“The man called the name of his wife Eve [Ḥava], because she was the mother of all living [ḥai]” (Genesis 3:20). “The man called the name of his wife Eve [Ḥava], because she was the mother of all living [ḥai]” (Genesis 3:20). She was given to him to enliven him, but she gave him counsel like a serpent [ḥivya]. Another matter, Ḥava – Adam the first man told [ḥiva] her how many generations she had caused to perish.
Rabbi Aḥa said: [Adam said:] The serpent was your serpent and you were Adam’s serpent [ḥivya].49The serpent was the cause of your downfall, and you, in turn, were the cause of Adam’s downfall. “Because she was the mother [em] of all living” – Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar said: With [im] all life.50”Life” referring to a comfortable standard of living. It is taught: If [someone’s husband] becomes wealthy she ascends with him,51If a husband becomes wealthy and hires servants, his wife is excused from her domestic duties.
She thus ascends in status, as at the time of her marriage she had been required to perform them. but if he becomes poor she does not descend with him.52If a husband was rich at first, able to hire servants, thus exempting his wife from household chores, and then he becomes poor and unable to afford domestic help, his wife nevertheless remains excused from household chores, and does not descend from her original status.
Rabbi Simon said: “Mother of all living” – the mother of all living beings, as Rabbi Simon said: All one hundred and thirty years that Eve was estranged from Adam, the male spirits53Demons. would be aroused by her and she would bear offspring from them, and the female spirits would be aroused by Adam and would bear offspring from him. That is what is written: “Who, when he commits iniquity, I will rebuke him with the staff of men and with the afflictions of the children of man [adam]” 54With punishments inflicted by malevolent spirits, described here as “children of Adam.” (II Samuel 7:14); the children of Adam the first man.
There is one opinion that says that house spirits55Malevolent spirits that inhabit one’s house. are better [for the resident of the house], because they grow up with him. And there is an opinion that says that they are worse, because they are intimately familiar with his sinful thoughts. Spirits of the field – there is an opinion that says they are better for a person, because they are not intimately familiar with his sinful thoughts. And there is an opinion that says that they are worse, because they did not grow up with him.