"it is written of Me in the beginning of the Book

“…it is written of Me in the beginning of the book.”

As described In the book of Genesis, man is the very crown of creation: “Let us make man in our image and after our likeness.” And just below this it says: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them” (Gen. 1:26-27).

Contemplating this passage in the light of Christ, we can infer that this imperative declaration of God “let us make man,” was creative of two different men, the type and the true, that is, Adam and the Messiah. God created a man in His own image, namely Adam and Eve, and then, in the fulfillment of time, created a man in His own image and after His own likeness, the God-man, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah. The great Serbian theologian and intimate disciple of St. Justin the New, Bishop Athanasios Yevtich writes: “Although the first Adam was created before Christ was born, God already had Christ in mind as the Incarnate Son of God, Who became Man, and so He created man in His Image (Col1:16-17, 3:10). This is why man is turned toward Him, and this yearning and aspiration is turned toward Christ.” (1)

Because Adam was the first to be created, one is apt to be confused and not understand that the expression “Let us make” has reference to another man and not to Adam. This prophecy, therefore, may be considered the first one concerning a Messiah.  Announced in the beginning of Genesis, this was the great Master Plan (Design) which God conceived from before all ages - to make a perfect man both in His own image and after His own likeness - who would be the foundation and purpose of  the entire creation; He would make a perfect man or God-man (Theanthropos) and through him a multitude of godlike men with whom He would be in communion. After the Fall of man, the Book of Genesis then offers us an enigmatic prophecy of man’s salvation, known as “the Protoevangelion,” or first Gospel. This prophecy is made by God when He condemns the Serpent for deceiving Eve by telling her “Ye shall not surely die. For God does know that, in the day ye eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil” (Gen.3: 4-5).  The Lord declares: 

“And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed. He shall bruise thy head. And thou shalt bruise his heel”(Gen. 3:15).

In the first prophecy we discussed, God the Father pre-announced the creation of a perfect man, while in the second prophecy He pre-announces the birth of that man by a new woman at enmity with the serpent, and that her seed would crush the Serpent’s head. The two prophecies may be considered one as the second prophecy explains and supplements the first.

Therein is foretold the birth by a new woman of a new man in the image and after the likeness of God, a man at enmity with the Serpent and uncorrupted by him; this man will strike the Serpent in the head and abolish his dominion of sin and death. It is important to note here, that Eve did not know good and evil, and the cunning Serpent found it easy to deceive her. But this new woman, the ever virgin Mary, knows good and evil and the deceitful suggestions of the cunning Serpent and rejects his evil thoughts. The Devil was unable to lead her astray. Remaining pure and devout and loathing sin, the Virgin conceived God the Logos incarnate in accordance with the Lord’s pre-eternal plan. This interpretation of Genesis 3:15 is clearly expounded in the early tradition of the Church, both east and west, including St. Justin, St.Irenaeus, St. Cyprian, St. Ephraim the Syrian, Pope Leo the Great, and St. Ambrose of Milan to name a few of the more prominent interpreters in this tradition.

By seed of the Serpent is meant the wicked men who disobey God and obey the Serpent. But who is meant by “seed of the woman”? A woman has no seed. This is worthy of note. The new woman has a child, whom she conceived and bore without seed of man, which is to say, supernaturally, while still a virgin.

“He shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.”  “He” has reference to the offspring of the woman. The son of the woman, having been conceived and born without the seed of man, is a powerful person who will smite the Serpent in the head, though he himself will be wounded in the heel. The Serpent’s head represents his evil thoughts and cunning designs which Christ the Messiah frustrates by thinking and acting according to the will of God. By “heel” is meant the body of Christ the Messiah, which, after being put to death on the cross - as a result of the malicious action of the cunning serpent called the Devil - was resurrected to reign eternally in heaven, thereby crushing the head of the Serpent forever.  

As Christians, we would do well to contemplate this early prophecy of the plan of salvation and be mindful of the great purity of the ever-Virgin and that our Lord Christ is the very center of the sacred Scriptures and is written of, as He tells us, “in the beginning of the Book” (Hebrews 10:7; Psalm 40:7).

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