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ADAM.—The derivation is doubtful. The most plausible is that which connects it with the Assyr. [Note: Assyrian.] adâmu, ‘make,’ ‘produce’; man is thus a ‘creature’—one made or produced. Some derive it from a root signifying ‘red’ (cf. Edom, Gen_25:30), men being of a ruddy colour in the district where the word originated. The Biblical writer (Gen_2:7) explains it, according to his frequent practice, by a play on the word ’adâmâh, ‘ground’; but that is itself derived from the same root ‘red.’ The word occurs in the Heb. 31 times in Gen_1:5 to Gen_5:5. In most of these it is not a proper name, and the RV [Note: Revised Version.] has rightly substituted ‘man’ or ‘the man’ in some verses where AV [Note: Authorized Version.] has ‘Adam.’ But since the name signifies ‘mankind,’ homo, Mensch, not ‘a man,’ vir, Mann (see Gen_5:2), the narrative appears to be a description, not of particular historical events in the life of an individual, but of the beginnings of human life (ch. 2), human sin (ch. 3), human genealogical descent (Gen_4:1; Gen_4:25, Gen_5:1-5). In a few passages, if the text is sound, the writer slips into the use of Adam as a proper name, but only in Gen_5:3-5 does it stand unmistakably for an individual.
1. The creation of man is related twice, Gen_1:26-27 (P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] ) and Gen_2:7 (J [Note: Jahwist.] ). The former passage is the result of philosophical and theological reflexion of a late date, which had taught the writer that man is the climax of creation because his personality partakes of the Divine (and in Gen_5:3 this prerogative is handed on to his offspring); but the latter is written from the naïve and primitive standpoint of legendary tradition, which dealt only with man’s reception of physical life (see next article).
2. Man’s primitive condition, Gen_2:8-25 (J [Note: Jahwist.] ). The story teaches: that man has work to do in life (Gen_2:15); that he needs a counterpart, a help who shall be ‘meet for him’ (Gen_2:18; Gen_2:21-24); that man is supreme over the beasts in the intellectual ability, and therefore in the authority, which he possesses to assign to them their several names (Gen_2:19-20); that man, in his primitive condition, was far from being morally or socially perfect; he was simply in a state of savagery, but from a moral standpoint innocent, because he had not yet learned the meaning of right and wrong (Gen_2:25); and this blissful ignorance is also portrayed by the pleasures of a luxuriant garden or park (Gen_2:8-14).
3. The Fall, Gen_2:16 f., 3 (J [Note: Jahwist.] ). But there came a point in human evolution when man became conscious of a command—the earliest germ of a recognition of an ‘ought’ (Gen_2:16 f., Gen_3:3); and this at once caused a stress and strain between his lower animal nature, pictured as a serpent, and his higher aspirations after obedience (Gen_3:1-5) [N.B.—The serpent is nowhere, in the OT, identified with the devil; the idea is not found till Wis_2:23]; by a deliberate following of the lower nature against which he had begun to strive, man first caused sin to exist (Wis_2:6); with the instant result of a feeling of shame (Wis_2:7), and the world-wide consequence of pain, trouble, and death (Wis_2:14-19), and the cessation for ever of the former state of innocent ignorance and bliss (Wis_2:22-24).
On the Babylonian affinities with the story of Adam, see Creation, Eden.
A. H. M‘Neile.