When your Lord said to the angels: ‘I am placing on the earth one that shall rule as My deputy,’ they replied: ‘Will You put there one that will do evil and shed blood, when we have for so long sung Your praises and sanctified Your Name?’
He said, ‘I know what you know not.’
When the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life the man became a living creature. In Eden He planted a garden and there put the man he had formed. The Lord God made trees spring from the ground and in the middle of the garden he set the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
He told the man, ‘You may eat of every tree in the garden, but not from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for on the day that you eat from it, you will surely die.’ The Lord God put the man into a trace, and while he slept, he took one of his ribs and built up the rib into a woman.
The serpent spoke to the woman, ‘Is it true that God has forbidden you to eat from any tree in the garden?’
‘We may eat the fruit of any tree in the garden,’ the woman said, ‘except for the tree in the middle of the garden. God has forbidden us either to eat or to touch its fruit; if we do we shall surely die.’
The serpent said, ‘You will not surely die. God knows that as soon as you eat it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods knowing both good and evil.’ The woman looked upon the fruit of the tree and she took some and ate it and gave her husband some and he ate it.
When the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God they hid among the trees of the garden. The Lord God called to the man and said to him, ‘where are you?’
He replied, ‘Because I was naked, I hid myself from you.’
God answered, ‘Who told you that you were naked; have you eaten from the tree which I forbade you?’
The man said, ‘The woman you gave me for a companion gave me fruit from the tree and I ate it.’
Then the Lord God said to the woman, ‘What is this that you have done?’
The woman said, ‘The serpent tricked me, and I ate.’
‘Go hence,’ We said, ‘and may your offspring be enemies to each other. The earth will for a while provide your sustenance and a dwelling place.’
The man called his wife ‘Life’ because she was the mother of all who live. The man lay with the woman, ‘Life’ and she conceived and gave birth to Cain. Then she said with the help of A E I , I have brought a man into being.’
Afterwards she had another child, his brother Abel. Cain said to his brother, ‘Let us go into the open country. I will surely kill you.’
His brother replied, ‘If you stretch your hand to kill me, I shall not lift mine to slay you; for I fear God, the Lord of the Creation.’ Cain attacked his brother and murdered him.
Then the Lord said to Cain, ‘Where is your brother Abel?’
Cain answered, ‘I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?’ A raven dug the earth to show him how to bury the naked corpse of his brother.
Then Cain lay with his wife and she conceived and bore Enoch. Enoch begot Irad; Irad begot Mehujael; Mehujael begot Methushael; Methushael begot Lamech and Lamech was one hundred and eighty-two years old when he begot Noah.
Adam lay with his wife again. She bore him a son, and named him Seth, ‘For God has granted me another son in place of Abel, because Cain killed him.’ Seth too had a son, whom he named Enosh. At that time men began to invoke A E I by name. After the birth of Seth, Adam lived eight hundred years and when Adam died Lamech was fifty-six years old .