Adam and Eve were, according to the Genesis creation narratives, the first human couple to inhabit Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

, created by YHWH, the God of the ancient Hebrews

Hebrews

Hebrews is an ethnonym used in the Hebrew Bible...

. Adam

Adam

Adam is a figure in the Book of Genesis. According to the creation myth of Abrahamic religions, he is the first human. In the Genesis creation narratives, he was created by Yahweh-Elohim , and the first woman, Eve was formed from his rib...

 and Eve

Eve

Eve is the first woman created by God in the Book of Genesis.Eve may also refer to:-People:*Eve , a common given name and surname*Eve , American recording artist and actress-Places:...

 ate fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, causing their expulsion from the Garden of Eden

Garden of Eden

The Garden of Eden is in the Bible's Book of Genesis as being the place where the first man, Adam, and his wife, Eve, lived after they were created by God. Literally, the Bible speaks about a garden in Eden...

.

"It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner." - Genesis 2:18

The language of sexuality and gender distinction is not used explicitly until the woman is created in Genesis 2:22-24.

Adam and Eve were, according to the Genesis creation narratives, the first human couple to inhabit Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

, created by YHWH, the God of the ancient Hebrews

Hebrews

Hebrews is an ethnonym used in the Hebrew Bible...

. Adam

Adam

Adam is a figure in the Book of Genesis. According to the creation myth of Abrahamic religions, he is the first human. In the Genesis creation narratives, he was created by Yahweh-Elohim , and the first woman, Eve was formed from his rib...

 and Eve

Eve

Eve is the first woman created by God in the Book of Genesis.Eve may also refer to:-People:*Eve , a common given name and surname*Eve , American recording artist and actress-Places:...

 ate fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, causing their expulsion from the Garden of Eden

Garden of Eden

The Garden of Eden is in the Bible's Book of Genesis as being the place where the first man, Adam, and his wife, Eve, lived after they were created by God. Literally, the Bible speaks about a garden in Eden...

.

Man and woman

"It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner." - Genesis 2:18

The language of sexuality and gender distinction is not used explicitly until the woman is created in Genesis 2:22-24. Before the creation of woman, Adam is in a sense not yet specifically male. Therefore, 'Adam could be seen as both an individual and a collective human. The connection of men and women is thus affirmed, by the making of the woman from the part of the man.^[2:21-22] The man expresses this connection in a jubilant poem: "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman, ( 'ishshah ) for out of Man ( 'iysh ) this one was taken."^[2:23] The names "man" ( 'iysh ) and "woman" ( 'ishshah ) are considered a wordplay. The man’s affirmation of the woman corresponds to Genesis 1:31, "God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good." Where individual elements of creation were "good", the whole is very good, perfectly corresponding to God's intention. The man "clings to his wife, and they become one flesh"^[2:24] alludes to the sexual union of the two, reflecting the connection God created between men and women.

The Fall of Man

The Serpent

Serpent (Bible)

Serpent is the term used to translate a variety of words in the Hebrew bible, the most common being , , the generic word for "snake"....

, "slyer than every beast of the field," tempts the woman to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, telling her that it will make her more like God, and that it will not lead to death. After some thought, the woman decides to take from the tree and eat it. She then gives the fruit to the man, who eats also, "and the eyes of the two of them were opened." Aware now of their nakedness, they make coverings of fig leaves, and hide from the sight of God. God asks them what they have done, and man and woman defer responsibility. The man blames the woman for giving him the fruit, but implies a sentiment that God is also at fault for making the woman in the first place ("The woman Thou gavest to be with me, she gave me the fruit of the tree, and I ate"), while the woman blames the serpent for seducing her to disobedience ("The serpent beguiled me and I ate"). God curses the serpent "above all animals," making it lick dust and go on its belly all its days and to be an enemy of the human race. God then passes judgment for the disobedience of the man and woman, condemning the man to a life of toil and the woman to create new life through painful childbirth, and banishes them from the Garden. The woman is given the name Eve (Heb. hawwah) "because she was the mother of all living [Heb. hay]," and Adam receives his name when the text drops the definite article from the word for "the man," changing "ha-adam" to "Adam".
Eve/woman is also established as subordinate to Adam/man, ending the unity between the sexes. God then posts two cherubim, with flaming swords, at the entrance to the Garden of Eden in order to block the way to the Tree of Life, "lest he put out his hand .. and eat, and live forever."

