Grace Theological
Journal 7.2 (1986) 203-12
Copyright © 1986 by Grace
Theological Seminary; cited with permission.
WOMAN'S DESIRE FOR MAN:
GENESIS
IRVIN A. BUSENITZ
Lexical
and etymological studies of the words of Gen 3:16b yield
little help for interpreting the meaning of the woman's desire for
man.
Contextual evidence,
however, indicates that the woman's desire for
the man and his rule over her are not the punishment but the
conditions in which the woman will suffer punishment. Although there
are linguistic and thematic parallels between Gen 3:16b and Gen
4:7,
contextual differences and interpretive problems indicate that Gen 4:7
cannot be used to interpret the meaning of “desire" in Gen
3:16. Cant
be concluded that, in spite of the Fall, the woman will have a
longing
for intimacy with man involving more than sexual intimacy.
*
*
*
INTRODUCTION
ALTHOUGH
in the past few decades there has been a proliferation of
books and articles discussing biblical norms for the
role of women
both in society and in the church, a consensus of
interpretation has not
emerged. The complexity of the issue, coupled
with the exegetical
difficulty of relevant Scripture, has made general
agreement elusive.
Part
of the discussion has focused upon the last phrase of Gen 3:16:
"yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule
over
you."l
Various interpretations have been
propounded for the meaning of
this phrase, centering primarily around the
definition of "desire." One
prominent interpretation suggests that, as a
punishment for the Fall, a
woman's desire will be subject to her husband's.
"Her desire, whatever
it may be, will not be her own. She cannot do what
she wishes, for her
husband rules over her like a despot and
whatever she wishes is subject
1 All biblical quotations
from NASB unless otherwise noted.
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GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
to his will.”2 Another viewpoint
contends that the woman will have an
immense longing, yearning, and psychological
dependence.3 More
recently a third view has surfaced. It suggests
that, based on the usage
of "desire" in Gen 4:7, the woman will
desire to dominate the relation-
ship with her husband. "The woman's desire is
to control her husband
(to usurp his divinely appointed headship), and he must
master her, if
he can.”4
LEXICAL CONSIDERATIONS
The Hebrew term rendered "desire" is hqAUwT; and is derived from
qUw. It is given the
general lexical meaning of "attract, impel, of desire,
affection”;5 however, due to its
infrequent occurrence in the OT (Gen
logical data is equally obscure. The word may be
related historically to
the Arabic saqa (which is often used in contexts indicating sexual
desire) or saqa (which is used in a more general sense of desire).7
Nevertheless,
saqa does
not demand sexual connotations and saqa
does not rule them out.8 In light of its
usage in Gen 4:7, the term
appears to have a meaning which is broader than
sexual desire.
Perhaps the translators of the LXX attempted to
clarify their
understanding of the term by
translating it with a]postrofh<
in Gen
a]po<, when attached to the
verb stre<fw,
suggests "to turn away," while
e]pi< suggests "to turn
toward." However, it is difficult to understand
2 E. J. Young, Genesis 3 (London: Banner of Truth, 1966) 127; cf. John Calvin,
Genesis (reprint;
example of Hebrew poetry in which a thought is
restated in a subsequent phrase. As
such, "and he shall rule over you" is a
reassertion of "your desire shall be to your
husband."
3 Gini
Andrews, Your Half of the Apple
(Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1972) 51; cf.
H.
C. Leupold, Genesis
(2 vols.;
4 Susan Foh,
"What Is the Woman's Desire?" WTJ
37 (1975) 382; cf. also Foh's
Women
and the Word of God (reprint;
5 BDB, 1003. The definition given by
Koehler and Baumgartner (KB, 1. 1043) is
similar: "impulse, urge."
6 The significance of the term as used in
these three passages is treated below. The
number in brackets refers to the versification of the
Hebrew text.
7 Foh (Women, 67) seeks to remove any sexual
connotation from "desire" in 3:16b
by contending that "the phonemic equivalent
of the Hebrew s [w of qUw] is s in Arabic.
The
proper etymology in Arabic for qUw is saqa, to urge or drive on. This
meaning need
not have sexual connotations."
