already been pointed out
by _Hofmann_, who remarks in the _Schriftbeweis_ i. S. 378, that Satan
appears in this book as a well-known being, as much so as are the sons
of God. Nor is Lev. xvi. an appropriate place for introducing, for the
first time, this doctrine into the knowledge of the people. The
doctrinal essence of the symbolical action there prescribed is
this:--that Satan, the enemy of the Congregation of God, has no power
over those who are reconciled to God; that, with their sins forgiven by
God, they may joyfully appear before, and mock and triumph over, him.
The whole ritual must have had in it something altogether strange for
the Congregation of the Lord, if they had not already known of Satan
from some other source. The questions: Who is Asael? What have we to do
with him? must have forced themselves upon every one's mind. It is not
the custom of Scripture to introduce its doctrines so abruptly, to
prescribe any duty which is destitute of the solid foundation of
previous instruction.

If thus we may consider it as proved, (1) that the serpent was an agent
in the temptation, and (2) that it served only as an instrument to
Satan, the real tempter,--then we have also thereby proved that the
curse denounced against the tempter must have a double sense. It must,
in the first place, refer to the instrument; but, in its chief import,
it must bear upon the real tempter, for it was properly he alone who
had done that which merited the punishment and the curse. Let us now,
upon this principle, proceed to the interpretation of our passage.

It is said in ver. 14: "_And Jehovah Elohim said unto the serpent,
Because thou hast done this, thou shalt be cursed above all cattle
and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go,
and dust thou shalt eat all the days of thy life._"--If we do not
[Pg 24] look beyond the serpent, these words have in them something
incomprehensible, inasmuch as the serpent is destitute of that
responsibility which alone could justify so severe a sentence. There is
no difficulty attached to the idea that the serpent must suffer. It
shares this fate along with all the other irrational earthly creation,
which is made subject to vanity (Rom. viii. 20), and which must
accompany man, for whose sake it was created, through all the stages of
his existence. But the question here at issue is not about mere
suffering, but about well-merited punishment. The serpent is not, like
the whole r