Eve was the first woman created by God. She is called the “mother of all the living,” (Genesis 3:20). She was made by God after God had finished the creation of the world and also after Adam was formed. She was to be a helpmate to him in carrying out the creation mandate. The account of her creation is as follows:
Gen. 2:18-25, “Then the LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.” 19 Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. 21 So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. 22 The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. 23 The man 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.” 24 For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. 25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.”
According to the Bible, Eve was given two names by Adam: Woman and Eve.
- Gen. 2:23, “The man 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. 3:20, “Now the man called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all the living.
The name “Eve” seems to be derived from the Hebrew hayya, to live.
The serpent tricked Eve into eating the fruit of the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil,” (Genesis 2:17; 3:1-3). She then gave the fruit to her husband, Adam, and he ate, through whom sin entered the world (Romans 5:12).
Eve is mentioned twice in the New Testament.
- 1 Timothy 2:13, “For it was Adam who was first created, and then Eve.”
- 2 Corinthians 11:3, “But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.”
She became the mother of Kane, Abel, and Seth.
- Genesis 4:1-2, 25, “Now the man had relations with his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, “I have gotten a manchild with the help of the LORD.” 2 Again, she gave birth to his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of flocks, but Cain was a tiller of the ground. 25 Adam had relations with his wife again; and she gave birth to a son, and named him Seth, for, she said, “God has appointed me another offspring in place of Abel, for Cain killed him.”