8 In either case, etymology is often of
little help in ascertaining meaning, which is
determined by context and usage.
BUSENITZ: WOMAN'S DESIRE FOR MAN 205
how Gen 4:7 could embody any idea of "turning
away.”9 Furthermore,
the terms are virtually synonymous in meaning in
noun form,10 so that
the change in prepositional prefix is
"unconvincing"11 as an interpreta-
tion and "quite
unnecessary."12
The Tg. Onq. translates
the term with j`yTib;UxTi, which means "to
desire, long for." While it does not occur in the
Aramaic portions of
the OT, its Hebrew equivalent is recorded in Ps
119:20: "My soul is
crushed with longing [hbxt] after Thine ordinances at all times."
The
other terms used in Gen 3:16 are even less helpful (when
treated individually) for determining the
meaning of the text. The verb
"to rule," from lwamA, is employed both here
and in 4:7. The LXX
translates the term in
over,"13 but uses a verb form
of a@rxw
("to
rule over"14) in 4:7, possibly
to depict a more governmental, autocratic concept.
Similarly, little
significance can be attached to the
interchange of the prepositions
(
employs the two prepositions interchangeably,
with apparent indis-
crimination.15
Ultimately, the effort to achieve exegetical
clarity cannot be
propelled by lexical or etymological information,
for the data revealed
9 The same should be said of Gen 3:16 also,
for even understanding to mean a
desire for domination and control does not essentially
incorporate a "turning away"
concept.
10 The meaning assigned to both terms in
BAGD (100, 301) is "to turn toward."
11 John Skinner, Genesis (ICC; Edinburgh: T. & T.
Clark, 1969) 83.
12 U. Cassuto, The Book of Genesis (2 vols;
13 Some have contended that kurieu<w connotes the idea of
establishing one in an
office over another. If this were true it would
suggest that the husband was not installed
in the "office" of leader/headship until
after the Fall. Yet 1 Tim 2:12-14 implies that the
role of headship was divinely ordained prior to the
fall. Equally untenable is the
following analysis: "This is obviously
neither an intensification nor a warping of a
pre-existing hierarchy between the
sexes for no such hierarchy is alluded to" (Victor P.
Bruce
K. Waltke, and Gleason L. Archer, Jr. [2 vols;
While
Genesis 1-3 does not specifically refer to a preexisting hierarchy, it is
alluded to in
a multiplicity of ways in the opening chapters.
Examples include the purpose of woman's
creation (
elsewhere in Scripture that a hierarchical
structure between man and woman antedated
the Fall (I Tim
14 BAGD, 113.
15 Cf. BDB, 41. Numerous examples of
this interchange exist in the OT (e.g., I Sam
encompass the concept of "against," as
it does in Gen 4:8, it is made evident only by the
context. Since such a thought is not inherent in
the context of
too quick to read the idea of "against"
back into it.
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GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
by such is dim and inconclusive. Lexically and
etymologically, the term
qUw is shrouded in obscurity;
the verb lwamA and the prepositions lx, and
lfa are equally impotent to unlock the meaning of Gen
3:16.
CONTEXTUAL
CONSIDERATIONS
While the study of each of the terms does not
shed much light on
the meaning of Gen 3:16, the context does. In Gen
woman serves as a point of transition to v 16 where
the Lord
pronounces judgment upon the woman. A similar
connection is pro-
vided between v 16 and v 17; the mention of the
husband in v 16b
allows for a smooth transition to the judgment
pronounced upon the
man in vv 17-19.
The first thing to be noted by the context is
the fact that each
recipient of God's judgment receives one
punishment. In the case of the
serpent (
receives one judgment--a death blow administered
by the seed of the
woman.16 In the judgment upon
man (
readily yield its fruit. In Gen 4:11, Cain too
is the recipient of only one
punishment. Consequently, in 3:16 woman is probably
the recipient of
only one judgment.
Second, in each of the judgments which God
pronounced in Gen
3:14-19
and 4:11-12, the nature of the curse has no essential relation-
ship to the nature of the sin committed. The ground
not readily
yielding its fruit has no essential relationship
to Adam's eating of the
forbidden fruit; the fact that the serpent would
now crawl on the
ground has no integral connection to his enticing
conversation with the
woman. Consequently, one should not assume that the
woman's
punishment is to be sealed forever under the
control of her husband,
because she stepped out of her divinely ordained
role of submission
and followed the admonition of the devil.
