Genesis 3a: The Serpent 

The true teaching of the Bible is very rare these days. God has used technology and the internet and RU-vid to bolster his preaching. Anyone can learn from the comfort of their own home or if they're old and rather disabled like me. It is quite a blessing to be able to learn like this even in old age. Thanks so much.

Something to keep in mind, Moses (the author of Genesis) was Egyptian. Raised as a prince of Egypt, he'd have been educated in all Egyptian beliefs and taught hieroglyphics, etc. The Hebrew people he was writing to, were also Egyptian and had incorporated many of their beliefs into their own and worshiped their gods. They likely would have understood references to Egyptian ideologies and symbolisms. It would make sense that the connection between Genesis iconography and Egyptian culture would be very strong and would have been a common frame of reference when Moses wrote to the Hebrews to explain complicated topics, theologies and beings.

Boy was I so confused when I first started the series now I starting to understand and it’s fascinating!!! I’m so excited to finish the Bible.

Awesome! I’ve been teaching this very same thing for about 20 years. It is refreshing to know others have seen this!!! Praise God!😇🙏🏻

As a child i use to pray a lot and give thanks every night and one night, as i was praying, i mentioned the idea of a divine council in my prayer. It was something profound because i wasnt even sure whay council meant exactly i even asked my brother about it and told him about this divine council

This was great! I am a VFX/digital media artist and have Christian projects in the works. I have been researching everything put out by Dr. Heiser and other writers (Gilbert, Peck, Gallops, etc.). Your presentation and quality of work was spectacular. Keep it up. We need to be able to compete with these big, secular companies' quality of work! Keep it up!

IP: Dust actually just means death Me: .......... *sudden urge to clean room*

The only thing I hate about your videos is that they end. Terrific quality, love your voice, keep up with the good work brother. Although I do not particularly agree with Heiser's theology it's always good to hear his points

Really good content.. The more research that we do on the original language, the more fascinating the scriptures become.

This video is genuinely amazing. The Judean iconography is incredibly interesting, I love the way it looks. Also, that bit at the end with flashing images of Christ was such a great addition.

I hear a lot of people arguing over Satan being a Seraph or a Cherub. Person 1: Is Satan a Seraph? Person 2: Is Satan a Cherub? IP: Yes.

I've been in a Judaism class recently and we keep gravitating to the first few chapters of Genesis, this helps a lot with everything!

the ending gave me the biggest goosebumps in my life

When you kept memtioning Egyptians...i understood....the devil appears as an angel of light, its obvious he appeared to them as seraphim hence, the shiny winged serpent on every pharaoh and every noble and men of renown. The Egyptians fell hard for it, sorcery, magic, they paid hard for it as well. May our lives matter before The GOD-HEAD, may our discerning minds and hearts be sharper with the help of The Holy Spirit, mayThey keep us in Their Shekinah now and forevermore, in The name that is above every name, JESUS The CHRIST, our LORD amen.

Got an ad about studying the Bible and the first thing they said asked was “Who is the serpent?” Lol.

I really didn't want this video to end.

Well done with the background music. Remember watching some of your videos way back that felt like the background noise was competing to much with your voice. This one worked perfectly.

To the complainers in the comments : You can make your own video, with your own thoughts, and knowledge.

This video makes a lot of sense knowing that moses grew up in Egyptian culture, he would use his knowledge to describe the events perfectly.

I read (from a different source) that the Trees in Eden were a type symbology of the angels, which would reinforce the idea of Eve being comfortable speaking with a divine creature without fear, thus making it that much easier to deceive her. Good teaching!

Woah! Just noticed you got 100K subscribers!!!!! Congratulations, IP!!! Thanks for making such great videos, you’ve helped me in so many ways. God bless!

My friend that was a well done and edifying video. I have never understood the serpentine connection to Lucifer until now. It is starting to make a lot of sense now, which to me proves the validity. Thank you.

I just love your videos. They are so informative and well made. I get excited when I see a new one posted. You are right up there with my three favs- Heiser, Walton and Viola.

