Did Adam and Eve really exist?

Bible People & HistoryIn theological review

The short answer

Yes, Contend treats Adam and Eve as real people, the first human beings, created by God and standing at the head of the human race. Genesis 1 to 5 presents them as historical figures in a genealogy that runs on into recorded history, Jesus and the apostles speak of Adam as a real man, and Paul's teaching that sin and death came through one man, answered by salvation through one man, Jesus, only works if Adam was real.

The fuller answer

Genesis introduces Adam and Eve not as symbols in a myth but as the first people in a continuous account. God forms the man from the dust of the ground and breathes life into him, places him in a garden in Eden, and fashions the woman from his side as his counterpart and helper. Together they bear God's image, are blessed and told to fill the earth, and are given work and one command. Genesis 5 then traces a genealogy from Adam through Seth to Noah, with ages and deaths recorded in the same matter of fact style used for later generations in the book.

So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

Genesis 1:27 (BSB)

The fall follows in Genesis 3. Tempted by the serpent, Eve ate the fruit of the one forbidden tree and gave some to Adam, who ate as well. Shame, blame, curses on the ground and on childbearing, and exile from the garden followed, along with the first promise of a descendant who would crush the serpent. Adam named his wife Eve, which Genesis links to her being the mother of all the living. Whatever readers make of the garden's details, the text presents two real people making a real choice with consequences for everyone descended from them.

Then the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils, and the man became a living being.

Genesis 2:7 (BSB)

The New Testament treats Adam exactly that way. Jesus, answering a question about marriage in Matthew 19, quotes Genesis 1 and 2 as the record of what the Creator did at the beginning, joining a real man and woman. Luke's genealogy of Jesus runs back name by name and ends with Adam, the son of God, placing Adam in the same list as Abraham and David. Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 calls Adam the first man and contrasts him with Christ, the last Adam, in an argument about the real resurrection of real bodies.

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, so also death was passed on to all men, because all sinned.

Romans 5:12 (BSB)

Paul's argument in Romans 5 is where the question stops being only about origins. He teaches that sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and that death spread to all because all sinned; then he sets Adam beside Christ as the two heads of humanity, one bringing condemnation and the other justification and life. If Adam were only a symbol for everybody, the parallel with the historical Jesus would collapse at its centre. That is why Contend's position, following its statement of faith, is that Adam and Eve really existed, and why the church has confessed the fall of a real first couple ever since.

Sources

Berean Standard Bible (BSB)

Review status: in-theological-review. Every Contend page passes a human theological review against the Statement of Faith before it is published as approved teaching. This section is in that queue.

Dig deeper

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What is sin?Sin is anything in us or done by us that falls short of God's holy character and breaks his good law. The Bible treats it as more than mistakes: it is rebellion against a good God, missing the life we were made for, and it separates us from him until he puts it right.Are we born sinful?Yes, in the Bible's teaching people are born with a fallen nature inherited from Adam, inclined away from God before they choose any particular act. Christians have explained the details differently, but the texts point to a need that begins at birth, which is why salvation is presented as new birth, not self improvement.Was there really a flood over the whole earth?Yes, Genesis presents the flood in Noah's day as a real judgement that covered the earth as its people knew it and destroyed human and animal life outside the ark. The Hebrew text describes waters covering the high mountains and all flesh dying, Peter treats the event as history, and the honest open question among Christians is the flood's exact geographical extent, since the Hebrew word for earth can also mean land.Who wrote the Bible?People did, and God did, and the Bible insists on both. On the human side it has many authors across many centuries, from Moses to John. On the divine side, Peter says men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit, and Paul calls all Scripture God-breathed. Real writers, real styles, one intention behind them.Bible Character: AdamThe first man, formed by God from the dust of the ground and placed in the garden of Eden.Bible Character: EveThe first woman, built by God from Adam's rib, and the mother of all the living.Lesson: The big story of the BibleThe Bible is one story, not sixty-six separate ones. Walk the whole arc once, from creation to new creation, and every book you open will have a place to sit.