Offspring

Chapter four of Genesis tells of the birth of Cain and Abel, Adam and Eve's first children, while chapter five gives Adam's genealogy further. Later came Seth

Seth

Seth , in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, is the third listed son of Adam and Eve and brother of Cain and Abel, who are the only other of their children mentioned by name...

, and "other sons and daughters" (Genesis 5:4, NIV). Adam lived for 930 years and Eve lived for 929 years.

Textual notes

• "Let us make man..." - The plural "us" (and "our" in the phrase "in our image") is used. Recent scholarship is that it reflects the common Middle Eastern view of a supreme god (referred to in Genesis 1 by the generic noun "Elohim", god, which is itself in a plural form, rather than by his personal name of YHWH) surrounded by a divine court, the Sons of God (Heb. bene elohim).

• "man" - Though the word for "man" is in the singular, when in the text a pronoun is used, it is rendered by the plural "them", indicating that the word is used generically to cover "man and woman", and that a rendition of "mankind" or "human beings" is not out of place.

• "...in our image" - The phrase image of God has had many interpretations, although something more than the simply anthropomorphic
  Anthropomorphism
  Anthropomorphism is any attribution of human characteristics to animals, non-living things, phenomena, material states, objects or abstract concepts, such as organizations, governments, spirits or deities. The term was coined in the mid 1700s...
  
   seems intended. Elsewhere in the ancient Near East kings were called the "image of god", symbolising their rule by divine appointment: the phrase may therefore indicate that mankind is God's regent on earth.

• "...a living being" - God breathes into the man's nostrils and he becomes nefesh hayya. The earlier translation of this phrase as "living soul" is now recognised as incorrect: "nefesh" signifies something like the English word "being", in the sense of a corporeal body capable of life; the concept of a "soul" in our sense did not exist in Hebrew thought until around the 2nd century BC, when the idea of a bodily resurrection gained popularity.

• "...tree of knowledge of good and evil..." - The tree imparts knowledge of tov wa-ra, "good and bad". The traditional translation is "good and evil", but tov wa-ra is a fixed expression denoting "everything," rather than a moral concept.

• "...you shall surely die" - Adam is told that if he eats of the forbidden tree the consequence will be moth tamuth, "die a death", indicating not merely death but emphatically so. As Adam does not in fact die immediately on eating the fruit, some exegetes have argued that it means "you shall die eventually," so that Adam and Eve would have had immortality in the Garden, but lost it by eating the forbidden fruit. However, the grammar does not support this reading, nor does the narrative: Adam and Eve are expelled from the Garden lest they eat of the second tree, the tree of life, and gain immortality. Another explanation is that Adam will undergo "a spiritual death". The 2nd century Book of Jubilees
  Jubilees
  The Book of Jubilees , sometimes called Lesser Genesis , is an ancient Jewish religious work, considered one of the pseudepigrapha by Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox Churches...
  
   (4:29–31) explained that "one day" is equivalent to a thousand years and thus Adam died within that same "day"; the Greek Septuagint, on the other hand, has "day" translated into the Greek word for a twenty-four hour period.

• "...a rib..." - Hebrew tsela` or sela can mean side, chamber, rib, or beam. The traditional reading of "rib" has been questioned recently by feminist theologians who suggest it should instead be rendered as "side," supporting the idea that woman is man's equal and not his subordinate. Such a reading shares elements in common with Aristophanes
  Aristophanes
  Aristophanes , son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, was a comic playwright of ancient Athens. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete...
  
  ' story of the origin of love and the separation of the sexes in Plato's Symposium.

• "Eve" - The Hebrew word for Eve is hawwah, deriving from a word for "life" or "living". "Eve" probably resulted from corruption of the Hebrew phonemes, roughly pronounced CHA-vah, as the stories of the ancient Israelites spread into Greece and Rome.

