Genesis 3 - Desire Contrary to Your Husband's

· 3 min read

Looking at the second part of the woman’s curse in verse 16 we see an interesting statement:

“Your desire shall be contrary to your husband,
   but he shall rule over you.” - ESV

Again, this is one of those verses where you could come away with different interpretations depending on what translation you are reading. For example, the NIV says “Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."

The NASB says, “Your desire will be for your husband, and he shall rule over you."

The NKJV says, “Your desire shall be for your husband, And he shall rule over you."

The NLT says, “And you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.”

The Tree of Life version says, “Your desire will be toward your husband, yet he must rule over you."

In this particular case, I think the ESV gets the closest to what is being communicated in the Hebrew.

The key to understanding the first part of this sentence is in the word “contrary” (אֵל) or “to,toward.” Using the BibleArc app to do a little word study/search, we can see how this word is used in other places in the OT. see here

I think the immediate place you can see a parallel useage is in the very next story of Cane and Able where we get almost an exact parallel statement in Genesis 4:7 where it states, “If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it."

Compare 4:7 to our verse in 3:16.

It appears that the overall idea that is being conveyed here is that God is warning Eve that because of sin, there will now be fractured relationships. When we choose to follow our desires instead of the desires of God, we choose selfishness…and selfishness in relationships almost always lead to conflict (e.g. “your desire shall be contrary to your husband”). In other words, humans will now experience brokeness in relationships with others.

So, if you take this in conjunction with the previous note on the “curse” of the woman, we see God letting Eve know that relationships within her life - either with her children or with her husband (i.e. the homelife in general) - will be a struggle. There will be anxiousness, worry, and sorrow. All because of a choice made to follow her own desires over that of God’s.

These notes are unpolished on purpose. You can read more about why, here.