Third, the judgments given to the woman and the
man (
revolve around propagation and seed.17
"Both sentences involve
16 This argument follows the view that
Satan is being addressed in v 15. It is doubtful
that the term "enmity" (hbAyxe) can be limited merely to a hostility between
man and beast,
for elsewhere the term is employed only of enmity
between morally responsible agents
(cf.
Num 35:21, 22; Ezek 25:15; 35:5). Furthermore, if the v 15 judgment refers to
the
serpent, then it is essentially no judgment at
all, for animals in general exist under a
similar relationship with man.
17 The opening statement of
conception" is probably a hendiadys--an
idiomatic phrase referring to pain which
results from pregnancy. In addition to the fact
that it is doubtful if an increased fertility
cycle would constitute a punishment, the next phrase
combines the two thoughts: "in
pain you shall bring forth children." Cf. Cassuto's suggestion (Genesis,
better interpretation is: your suffering in general,
and more particularly that of your
child bearing. "
BUSENITZ: WOMAN'S DESIRE FOR MAN 207
pain/toil, and both affect the
bringing forth of life, human and
otherwise."18 The context speaks
not of the desire of woman to rule the
man but of the continuation of life in the face of
death. Such is the
central element of 3:16a. Such is the focal
point of
is good cause to believe that the same idea is
present in 3:16b.
Fourth, in the contextual development of Genesis
3 the woman is
specifically addressed in
pronouncement of judgment in 3:17-19.
If the "desire" of 3:16b is the
desire of the woman to control and dominate her
husband, then the
sentence is no longer a judgment upon the woman;
rather, it is the man
who bears its brunt. Yet man's judgment is not
mentioned until
"Since
the punishment was specifically intended for the woman and her
female descendants, and was not a penalty shared with
the men, it had
inevitably to be of a nature restricted to the
female sex."19
Fifth, in each of the punishments the
pronouncement is given first,
then an explanatory statement follows. In the case
of the serpent (
the explanatory phrase is "And dust you shall
eat all the days of your
life." Serpents are not dust-eaters per se;
rather, the phrase is an
explanatory elaboration of the fact that they would
crawl around on
their bellies. In
phrase "And I will put enmity between your seed
and her seed," with
the subsequent phrase denoting the extent of that
enmity, namely,
death. In
of the ground (3:17a); 3:17b-19 is explanatory,
describing how this
punishment would affect Adam and his descendants.20
The same is true
in
punishment recorded in 3:16a. Since each of the
explanatory state-
ments in
statement, it would be exegetically inadvisable to
divide
separate, unrelated punishments. Rather, 3:16b is
elaborating on 3:16a.
The
"desire factor" is not a part of the judgment but an explanation of
conditions and relationships as they will exist
after the Fall. Even
though the intimacy between the first man and his wife
was abrogated,21
18 Foh,
Women, 67. The judgment of both
the woman and the man affects their
physical being. For the woman, pregnancy and
childbirth will be accompanied by great
hardship and toil. The judgment on man will also
involve hard labor (note the same
word [bc,f, = pain] used in both
19 Cassuto, Genesis, 1. 164.
20 Cf. Gen 4: 11-12 where the punishment of
Cain is a further cursing of the ground
(
an explanation of the judgment, describing the
extent and impact of it.
21 God's words in Gen 3:16b do not
"destroy the harmony of marriage" (Foh,
"Woman's
Desire," 383), for such harmony was broken earlier (cf. "his
wife" of
3:8
with "the woman" and the phrase, "which You
gave to me, she gave. . ." in
Though
Eve is later called "his wife," the initial intimacy appears to be
gone.
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GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
even though the unity with man would bring woman to
the threshold
of death itself in the process of childbirth"
yet woman would still
possess a strong desire to be with man. The
broken intimacy and the
pain in childbearing would not be allowed to nullify
the yearning of
woman for man and the fulfillment of God's command to
populate the
earth22 or to alter the divine
order of the headship of man.