Jewish traditions

The Sibylline Oracles

Sibylline oracles

The Sibylline Oracles are a collection of oracular utterances written in Greek hexameters ascribed to the Sibyls, prophetesses who uttered divine revelations in a frenzied state. Fourteen books and eight fragments of Sibylline Oracles survive...

, dating from the centuries immediately around the time of Christ, explain the name Adam as a notaricon composed of the initials of the four directions; anatole (east), dusis (west), arktos (north), and mesembria (south). In the 2nd century, Rabbi Yohanan used the Greek technique of notarichon to explain the name אָדָם as the initials of the words afer, dam, and marah, being dust, blood, and gall

Gall

Galls or cecidia are outgrowths on the surface of lifeforms caused by invasion by other lifeforms, such as parasites or bacterial infection. Plant galls are abnormal outgrowths of plant tissues and can be caused by various parasites, from fungi and bacteria, to insects and mites...

.

According to the Torah

Torah

Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...

 , Adam was formed from "dust from the earth"; in the Talmud

Talmud

The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....

 (Tractate Sanhedrin 38b) of the first centuries of the Common era

Common Era

Common Era ,abbreviated as CE, is an alternative designation for the calendar era originally introduced by Dionysius Exiguus in the 6th century, traditionally identified with Anno Domini .Dates before the year 1 CE are indicated by the usage of BCE, short for Before the Common Era Common Era...

 he is, more specifically, described as having initially been a golem

Golem

In Jewish folklore, a golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing....

 kneaded from mud

Mud

Mud is a mixture of water and some combination of soil, silt, and clay. Ancient mud deposits harden over geological time to form sedimentary rock such as shale or mudstone . When geological deposits of mud are formed in estuaries the resultant layers are termed bay muds...

.

Even in ancient times, the presence of two distinct accounts of the creation of the first man (or couple) was noted. The first account says male and female [God] created them, implying simultaneous creation, whereas the second account states that God created Eve subsequent to the creation of Adam. The Midrash Rabbah - Genesis VIII:1 reconciled the two by stating that Genesis 1, "male and female He created them", indicates that God originally created Adam as a hermaphrodite

Hermaphrodite

In biology, a hermaphrodite is an organism that has reproductive organs normally associated with both male and female sexes.Many taxonomic groups of animals do not have separate sexes. In these groups, hermaphroditism is a normal condition, enabling a form of sexual reproduction in which both...

, bodily and spiritually both male and female, before creating the separate beings of Adam and Eve. Other rabbis suggested that Eve and the woman of the first account were two separate individuals, the first being identified as Lilith

Lilith

Lilith is a character in Jewish mythology, found earliest in the Babylonian Talmud, who is generally thought to be related to a class of female demons Līlīṯu in Mesopotamian texts. However, Lowell K. Handy notes, "Very little information has been found relating to the Akkadian and Babylonian view...

, a figure elsewhere described as a night demon.

Genesis does not tell for how long Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden, but the 2nd century BC Book of Jubilees, provides more specific information. It states (ch3 v17) that the serpent convinced Eve to eat the fruit on the 17th day of the 2nd month in the 8th year after Adam's creation. It also states that they were removed from the garden on the new moon of the fourth month of that year (ch3 v33). Other Jewish sources assert that the period involved was less than a day.

According to traditional Jewish belief Adam and Eve are buried in the Cave of Machpelah, in Hebron

Hebron

Hebron , is located in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judean Mountains, it lies 930 meters above sea level. It is the largest city in the West Bank and home to around 165,000 Palestinians, and over 500 Jewish settlers concentrated in and around the old quarter...

.

Christianity

The story of Adam and Eve forms the basis for the Christian doctrine of original sin

Original sin

Original sin is, according to a Christian theological doctrine, humanity's state of sin resulting from the Fall of Man. This condition has been characterized in many ways, ranging from something as insignificant as a slight deficiency, or a tendency toward sin yet without collective guilt, referred...

: "Sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all men sinned," said Paul of Tarsus

Paul of Tarsus

Paul the Apostle , also known as Saul of Tarsus, is described in the Christian New Testament as one of the most influential early Christian missionaries, with the writings ascribed to him by the church forming a considerable portion of the New Testament...

 in his Epistle to the Romans

Epistle to the Romans

The Epistle of Paul to the Romans, often shortened to Romans, is the sixth book in the New Testament. Biblical scholars agree that it was composed by the Apostle Paul to explain that Salvation is offered through the Gospel of Jesus Christ...

