Living” Eve…the first woman in the Bible. After God created Adam, the first man, He created Eve as a suitable companion for Adam. Once Adam fell into a deep sleep, God formed a woman out of one of Adam’s ribs. Adam then said: “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man”, (Gen 2:23). She was named Eve, which means ‘the living’ or ‘life’. She was the first woman, the first wife and the first mother on earth. Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden which God created for them. At that stage, the world was like a paradise with no evil or sin. They were allowed to eat of all the trees growing in the garden, but God commanded Adam “of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die”, (Gen 2:17). We don’t know how long they lived in the Garden of Eden, but one day Satan, disguised as a serpent started to talk to Eve about the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. He convinced her that if she ate the fruit, she would not die, but that her eyes will be opened and she will become like God. Eve decided to take one of the fruit from this tree and she ate it. We need to observe that after she ate this fruit, nothing happened. She offered the fruit to Adam who also ate it, and immediately after Adam did this, their eyes opened and for the first time they realized that they were naked. They covered themselves and tried to hide from God. It is also interesting to note that when God spoke to them, He first spoke to Adam about eating the fruit and not to Eve. Adam blamed Eve, who in return blamed the serpent. When God handed out punishment, He punished the serpent, who was the first deceiver, first. After this God punished Eve. From this day, all women will have pain when giving birth and their husbands shall rule over them. Next in line was Adam, who was first told that going forward he would need to work the lands with great difficulty to be able to eat. Then came the great blow – God told Adam that man will die and return to the dust of the earth. Adam and Eve were then banished out of the Garden of Eden and angles were placed at the garden to protect the Tree of Life. Eve’s actions in tricking her husband to disobey God, had results that is still present to this day. Being pregnant and going through child birth, is to this day a very stressful and painful ordeal for every woman. After God made man the head of the household over woman, a strife began between the two. In today’s life it is all about equal rights for woman, woman can do everything a man can do, woman does not have to submit to their husbands etc, etc. This is all in contradiction to God’s Word. With the punishment Eve received for committing sin, should we as women today not learn from this and obey God’s Word to the letter? As the original command not to eat of the tree was given to Adam and not to Eve, sin came into this world through one man, (Romans 5:12). Only when Adam sinned, the whole of human kind was sentenced to death. We can however be grateful that God is also forgiving and have mercy. Because Jesus died for us on the cross was resurrected on the third day, we can all have eternal life if we choose to submit to Jesus and accept Him as our one and only Saviour. “But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive”, (1 Corinthians 15:20-21).