Elaine Pagels, in Adam, Eve, and the Serpent, argues that the story of creation to which her book's title refers has had a very real and very powerful impact on the way Western thought has developed: " . . . The story of Adam, Eve and the serpent, written down by Hebrew tribes about three thousand years ago
. . . wields an extraordinary influence upon western culture" (xix).
Specifically, the author believes that the creation story has had a strong influence on our culture not only hundreds or thousands of years ago, but today as well, although she focuses on the first centuries after Christ:
What I intend to show in this book is how certain ideas---in particular, ideas concerning sexuality, moral freedom, and human value---took their definitive form during the first four centuries as interpretations of the Genesis creation stories, and how they have continued to affect our culture and everyone in it, Christian or not, ever since (xxviii).
Her book explores the evolution of this influence, focusing on the strict moral message of the story and its impact on Christians and the development of Christian morality.
Pagels supports her arguments with analysis based primarily on Christian theological literature which represents Christian thinking through the centuries. For example, the author notes that the early Christians did not think that the sin of Adam and Eve in Genesis was sexual, but rather a matter of disobedience toward God and moral responsibility: "Its point is to show that we are responsible for the choices we freely make---good or evil
To support this argument, the author refers to the writing of Clement of Alexandria, writing in the 2nd century after Christ. Her documentation is based on the available historical records. What makes her work uniquely useful is that it focuses specifically on the impact of the creation story on the development of Christian morality and values, and on the effect of the spo...