The early church father Tertullian had harsh words for the female sex. He quotes Genesis 3:16 and asks,
And do you not know that you are (each) an Eve? The sentence of God on this sex of yours lives in this age: The guilt must of necessity live too, You are the devil’s gateway: you are the unsealer of that (forbidden) tree: you are the first deserter of the divine law: you are she who persuaded him whom the devil was not valiant enough to attack. You destroyed so easily God’s image, man. On account of your desert – that is, death – even the Son of God had to die.
From Tertullian, “On the Apparel of women,” The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Grand Rapids, Mich: Eerdmans, 1968), p. 14.
Text and note from Joy Fleming, A Rhetorical Analysis of Genesis 2-3, with Implications for a Theology of Man and Woman, University of Strasbourg, France, 1987, p. 14 (available on request from Bruce@Tru316.com)