FINALLY!! I’ve been looking for a video specifically covering this. Wow I’m so happy to have come upon this. Thanks for making this.

I enjoyed this immensely. Thank you so much for your research and attention to detail.

Such a fantastic series! Really looking forward to the next one 🙂 God bless you mate.

Great video!! Hopefully we get to learn more about the Divine council. It seems that so the world's mythologies are just telling us about the truths as taught by their gods (former council members) that divided the world while God took a little insignificant Nation and turn them into his chosen people that have survived over the millennia.

In our language, ahas is snake, and when King Ahaz was mentioned, it's like the King Snake 🐍

Minute 13:55 onward to say the fall of humaniy and Lucifer at the same time is an oxymoron, the serpent was clearly in a fallen stage already when tempted Eve (it lie, deceive and was rebelious when it said to be "like God",) the nice graphics in this video does not support the Bible hermeneutics.

BRILLIANT!! Please, please, please more!! Biblical teaching in context to the ANE is so needed.

"Does the Bible teach a talking serpent actually existed?" IP - "Yes, but actually no"

I teach theology and admit this was interesting.

Love the intense but subtle Jesus on the Cross that crushes satan's head. Great video!

You'll find the same theme in Mesoamerica with the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl; 'The winged serpent' =)

I like that you mention that Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 are talking about earthly Kings but in such a way that harkens back to a rebellious divine being instead of asserting that the authors change topics in the mid monologue as I usually hear. This makes a lot more sense.

Your videos keep getting better and better. I'm hoping one day my videos will have the same quality.

Love your videos. How far are you going with this? Are you doing the whole genesis or all books?

Thanks you for such a well researched presentation. I find the OT fascinating and having this information that helps me understand how parts of it evolved . I do admire your method of putting the info out there but leaving it to the us any conclusions. Subscribed! PS... I also find the comment sections on subject matter like this both amusing and frightening. Keep up the good work!

Thanks for this message. The Unseen Realm is a great read. Michael Heiser has brought many questions to a modern day understanding with his study of Hebrew. Great job on the animation and narrative.

This is so good! I saw you mention your Genesis playlist in a comment on your most recent video about hyper literal interpretation and I'm so happy I ran across it! I'm looking forward to going through these videos! Your work is great and very appreciated!

Imagine genesis as an anime that always throws me off

' InspiringPhilosophy ' is set apart (in my brain, at least). I learned so much last eighteen months or so. A whole new view on the Bible. Thank you.

Love your vids - thank you for biblical explanations for those who love to study philosophy and physics

This just goes to show how much knowledge is needed to interpret these ancient scriptural texts. I used to teach Eastern religions in university and it was the same way. I also taught Introduction to World Religions and interpreting the Bible was extremely difficult for me. I wish I had had access to interesting videos like this back then. Thanks a lot! Fascinating!

That was awesome! keep it up and up and up and thank you once again for the insights. I am truly appreciative of all the wisdom attained from many different sources! Thank you for being on my journey!!!

This being the first video you made solely focused on the devil I love the music choice

Keep in mind Moses wrote the book of Genesis. He was taught from Egyptian teacher. That’s why it has a lot of Egyptian culture.

These teachings are incredible! Great work.