It is equally tenuous to maintain that the
phrase "and he shall rule
over you" was given because Eve had usurped the
authority and
leadership role of Adam when she took and ate from
the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil. The sin of the first
woman was not that
she took the lead without seeking the prior counsel
of Adam. No such
prior consultation was needed, for she herself knew
God's command-
ment prohibiting them from
eating the fruit of the tree of the knowl-
edge of good and evil (
herself above her Creator. She took it upon
herself to determine,
together with the counsel of the serpent, if
God's law was good or bad,
if it was right or wrong. Her sin had nothing to
do with denying Adam
his rightful role of leadership in their marriage
or with grasping a role
that belonged to her husband. The only role that Eve
usurped was
that of God's, a usurpation that is characteristic
of all acts of sin of
all people living in all times of the history of
mankind.
Woman
may desire to dominate or rule over man, but it is not a
part of the punishment pronounced upon woman; it is
just the essence,
character, and result of all sin against God.
Self-exaltation and pride
always result in the desire to dominate and rule.
Every person to some
extent desires to dominate and rule over others--not
just woman over
man.23
GENESIS 4:7
One of the two passages most directly related to
this discussion is
Gen
4:7. While there are linguistic and thematic parallels between this
verse and Gen
22 This element should not be dismissed too
readily, for there is every reason to
believe that the broken intimacy, together with
the deadly pain of childbirth, would be
sufficient to place the command to be fruitful, multiply,
and fill the earth (
jeopardy (cf. also Gen 11:4, 9).
23 The NT commands to submit to the
husband's authority (Eph
3:1)
do not suggest that woman's desire to rule over man is a part of the Genesis 3
judgment. These passages incorporate admonitions
directing slaves to submit to their
masters, children to obey their parents, and
younger men to submit to their elders,
indicating that nonsubmissive
attitudes and actions are the result of sin. To be certain,
women may seek to usurp authority not rightfully
theirs. But it is an action which is the
consequence of sin and not a result of the judgment
of Gen 3:16.
BUSENITZ:
WOMAN’S DESIRE FOR MAN 209
interpretation of Gen 4:7 faces unique
difficulties all its own.24 Gener-
ally speaking, there have been two interpretations.
The less common
interpretation posits Abel as the
antecedent of OtqAy.wT; ("his
desire"),
suggesting that if Cain does what is right, then he
will be lifted up and
restored to his position of preeminence which
formed a part of his
birthright as the older brother.25
"From the latter clause of the verse it
is evident that God alludes to the prerogatives of
the birthright which
Cain
would be in no danger of losing if his conduct were such as it
ought to be.”26 This interpretation
embodies at least two favorable
aspects. The first is contextual, for it readily
accounts for the actions of
Cain
toward Abel in the following verse.27 The
second is grammatical,
for in OtqAy.wT; ("his
desire") the pronominal suffix is masculine. If the
antecedent were "sin [txF.AHa] crouching at the door," one would expect
a feminine pronominal suffix, since txF.AHa is feminine.
A more common understanding of Gen 4:7 is that
sin, pictured as
a wild beast, is waiting to pounce upon and
control its victim. "The
fem.
txF.AHa is construed as a
masculine, because sin is personified as a
wild beast, lurking at the door of the human heart,
and eagerly desiring
to devour his soul (1 Pet. v. 8).”28
This view benefits from the closeness
of the pronominal suffix ("his desire")
to the antecedent ("sin crouching
at the door"); yet, despite the
personification of sin as a wild beast, it
suffers from the discord of gender.
Regardless of which view one espouses, neither
is sufficiently
certain to allow it to become the basis for
establishing the meaning of
qUw in Gen 3:16. It is
readily admitted that there are some noteworthy
similarities between Gen 4:7 and Gen
3:16. Both are given in a context
of divine judgment. Both come from the hand of the
same writer. Both
employ similar terminology.29 It is true
that "the proximity of Genesis
4:7
to Genesis
24 Many commentators readily admit that the
verse is one of the most difficult in all
of the OT to explicate. Skinner (Genesis, 107) has observed: "Every
attempt to extract a
meaning from the verse is more or less of a tour de force, and it is nearly certain
that the
obscurity is due to deep-seated textual
corruptions." Suggested textual emendations are
feeble at best and have generated little light.
