Eve's Name was not Eve

The personal name of the first man was not originally Adam, nor was the personal name of the first woman originally Eve. 

Her husband eventually called her by the Hebrew name, Chavvah [pronounced Kavah], but God did not give her this name. It was given to her after The Fall by her husband, who was never commanded or commissioned by God to name his wife.  

Portions of this post are excerpts from the Hungry Hearts Bible Commentary.

The name “Eve,” comes from a Greek transliteration, which transformed the Hebrew name, Chavvah, meaning "Life", into a series of Greek letters forming the word, Ava [which has no meaning], and from there, Ava migrated and transformed into the English name, “Eve,” which likewise has no meaning past its historical connection with the first woman.

The woman, Eve, is generally cloaked with a literary and theological burqa. She is invisible except for the magnitude of her sin, which covers every inch of her and undulates with ecclesiastical breezes in one direction or another, as she moves among us seeking a place of rest and redemption. 

When her name is paired with that of her husband, as in "ADAM and Eve," She becomes a cliché in the minds of many, an ancient legend, a mythical person, her existence is often denied, even among professing believers. 

What is difficult to understand, is why Bible translators, scholars who should know better, uniformly and consistently use the Greek transliteration of Chavvah’s name in the Hebrew portion of the Holy Scriptures. This is astounding and can only be attributed to a combination of antisemitism and misogyny. Because of this, the name, Chavvah is largely unknown to English-speaking believers. This is because the name in the Greek texts is **“transliterated from Hebrew to Greek, and not translated. And that, is the short version of how Chavvah, meaning "Life," is transformed into Ava/Eve, names that have no meaning. 

Credit where credit is due, goes to the Jewish translators of the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures), these at least translated Chavvah's Hebrew name into a corresponding Greek name--Zoe. Both Chavvah and Zoe mean "Life."

The name Chavvah (Life) was bestowed on the first woman by the first man, because he said she was the mother of all living. At least, that was the reason he gave for "naming" her, just like he did the animals before she came into being. 

Some claim he named her when he said "She is called woman because she is taken from man." This writer respectfully disagrees with that theory. The man was not naming her in this instance, as she was called woman from the instant of her creation. It was God who called her woman and gave the man supernatural knowledge of it. 

No doubt it was an inspired utterance on the part of the first man, but he did not name the first woman when the LORD GOD presented him with his equal and opposite counterpart. He was simply stating what was already a fact.


Fact: Before he sinned, it never occurred to the human male, ***‘âdâm-**Iysh, to name his wife, or that doing so it would lower the status of the human female, ‘âdâm-*'Ishshah, to an inferior position, thus creating an illegitimate hierarchy that transferred de facto power to himself and by extension a false notion of "headship" of all men over all women. 

It is more than interesting, and more than coincidence, that during his sinless existence before The Fall, such an idea never occurred to the first man. ... But it occurred to him quickly enough after he sinned. The first man's power-grab was the smoothest and most successful in history. In naming his wife Chavvah, the first man usurped the name God bestowed on the entire human race --âdâm (pronounced audawm--to himself alone. 

^{Genesis 5:2 states that "Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created."}

Even so, it is egregious that gender-biased Bible translators who know better, keep even the wrongly named Chavvah hidden under a semantic burqa by allowing her to be known by a name that has no meaning at all.

*'Ishshah: Hebrew for woman/wife
**'Iysh: Hebrew for man/husband 
*** ‘Adâm (pronounced: audawm): The name the Creator called all people (Genesis 5:1-2)

The Bible record does not record resistance from the woman, at being named by her husband, like he did the animals.  Why? Was Chavvah simply relieved to be alive and still with her husband that she failed to notice that his naming of her, appeared to place him in charge of her by lowering her status to that of the animals they both ruled over? 

Never-mind that God had commissioned the namings while Iysh was alone and could be made aware of the fact that as the animals needed equal and opposite counterparts, he was also in need of one. He, as a human, had already been given dominion over the plant and animal kingdoms. Naming the animals conferred nothing on the first man that he did not already have. 

Following are some proposed reasons for the uncontested coup: 1.) The woman felt relieved and flattered. Flattered by her husband giving her such a grand name, "Life" (considering he blamed her for precipitating death and ejection from Paradise). 2.) Relieved because the couple had just had a major rift when the first-husband attempted to throw the first-wife under the bus, while trying to save his own skin by volunteering hers. How horrified she must have been when loyalty fled and he blamed both God and his wife for the fact that he made a voluntarily choice to disobey the command concerning the fruit. No blow was too low to save himself, despite that there is no scriptural evidence that his wife pressured him into disobeying the Creator or that he resisted the temptation at all. He eagerly tasted the forbidden fruit. So, given all the drama and blame-shifting [no doubt anger and recriminations as wells] that must have taken place after "bite-remorse" set in, when Iysh finally appeared to calm down and give 'Ishshah a name as wonderful as "Life," she must have felt tremendous relief that she was back in favor with her husband. 

