Who Told You? (Gen 3:11)

Into and Out of the Garden

¹¹ YHWH God said וַיֹּ֕אמֶר

Both v. 10 and v. 11 begin with the word ויאמר va-yómer ‘[and then] he said’. I have added “YHWH God” (as through most of Genesis 2–3) simply to clarify who’s talking. Biblical Hebrew often takes for granted that you will assume the next va-yómer switches to the other character in the scene. The Talmud does the same thing, often repeating אמר ליה (Aramaic “he said to him”) over and over and expecting you to keep track of who’s saying it to whom.

Look at Exodus 3, where in v. 4 God calls Moses:

• va-yómer Moses, Moses!

• va-yómer Here I am.

• va-yómer Don’t come any closer without taking off your shoes.

It’s interesting to compare the NRSV and the NJPS in our section:

• verse         NRSV             Hebrew          NJPS

• 9                and said           וַיֹּ֥אמֶר               and said

• 10              He said            וַיֹּ֕אמֶר               He replied

• 11              He said            וַיֹּ֕אמֶר               Then He asked

Notice how at the beginning of v. 11 NJPS adds “then” (always implied by a consecutive verb) just so they can capitalize “He” to show God is speaking. Without “then,” “He” would be at the beginning of the sentence, and capitalized no matter who it referred to. But it’s also a translation choice to vary the verbs in order to shape the story, something very natural in English and much less so in Biblical Hebrew.

Exod 3:14 begins with “God said” (va-yómer elohim) and continues with another va-yómer, lacking a subject, where it’s clear that God is still speaking. NJPS translates there, “He continued.” Gen 16:9–11 is another interesting case, and one that we have a reasonable chance to reach somewhere down the road. In that passage, a divine messenger is speaking to Hagar, and each verse begins with the phrase va-yómer lah mal’akh YHWH, even though the mal’akh is the only one speaking.

All of this is to explain why I’ve added in “YHWH God” as the subject of va-yómer here at the beginning of v. 11 even though that is left unsaid in the actual Hebrew text. I’m in good company; BHQ notes:

The variants attempt to stress that, unlike the previous verse, the speaker here is God.

The “variants” are the ancient translations; in this case, both the LXX and the Vulgate (Latin) translations add “he said to him,” the talmudic way, to indicate the change of speaker, and the Peshitta (Syriac) adds “The Lord said to him.” The Contemporary Torah quite cleverly uses the spacing and quotation marks of modern fiction to indicate the change in speaker without adding anything. It also enables them to avoid giving God a pronoun and therefore a gender:

He replied, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.”

“Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat of the tree from which I had forbidden you to eat?”

The Human said, “The woman You put at my side—she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”

Since God’s words are clearly a question, even “Then He asked” is quite a reasonable translation of va-yómer here. Still, it’s a good reminder both that you want to choose a Bible translation that will best help you understand the text and that if you’re reading something in English, it isn’t the Bible itself.

“Who told you you were nude?” מִ֚י הִגִּ֣יד לְךָ֔ כִּ֥י עֵירֹ֖ם אָ֑תָּה

“Uh … no one told me. I am not as dumb as I look.” Oops. It’s a little late to tell you so, but you have the right to remain silent. Now, as you are about to find out, the cat is out of the bag.