, although Chapter 3 of Genesis does not use the word "sin" and Genesis 3:24 makes clear that the couple are expelled "lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever". St Augustine of Hippo (354–430), working with a Latin translation of the epistle, understood Paul to have said that Adam's sin was hereditary: "Death passed upon (i.e. spread to) all men because of Adam, [in whom] all sinned". Original sin, the concept that man is born in a condition of sinfulness and must await redemption, thus became a cornerstone of Western Christian theological tradition; the belief is not shared by Judaism or the Orthodox churches, and has been dropped by some post-Reformation churches such as the Congregationalists and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Orthodox, however, do hold to the similar concept of ancestral sin

Ancestral sin

Ancestral sin is the object of a Christian doctrine taught by the Eastern Orthodox Church. Some identify it as "inclination towards sin, a heritage from the sin of our progenitors". But most distinguish it from this tendency that remains even in baptized persons, since ancestral sin "is removed...

: that is they accept the doctrine that Adam and Eve's sin has affected all humanity, and that human death is an inheritance from Adam caused by the sin, but the doctrine of ancestral sin does not include the notion of an inheiritance of guilt.

Because Eve tempted Adam to eat of the fatal fruit, some early Fathers of the Church held her and all subsequent women to be the first sinners, and especially responsible for the Fall. "You are the devil's gateway," Tertullian

Tertullian

Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, anglicised as Tertullian , was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He is the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of Latin Christian literature. He also was a notable early Christian apologist and...

 told his female listeners in the early 2nd century, and went on to explain that they were responsible for the death of Christ: "On account of your desert (i.e. punishment for sin), that is, death, even the Son of God had to die." In 1486 the Dominicans

Dominican Order

The Order of Preachers , after the 15th century more commonly known as the Dominican Order or Dominicans, is a Catholic religious order founded by Saint Dominic and approved by Pope Honorius III on 22 December 1216 in France...

 Kramer and Sprengler used similar tracts in Malleus Maleficarum

Malleus Maleficarum

The Malleus Maleficarum is an infamous treatise on witches, written in 1486 by Heinrich Kramer, an Inquisitor of the Catholic Church, and was first published in Germany in 1487...

("Hammer of Witches") to justify the persecution of "witches".

Over the centuries, a system of uniquely Christian beliefs has developed from the Adam and Eve story. Baptism

Baptism

In Christianity, baptism is for the majority the rite of admission , almost invariably with the use of water, into the Christian Church generally and also membership of a particular church tradition...

 has become understood as a washing away of the stain of hereditary sin in many churches, although its original symbolism was apparently rebirth. Additionally, the serpent that tempted Eve was interpreted to have been Satan

Satan

Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...

, or that Satan was using a serpent as a mouthpiece, although there is no mention of this identification in the Torah and it is not held in Judaism. A Christian basis for this identification can be found in Revelation 12:9 and 20:2 where Satan is called the "Old Serpent".

Gnostic and Manichaean traditions

Gnostic Christianity discussed Adam and Eve in two known surviving texts, namely the "Apocalypse of Adam

Apocalypse of Adam

The Apocalypse of Adam discovered in 1945 as part of the Nag Hammadi library is a Gnostic work written in Coptic. It has no necessary references to Christianity and it is accordingly debated whether it is a Christian Gnostic work or an example of Jewish Gnosticism...

" found in the Nag Hammadi

Nag Hammâdi

Nag Hammadi , is a city in Upper Egypt. Nag Hammadi was known as Chenoboskion in classical antiquity, meaning "geese grazing grounds". It is located on the west bank of the Nile in the Qena Governorate, about 80 kilometres north-west of Luxor....

 documents and the "Testament of Adam

Testament of Adam

The Testament of Adam is a Christian pseudepigraphical work extant in Syriac and Arabic. The earliest manuscript is dated to the 6th century, but the text is 4th century AD in origin, probably composed in Edessa...

". The creation of Adam as Protanthropos, the original man, is the focal concept of these writings.