25 The term txeW;
("lifted
up") is used in Gen 49:3 in the sense of "preeminence." In
this view "desire" would mean "to be
subservient to" as to the firstborn of the family (cf.
Gen
27:29).
26 George Bush, Notes on Genesis (2 vols; reprinted,
1976) 1.99.
27 The disaffectionate
relationship which developed between Esau and Jacob over
the matter of birthright (Genesis 27) is
significantly analogous.
28 C. F. Keil and
Franz Delitzsch, Genesis
(reprint,
112.
29 Gen 3: 16: j`BA-lwAm;yi xUhv; j`teqAUwT; j`weyxi-lc,v;
Gen
4:7. OB-lwAm;Ti hTAxav; OtwAUwT; j~yl,xev;
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GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
would have similar meaning.“30 But since
Gen 4:7 is besieged with
interpretive uncertainties, it ought
not to be applied unreservedly to
interpret Gen 3:16.
Furthermore, Gen 4:7 is not as parallel to Gen
3:16 as it may
appear. First of all, Gen 4:7 is figurative while Gen
3:16 is literal.
Hermeneutically,
one should proceed from the literal usage to the
figurative usage if one's exegesis is to have
validity.31 Second, while the
grammatical construction is similar, the two phrases
are actually
inverted in sense. In 4:7 the object of the desire
(Cain) is also the
recipient of the curse. However, in 3:16 the
object of the desire (the
man) is not the recipient of the curse. For
4:7,
the desire of woman would have to be part of the judgment against
the man. Third, similarity in grammar need not
demand similarity of
meaning. Verbal parallelism may be only
coincidental. As shown
above, the context of Gen
desires to dominate her husband. If it is to be
found in Gen 3:16, it
must be imported from Gen 4:7. However, the context
of Genesis 3
must be given the primary role in determining the
meaning of "desire"
in
The
thematic links between Genesis 2-3 and Genesis 432 neither
suggest nor imply that, as a part of the
judgment of Gen 3:16, woman
will desire to dominate man. For example, in Genesis
2-3 there is
intimacy between God and man; then sin turns that
intimacy to
alienation. There is intimacy between man and
woman; then sin causes
intimacy to become alienation. In Genesis 4,
intimacy between God
and Cain turns to alienation, and intimacy between
Cain and Abel
turns to alienation. But in each case the broken
intimacy, alienation,
and punishment are not allowed to go beyond God's
intended extent.33
In
the example of Cain, his death would be strongly avenged (Gen
3:16b.
The alienation between man and woman and the pain of
childbirth resulting from intimacy, would not be
allowed to interrupt
woman's desire for man, man's rulership over woman, or the carrying
out of the command to populate the earth (Gen
CANTICLES
Cant
my beloved's, and his desire is for me."
While the meaning of qUw may
30 Foh,
Women, 69.
31 It is difficult to perceive how one
could determine how sin desires Cain and then
utilize that as the basis for determining how
woman desires man.
32 Cf. Alan J. Hauser, "Linguistic and
Thematic Links Between Genesis 4:1-6 and
Genesis
2-3," JETS 23 (1980) 297-305.
33 Scripture is replete with instances of
divinely established parameters in the
punishment of mankind (cf., e.g., Exod
BUSENITZ: WOMAN'S DESIRE FOR MAN 211
be difficult to determine precisely in its two
previous occurrences, there
is little doubt here. It speaks clearly of the
natural power and compul-
sion of the love of an
individual for another. The slightest hint of one
desiring to dominate the other is totally absent.
Says Zockler: “hqAUwT;
as in Gen. iii.16, the passage which lies at the
basis of this, [speaks] of
the longing desire of the man for the society of
his wife, not of gross
sensual desires for sexual intercourse. The
whole is a triumphant
exclamation in which Shulamith
joyfully affirms that her lover cannot
exist without her.”34
It appears that the usage of qUw in Canticles is closer to that of
Gen
3:16 than is Gen 4:7, notwithstanding the latter's grammatical
similarities and textual proximity.
