“The eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; they sewed fig leaves, and they made themselves loincloths” (Genesis 3:7). “The eyes of both of them were opened” – Had they been blind? Rabbi Yudan in the name of Rabbi Yoḥanan ben Zakkai and Rabbi Berekhya in the name of Rabbi Akiva said: This is analogous to a villager who was passing by a glazier’s shop which had a basket filled with goblets and cut glass in front of it, and he grabbed them with his cane and shattered them.
He [the glazier] got up and grabbed him. He said to him: ‘I know that I will not be able to get any benefit out of you,26You have no money to pay me for the damage you have done. but come with me [into my shop] and I will show you how much goodness you have destroyed.’ So, too, He showed them [Adam and Eve] how many generations they had destroyed [through their sin].27By introducing death into the world.
It is in this sense that their "eyes were opened.” “They knew that they were naked” – they had been stripped bare of even that one commandment that they had received. “They sewed fig [te’ena] leaves” – Rabbi Shimon ben Yoḥai said: It is the leaf that brought grief [to’ana] to the world. Rabbi Yitzḥak said: [God said to them, in effect:] ‘You have ruined your handiwork, take a thread and sow it up.’28This is a metaphor.
Just as when one tears clothing, one is expected to repair it, Adam and Eve were expected to find a solution for the problem they had created – the issue of their being naked. “And they made themselves loincloths [ḥagorot]” – Rabbi Abba bar Kahana said: Ḥagora [singular], is not written here, but rather ḥagorot [plural] – several straps: istikhon, galyon, sedinim.29These are names of various types of belts or girdles, worn by men. And just as they made these for the man, so, they made for the woman: tziltzelin, kolasin, sekhanin.