The Manichean conception of Adam and Eve is pessimistic. According to them, the copulative action of two demons, Adam and Eve were born to further imprison the soul in the material universe.

"Mani said, 'Then Jesus came and spoke to the one who had been born, who was Adam, and … made him fear Eve, showing him how to suppress (desire) for her, and he forbade him to approach her… Then that (male) Archon

Archon

Archon is a Greek word that means "ruler" or "lord", frequently used as the title of a specific public office. It is the masculine present participle of the verb stem ἀρχ-, meaning "to rule", derived from the same root as monarch, hierarchy, and anarchy.- Ancient Greece :In ancient Greece the...

 came back to his daughter, who was Eve, and lustfully had intercourse with her. He engendered with her a son, deformed in shape and possessing a red complexion, and his name was Cain, the Red Man.'"

Another Gnostic tradition held that Adam and Eve were created to help defeat Satan. The serpent, instead of being identified with Satan, is seen as a hero by the Ophites

Ophites

The Ophites or Ophians were members of a Christian Gnostic sect depicted by Hippolytus of Rome in a lost work, the Syntagma....

. Still other Gnostics believed that Satan's fall, however, came after the creation of humanity. As in Islamic tradition, this story says that Satan refused to bow to Adam due to pride. Satan said that Adam was inferior to him as he was made of fire, whereas Adam was made of clay. This refusal led to the fall of Satan recorded in works such as the Book of Enoch

Book of Enoch

The Book of Enoch is an ancient Jewish religious work, traditionally ascribed to Enoch, the great-grandfather of Noah. It is not part of the biblical canon as used by Jews, apart from Beta Israel...

.

Islamic tradition

The Quran tells of Adam in the sura

Sura

A sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...

h al-Baqara (2)

Al-Baqara

Sura al-Baqarah is the second and longest chapter of the Qur'an. It is a Medinan sura and comprises 286 verses, including the single longest verse in the Qur'an...

:30-39, al-A'raf (7)

Al-A'raf

Sura Al-A'raf is the seventh chapter of the Qur'an, with 206 verses. It is a Meccan sura. Its final verse, verse 206, requires a sajdah, or prostration.-Verses:...

:11-25, al-Hijr (15)

Al-Hijr

Sura Al-Hijr is the 15th sura of the Qur'an. It has 99 ayat. It is a Makkan sura believed to have been received by Muhammad shortly after the 12th sura , Muhammad's last year in Mecca. Like the other sura of this period it praises God....

:26-44, al-Isra (17)

Al-Isra

Sura Al-Isra , also called Sura Bani Isra'il , is the 17th chapter of the Qur'an, with 111 verses.-Content:...

:61-65, Ta-Ha (20)

Ta-Ha

Sura Ta-Ha is the 20th sura of the Qur'an with 135 ayat. It is a Makkan sura.It is named "Ta-Ha" because the sura starts with the Arab letters طه ....

:115-124, and Sad (38)

Sad (sura)

Surat Sad is the 38th sura of the Qur'an with 88 ayat and 1 sajdah .ص~ وَالْقُرْآنِ ذِي الذِّكْرِ38:01 Sād [Fifteenth-centre/middle letter of the 29 letters of Arabic Alphabet, with ancillary glyph/prolongation sign/mark which extends/stretches the sound value of the letter to which it is added...

:71-85.

Accounts of Adam and Eve in Islamic texts, which include the Quran and the books of Sunnah

Sunnah

The word literally means a clear, well trodden, busy and plain surfaced road. In the discussion of the sources of religion, Sunnah denotes the practice of Prophet Muhammad that he taught and practically instituted as a teacher of the sharī‘ah and the best exemplar...

 (Hadith

Hadith

The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....

), are similar but different to that of the Torah and Bible.

Eve is referred to by Allah as Adam's spouse, and Islamic tradition refers to her by an etymologically similar name, .

Having been created, Adam, the first man, is described as having been given domination over all the lower creatures, which he proceeds to name. As one of the people to whom God is said to have spoken directly, Adam is seen as a prophet in Islam

Prophets of Islam

Muslims identify the Prophets of Islam as those humans chosen by God and given revelation to deliver to mankind. Muslims believe that every prophet was given a belief to worship God and their respective followers believed it as well...