First of all, the plain must be
employed to interpret the obscure and difficult
if there are contextual
reasons to believe that both usages are similar.
Such is the case
between Gen
"desire" in Cant
of the meaning of "desire" in Gen
literally in Cant
figurative.35 Third, in distinction
from Gen 4:7, both Cant
Gen
to Gen 4:7.
The true difficulty, then, is
not understanding the meaning of
"desire" as used in Cant
4:7.
This is noted indirectly by Skinner in his comment on
Gen 4:7:
"The
word hqaUwT; is unsuitable, whether
it be understood of the wild
beast's eagerness for its prey or the deference
due from a younger
brother to an older.”36 The reason qUw is so unsuitable is because the
other two usages speak of the power of attraction
between the sexes.
To
grant Gen 4:7 in its obscurity a determinative role in the interpreta-
tion of Gen 3:16 without
permitting the clarity of Cant
permeate the exegetical process is to abandon
hermeneutical discern-
ment and propriety.
CONCLUSION
The central consideration in the interpretation
of Gen 3:16b is
context; the meaning of "desire" is
best determined in the light of its
34 Otto Zockler, The Song of Solomon in Commentary on the Holy
Scriptures, by
J.
P. Lange (tr. & ed. by Philip Schaff;
"I
am my beloved's, and it is an obligation upon me to
desire him" is grammatically
permissible, especially in light of a similar
poetical use of ylafA in Prov
doubtful on contextual grounds, for elsewhere the
phrase "I am my beloved's" (6:3; cf.
35 Cf. BDB, 1003.
36 Skinner, Genesis, 107.
212 GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
immediate contextual setting. The context bespeaks
procreation and
the continuation of life, not the desire to
dominate. Furthermore, to
appeal to Gen 4:7 with its manifold obscurities to
unlock the interpre-
tive door of Gen 3:16 is to
throw exegetical caution to the wind. It is
much safer to apply the meaning of hqAUwT; in Cant
meaning is plain and its interpretation is
virtually unquestioned.
Consequently,
it should be granted preeminence over Gen 4:7 and
become the primary cross-reference in ascertaining the
meaning of
"desire. "
The text does not sustain the interpretation
that one aspect of the
woman's judgment is that she will desire to
dominate and control the
man. The last phrase of Gen
explanation and description of conditions which will
exist after the
fall. Thus, the last phrase could be translated:
"yet you will still desire
[as you did before the Fall, though now tainted by sin] your
husband,
and he will still rule [as he did before the Fall,
though now tainted by
sin] over you." The alienation, broken
intimacy, and pain in childbirth
resulting from the Fall will not be allowed to
annul that desire nor
abrogate the command to be fruitful.
In spite of the fact that man will rule over
woman, and in spite of
the fact that intimacy may result in the pain (and
possible death) due to
childbirth, yet woman will desire and yearn for
man. The issue is
broader than purely sexual but does not exclude
the sexual element.
This
interpretation does not imply that woman's sexual drives are
stronger than the man's. While it is generally
concluded that the man
has the stronger sexual desire, such is to be
expected, for there was
nothing in the judgment upon man to temper it.
On the other hand, the
woman must deal with the pain of childbirth; thus it
is to be expected
that the woman's sexual desires would be somewhat
moderated.
Nevertheless,
woman's desire for man is an attraction which cannot be
uprooted from her nature. The contention that
"sin has corrupted both
the willing submission of the wife and the loving
headship of the
husband”37 is unquestionably true.
But it is a natural consequence of
sin, not a result of God's judgment on the woman in
Gen 3:16! Just as
the sin-corrupted headship of the husband is not a
part of the divine
judgment upon the man but a consequence of sin,
so the sin-corrupted
submission of the wife is not a part of the
judgment; it is the result of
sin.38
37 Foh,
Women, 69.
38 While some may contend that the women's
liberation movement of recent years
does not corroborate this interpretation (Foh, Women, 67), the opposite may actually be
the case. Many of the women who speak out strongly
against the headship of man
nevertheless do get married and do
bear their husband's children. Certainly it cannot be
maintained that this interpretation is contrary to
the broader historical perspective.
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