Bible Character Spotlight: Adam

The Bible gives us many stories that feature a variety of characters. Most of us can name several of these characters and tell about their lives or their feats, but sometimes the significance of the people and what they represent gets lost. For that reason, it may be useful to take a look at certain characters in the Bible and think about them not just as they fit in their own stories, but also what role they play in the story that the Bible as a whole is telling.

Let’s start at the beginning with Adam. He was the first human being, and along with Eve, was the progenitor of humanity. He was not the first living thing made though. God made all the animals before Man, but then made Man to rule over all the living things of the Earth. In order for Man to rule over all other things, God had to set us apart, and his way of doing that is interesting.

Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” - Genesis 1:26

God set us apart from the animals by making us like Him. A little later in Genesis, the Bible clarifies exactly what God did.

Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. - Genesis 2:7

Anyone who has taken a biology class knows that science tells us that all living things on Earth are made from the same basic building blocks. That’s reasonable. God made all life. The Bible tells us that he made us from the dust of the ground, in other words, the basic elements found in the Earth itself. It’s likely he did that for all the other living things too, but he did something different for Man. He breathed life directly into Adam. God imparted part of His very essence into Man. What does that mean? Some may believe that by “breathing life” directly into Adam, God was imparting what we would call the human soul. The Bible doesn’t specifically say, but we know that when He created Adam, He set him apart from all else residing on the Earth. God favored Adam more, but he also expected more from Adam. Adam and Eve were the only of His Earthly creations to which God gave commands. Adam was instructed not to eat the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, but we know from the story that Adam and Eve did just that.

You may have heard some jokingly blame Adam and Eve for all the evil in the world, but that misses the point. We are no different than them. Had any one of us been in Adam and Eve’s place, we too would have sinned at some point. Adam wasn’t just the first human. He was the archetype of humanity. Whatever strengths and weaknesses you believe you see in him in the story, also exist in us. For example, just look at his reaction to God’s revelation of his sin.

And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” - Genesis 3:11-12

Adam knew what he was and wasn’t supposed to do. His sin was his and his alone, but as soon as he is confronted with his sin, the first thing he tries to do is shift the blame to Eve. Isn’t that just like us? We have no problem enjoying the “fruits” of our sins, but as soon as those sins come to light, we waste no time trying to find someone or something to blame for us falling short.

The story of Adam shows us that weakness was ingrained in us from the start. That begs a question though. Why would God make us flawed? He didn’t. He made us of the Earth and gave us a choice between Him and the Earth, and too often we use our choice to indulge in the things of the Earth. It is easy to lead us astray and difficult to keep us on a righteous path. Adam was the first example of that fact, but we see it reinforced throughout the Bible and, if we’re honest, even in our own lives. So what is the solution?

Well in the Genesis story, Adam and Eve are banished from the Garden of Eden. Their lives became much more difficult as part of their punishment, but they managed to make a life for themselves in the world as it is, just like we do every day. That was not the last time the Bible mentioned Adam though. His name was actually invoked thousands of years later by Paul.

So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. The first man was of the dust of the earth; the second man is of heaven. As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven. And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man. - 1 Corinthians 15:45-49

Jesus is the “last Adam” to which Paul is referring. Just as Adam is the model for what we humans are, Jesus was the model for what we can be. Just as Adam was ruled by his Earthly bounds and fell victim to his weakness. Jesus was committed to Heaven, and because of His sacrifice and the imparting of His spirit into everyone that believes in Him, we too, can live according to God’s will.

We have to understand that when we are born, we are all like Adam, living beings given great potential and set apart by God, but ultimately weak and flawed. We are prone to sin, and on our own merits, we cannot escape that. However, the new Adam came to Earth to help rise above that weakness. Even as we accept the new Adam and attempt to move beyond our limitations, let us not forget the story of the first Adam. As the well known saying goes “Those who forget about the past are doomed to repeat it.”

Chris Lawyer
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