.

When Allah orders the angels to bow to Adam one of those present, Satan, the chief of the Djinn, who said "why should I bow to man, I am made of pure fire and he is made of soil", refuses due to his pride, and is summarily banished from the Heavens. Liberal movements within Islam

Liberal movements within Islam

Progressive Muslims have produced a considerable body of liberal thought within Islam or "progressive Islam" ; but some consider progressive Islam and liberal Islam as two distinct movements)...

 have viewed Allah's commanding the angels to bow before Adam as an exaltation of humanity, and as a means of supporting human rights

Human rights

Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

, others view it as an act of showing Adam that the biggest enemy of humans on earth will be their ego.

"And We said, 'O Adam, dwell, you and your wife, in Paradise and eat therefrom in [ease and] abundance from wherever you will. But do not approach this tree, lest you be among the wrongdoers. But Satan caused them to slip out of it and removed them from that [condition] in which they had been. And We said, "Go down, [all of you], as enemies to one another, and you will have upon the earth a place of settlement and provision for a time." (Quran - 2:35-36)

"Then Satan whispered to him (Adam); he said, "O Adam, shall I direct you to the tree of eternity and possession that will not deteriorate? And Adam and his wife ate of it, and their private parts became apparent to them, and they began to fasten over themselves from the leaves of Paradise. And Adam disobeyed his Lord and erred". (Quran - 20:121-122)

As the above verses indicate (20:121 - 122), Adam initiated the eating of the fruit and that both Adam and Eve (Hawa) ate the forbidden fruit

Forbidden fruit

Forbidden fruit is any object of desire whose appeal is a direct result of knowledge that cannot or should not be obtained or something that someone may want but is forbidden to have....

, for which Allah later forgave them. A Prophetic Hadith recalls that after leaving Eden, they searched for each other, and finally found each other at the Plain of 'Arafat (near Mecca

Mecca

Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...

), which means recognition. Al-Qummi records the opinion that Eden was not entirely earthly, and so, having been sent to earth, Adam and Eve first arrived at mountain peaks outside Mecca; Adam on Safa

Al-Safa and Al-Marwah

Al-Safa and Al-Marwah are two small mountains now located in the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, Saudi Arabia between which Muslims travel back and forth seven times during the ritual pilgrimages of Hajj and Umrah.-History:...

, and Eve on Marwa

Al-Safa and Al-Marwah

Al-Safa and Al-Marwah are two small mountains now located in the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, Saudi Arabia between which Muslims travel back and forth seven times during the ritual pilgrimages of Hajj and Umrah.-History:...

. In this Islamic tradition, Adam remained weeping for 40 days, until he repented, at which point Allah rewarded him by sending down the Black Stone

Black Stone

The Black Stone is the eastern cornerstone of the Kaaba, the ancient stone building towards which Muslims pray, in the center of the Grand Mosque in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is revered by Muslims as an Islamic relic, which according to Muslim tradition dates back to the time of Adam and Eve.The...

, and teaching him the hajj

Hajj

The Hajj is the pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is one of the largest pilgrimages in the world, and is the fifth pillar of Islam, a religious duty that must be carried out at least once in their lifetime by every able-bodied Muslim who can afford to do so...

. The Hadith

Hadith

The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....

 (the prophetic narrations) and literature shed light on the Muslim view of the first couple.

The Qur'an also describes the two sons of Adam (named Qabil and Habil in Islamic tradition) that correspond to Cain and Abel.