That was actually the second fulfillment of the prophesies the Lord God gave the couple after the fall. The first was pre-prophecy when Iysh threw Ishshaw under the bus by not taking responsibility for his own actions. The second was when he usurped the name of the human race for himself and his wife meekly went along with it. 

Your turning will be to your husband and he will dominate you....

That was a prophecy and not a command.

Was ‘âdâm-'Ishshah (the human female) so relieved that she and her husband, ‘âdâm-'Ish (the human male), had finally "made up," that she chose not to fight the fact that he had just usurped her name and authority as ‘âdâm? It was the name given to her, and to the entire mortal creation, by the Creator.

 

No matter, from that point on, in the eyes of ‘âdâm-'Ish, the name ‘âdâm would be his alone. And history records the devasting fulfillment of the prophecy that 'ish would indeed dominate 'ishshah.

Contrast how 'iysh had been content to co-reign-over/co-manage all other creation along with his wife before he sinned. It was only after he sinned, that he chose to dominate his wife and manage her along with everything else. In order to accomplished this, his first move was to usurp her name--the name ‘âdâm for himself alone. 

He stole it when he "named" her Chavvah. It was a brilliant strategy, a coup d'état of stellar proportions, and a total success.  

Forever after, he would be known as ADAM--the one who the entire race was named after--inaccurate as that may be. And ‘âdâm-'Ishshah would lose even the complimentary, Chavvah--which means "Life"--to an insignificant and clichéd moniker that has no meaning at all. 


Chavvah would never be translated accurately in the Hebrew portions of Christian Bibles (except in the Hungry Hearts Bible Commentary). The entire world, throughout history would forever know her as "EVE," a name which means nothing at all. 

 The first woman, ‘âdâm-'Ishshah, has been hidden from the collective view--except for her sin. But even that is considered second rate as compared to ADAM's) Chavva has been covered from head to toe in a literary and theological burqa--forever marginalized and, everything but her great sin, invisible.

Literary Burqa: G2096 Eva a word with NO MEANING

 Although online Strong's concordances (such as the one on the Blue Letter Bible website) assign the meaning of "Life" to the name "Eve," this is not accurate. It is done presumptuously, as can be seen in the Strong's original concordance published in 1894. In the Original Strong's Exhaustive Concordance, the definition of Eve G2096, is simply "The First Woman." James Strong includes her name, Chavvah, but stubbornly refuses to define it.

But Chavvah is a lovely and accurate name, so how could an evil motive be ascribed to it? Remember Caiaphas, who predicted the atoning death of our Savior. God allowed him to say something that was absolutely true, but the motive was absolutely evil. 

The first couple were both gifted with awesome intellects, and the first man struck the first blow in the war between the sexes. He did it using the name. It was a stroke of genius. He won the first battle through manipulation. He gained the ascendancy and conquered peaceably...by flattery. Equal in creation and equal in The Fall, the fact that the first man took it upon himself to steal the name the first woman and give her another, showed the depth of his new-found understanding of warfare and contempt for his now-fallen wife.

The fact that she meekly absorbed the blow without any record of argument or retaliation was an immediate and direct fulfillment of prophecy and attested to the strength of her desire for a restored relationship with her husband. In her overthrow, her turning, just as the LORD God had predicted, was in the direction of her husband, and not to her Creator. 

This set precedence for traditional-role-religionists and complementarians to adopt that moment in history as their moment. They use that moment to claim the first man possessed a God-given authority that the scriptures never assigned. 

That the first woman, 'Ishshah, (later called, Chavvah), accepted the usurpation of her God-given status and co-title of ‘âdâm. was sin manifesting in her own fallen life. Her Creator had warned her this would be her weakness. He also warned her that the consequences of turning to husband over Creator would be severe. This sin would be passed down from the first mother to every daughter to easily beset all womankind:  Her "turning" would be to her husband instead of to her God, thereby feeding her husband's sin, one that would pass from the first father to every son, easily besetting all mankind. One of the first results of his sin would be a strong desire to dominate his wife. 

History has shown God's predictions to be true in the case of women and men, and contemporary statistics on world-wide violence against women, marital violence, and marital abuse, show that little has changed from the day the first couple was ejected from The Garden. 

The first woman's name was never Eve, And the Spirit of the Living God never approved, commanded, or commissioned the literary and theological semantic burqa that men, cultures, denominations, and churches have draped her with, and so zealously guard against removal of.

The good news is, that despite the success of ADAM's coup, after The Fall, God, in His Word, continues to recognize the equal autonomy of both sexes by calling all people--women and men--'âdâm.

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