The concept of original sin does not exist in Islam and Eve was not to blame for the consumption of the forbidden fruit. Even though Adam initiated the eating of the fruit, Allah simply blames both of them for the transgression as they both had eaten the fruit. However, there are hadiths– which are contested – saying the Prophet Mohammed (narrated by Abu Hurrairah) designates Eve as the epitome of female betrayal. “Narrated Abu Hurrairah: The Prophet said, ‘Were it not for Bani Israel, meat would not decay; and were it not for Eve, no woman would ever betray her husband.’" (Sahih Bukhari, Hadith 611, Volume 55) An identical but more explicit version is found in the second most respected book of prophetic narrations, Sahih Muslim. “Abu Hurrairah (May Allah be pleased with him) reported Allah's Messenger (May peace be upon him) as saying: Had it not been for Eve, woman would have never acted unfaithfully towards her husband.” (Hadith 3471, Volume 8). The verses from the Quran in the previous paragraph, (20:121-122) are the reason the authenticity of the Hadiths are challenged. As the Quran never blamed Eve for the sin that they both (Adam and Eve) committed together. To condemn all the women in the world for a sin that Eve committed is against a basic Quranic teaching which states that no soul is accountable for the sins of another, "Say, is it other than Allah I should desire as a lord while He is the Lord of all things? And every soul earns not [blame] except against itself, and no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another. Then to your Lord is your return, and He will inform you concerning that over which you used to differ." (Quran - 6:164)

In science

In terms of human genetics

Human genetics

Human genetics describes the study of inheritance as it occurs in human beings. Human genetics encompasses a variety of overlapping fields including: classical genetics, cytogenetics, molecular genetics, biochemical genetics, genomics, population genetics, developmental genetics, clinical genetics,...

, the concept that all humans descended from two historical persons is impossible. Genetic evidence indicates current humans descended from a group of at least 10,000 people, and to account for the observed human genetic variation

Human genetic variation

Human genetic variation refers to genetic differences both within and among populations. There may be multiple variants of any given gene in the human population , leading to polymorphism. Many genes are not polymorphic, meaning that only a single allele is present in the population: that allele is...

 it would take an impossibly high mutation rate

Mutation rate

In genetics, the mutation rate is the chance of a mutation occurring in an organism or gene in each generation...

 if all humans descended from two individuals several thousands of years ago as Young Earth creationism

Young Earth creationism

Young Earth creationism is the religious belief that Heavens, Earth, and all life on Earth were created by direct acts of the Abrahamic God during a relatively short period, sometime between 5,700 and 10,000 years ago...

 supposes. This has caused some religious practitioners to distance themselves from a literal interpretation and belief in the Adam and Eve creation myth. Other practitioners hesitate to abandon what they see as a fundamental religious belief

Religious belief

Religious belief is a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny. Such a state may relate to the existence, characteristics and worship of a deity or deities, divine intervention in the universe and human life, or values and practices centered on the teachings of a...

.

Art and literature

Adam and Eve were used by early Renaissance artists as a theme to represent female and male nudes. Later, the nudity was objected to and thus, more modest elements, such as the fig leaf, were added to older pictures and sculptures, covering their genitals. Depicting the fig is as a result of Mediterranean traditions that identified the unnamed Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil as a fig tree and according to Genesis, the fig leaves was used to cover Adam and Eve's nudity after their fall.

The concept of Adam and Eve being created, fully grown, has spurred has led to the argument of depicting the first human couple without navel

Navel

The navel is a scar on the abdomen caused when the umbilical cord is removed from a newborn baby...

s, known as the Omphalos theory

Omphalos (theology)

The Omphalos hypothesis was named after the title of an 1857 book, Omphalos by Philip Henry Gosse, in which Gosse argued that in order for the world to be "functional", God must have created the Earth with mountains and canyons, trees with growth rings, Adam and Eve with hair, fingernails, and...

. The idea is that they did not develop in a uterus

Uterus

The uterus or womb is a major female hormone-responsive reproductive sex organ of most mammals including humans. One end, the cervix, opens into the vagina, while the other is connected to one or both fallopian tubes, depending on the species...

, therfore could not have been connected to an umbilical cord

Umbilical cord

In placental mammals, the umbilical cord is the connecting cord from the developing embryo or fetus to the placenta...

 as are all born humans. Paintings have depicted them without navels, however, because it looks unnatural, some artists obscured that area of their bodies. They are sometimes depicted as covering up the lower torso

Torso

Trunk or torso is an anatomical term for the central part of the many animal bodies from which extend the neck and limbs. The trunk includes the thorax and abdomen.-Major organs:...

 with their hand or some other intervening object.

John Milton

John Milton

John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...

's Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse...

is a famous 17th-century epic poem written in blank verse

Blank verse

Blank verse is poetry written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. It has been described as "probably the most common and influential form that English poetry has taken since the sixteenth century" and Paul Fussell has claimed that "about three-quarters of all English poetry is in blank verse."The first...

 which explores the story of Adam and Eve in great detail.

American painter Thomas Cole

Thomas Cole

Thomas Cole was an English-born American artist. He is regarded as the founder of the Hudson River School, an American art movement that flourished in the mid-19th century...

 painted The Garden of Eden (1828), with lavish detail of the first couple living amid waterfalls, vivid plants, and attractive deer.

Mark Twain

Mark Twain

Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...

 wrote humorous and satirical diaries of Adam and Eve.

Malaysian lyricist, the late Rosli Khamis (Loloq), wrote a song named "Cinta Adam dan Hawa" in 2007. It was sung by pop star Misha Omar

Misha Omar

Samiha @ Aisah Binti Omar , commonly known as Misha, is a Malaysian singer and actress. She was first discovered by Adnan Abu Hassan when she became a finalist of the "Bintang RTM" competition in 2001 alongside fellow singers Azharina and Siti Sarah. Misha did not win the competition but her...

. The song tells about human romance is not as great as Adam and Eve.

See also

• Adam and Eve (LDS Church)
• Ask and Embla
  Ask and Embla
  In Norse mythology, Ask and Embla —male and female respectively—were the first two humans, created by the gods. The pair are attested in both the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources, and the Prose Edda, written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson...
  
  
• Balbira & Kalmana
  Balbira & Kalmana
  According to the Seder Hadorot, Balbira and Kalmana were the respective wives and twin sisters of Cain and Abel. In an effort to explain where Cain and Abel acquired wives, some traditional sources write that each child of Adam and Eve was born with a twin who became their mate...
  
  
• Mashya and Mashyana
  Mashya and Mashyana
  According to the Zoroastrian cosmogony, Mashya and Mashyana were the first man and woman whose procreation gave rise to the human race.-Etymology:...
  
  
• Generations of Adam
  Generations of Adam
  "Generations of Adam" is a concept in in the Hebrew Bible. It is typically taken as name of Adam's line of descent going through Seth. Another view equates the generations of Adam with material about a second line of descent starting with Cain in Genesis 4, while Genesis 5 is taken as the...
  
  
• Lilith
  Lilith
  Lilith is a character in Jewish mythology, found earliest in the Babylonian Talmud, who is generally thought to be related to a class of female demons Līlīṯu in Mesopotamian texts. However, Lowell K. Handy notes, "Very little information has been found relating to the Akkadian and Babylonian view...
  
  
• Pre-Adamite
  Pre-Adamite
  Pre-Adamite hypothesis or Preadamism is the religious belief that humans existed before Adam, the first human being named in the Bible. This belief has a long history, probably having its origins in early pagan responses to Abrahamic claims regarding the origins of the human race.Advocates of this...
  
  
• Seven Laws of Noah
• Christian naturism
  Christian naturism
  Christian naturists are Christians found in most branches and denominations of Christianity who practice naturism or nudism. They find no conflict between the teachings of the Bible and living their lives and worshiping God without any clothing, believing that covering the body leads to its...
  
  
• Biblical narratives and the Qur'an
  Biblical narratives and the Qur'an
  The Qur'an, the central religious text of Islam, contains references to over fifty people and events also found in the Bible. While the stories told in each book are generally comparable in most respects, important differences sometimes emerge....
  
  
• Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan
  Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan
  The Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan is a Christian pseudepigraphical work found in Ge'ez, translated from an Arabic original and thought to date from the 5th or 6th century AD....
  
  

External links

• Bible Genealogy
• First Human Beings (Library of Congress
  Library of Congress
  The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
  
  )
• The Story of Lilith in The Alphabet of Ben Sira

http://quran.com/4/1

• Islamic view of the fall of Adam (audio)
• 98 classical images of Adam and Eve
• The Book of Jubilees
• Adam and Eve in Medieval Reliefs, Capitals, Frescoes, Roof Bosses and Mosaics
• "Adam and Eve" in Christian Iconography
• Translation of Grimm's Fairy Tale No. 180, Eve's Unequal Children, a German Fairy Tale about Adam and Eve