This is gonna have me thinking for a few days. Great video as always! ❤

I love this channel! And I think this interpretation is spot on. But I also think you might be too narrowly defining some of the story's key elements. For instance, while I think you've made a great case for the serpent being more than a beast of the field, it's clearly connected to the beasts of the field in Genesis 3, as you pointed out. So I don’t think we should dismiss that, especially when there appears to be a good narrative reason for it. In Genesis 1, God creates man in his own image to have dominion over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky and the creatures that move on the ground. Man, as the image of God, is intended to rule over all other creatures and yet in the fall, he fails to have dominion over a representative of the beasts, the serpent, and finds himself cursed to endless cycle of subjugation. The serpent is cursed to eat the dust and war with woman. The woman to war with serpent (via her offspring) and to war with man. And man to war with the ground until he returns to the dust in death, to be eaten by the dust-eating serpent. Round and round it goes. Instead of creation being rightly ordered by the dominion of God's image, everyone is eating and being eaten by each other. The beasts also appear to represent more than just animals. The dominion over the animals in Genesis 1, as you’ve rightly pointed out, has the connotation of enslavement of other human beings. In Daniel 2 and 7, we find Daniel playing with the themes of images of Genesis 1-3. In Daniel 2, Nebuchadnezzar dreams of an idol (image of God) made of four different metals which represent four different Gentile kingdoms which are in turn destroyed by a rock cut from a mountain and growing into a mountain, representing the kingdom of God. And in Daniel 7, Daniel has a vision of four beasts representing the same Gentile kingdoms which are in turn destroyed by "one like the son of man" (the image of Man/God contrasted with these four beasts) who represents the kingdom of God. It seems to me that Genesis 1-3 also has this same idea within it. The beasts aren't simply beasts but are representative of the Gentile nations over which God had called Israel to have dominion. Genesis 1-3 isn't a history lesson about human origins; It’s a metaphorical/mythological summary depicting for us the Bibles main themes. In the Beginning God creates Man (male and female) as the image (idol) of his temple, gives them a law and a land but Man disobeys the law and is ejected from the land. That's the story of Israel. Eden is the rightly ordered davidic kingdom. The fall isn’t just history; it’s a warning to Israel about the dangers of religious and cultural assimilation.

Well done Mike, very excellent presentation. looking forward for more excellent topics. by the way, I am interested in knowing what was Walton's feedback on the main points of this presentation. I hope in the future I can support you as a patreon member because I believe you have great potentials and God is using you to spread the Gospel. God bless you man, and keep up the good work and.

I love when the bible is broken down like this, it make so much sense.

God is good. I've been waiting for the release of this video. The detail is amazing and seems to fit perfect with the bible especially the hebrew text. Thank you.

Brilliant presentation, IP. Thank you.

Such a crafty video. Made with tact and wisdom. Thanks for the help, IP. God bless you!

It says that the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the field. NOT THAT he WAS one of the beasts of the fields.

The ending-absolute chills

Having listened to this several times and having deleted my previous comments, this is starting to make sense. The Shining one.

I appreciate these videos and the visuals. U did a great job.

It's a small thing to put at the end of the video, but I loved the rapid changing Christ pictures right after you referred to someone crusging its head. Very nice touch.

Bill Maher should see this. He is fond of mocking the "talking snake." If he only knew the sophistication of what he mocks. But of course, he wouldn't find this the least bit compelling either. Such is the lot of mockers.

There is a lot of confusion nowadays regarding Satan, and who he is, and what his name is in the Scriptures. Just as the Lord Himself has many names, from the Tree That Preserves Life in the Garden, to the Savior Riding the White Horse in Revelation, the Devil has many names, is called several different things, is characterized in numerous ways, and there are a lot of terms, names, and titles used to identify him. The many names, titles, and terms the Devil is called in the Scriptures: the Serpent/Snake; Satan; the Crooked Serpent/Snake; that Old Serpent/Snake Who Was in the Garden; the Hireling; the Bad Tree That Produces Bad Fruit; the Tree That Produces Knowledge That is both Good and Evil; the Punisher; the Seducer; the First Liar; the First Murderer; the Enemy; the Tempter; the God Who Rules Over This Age; the Accuser; The Angel Ruling Over the Bottomless Abyss; Apollyon (the Destroy er); the Devil; the Evil One; the Wicked One; Beelzebub (the God Who Rules Over the Flies); Lucifer (Light Bearing Son of the Morning); Belial (the Worthless One); the Fake One Who Presents Himself as a Messenger of Light; the Adversary; the Ruler Over Darkness; the Ruler Over the Atmosphere; the Ruler Over the Demons; the Anointed Guardian Kherubim; the Father of Lies; the Great Snake/Serpent (transliterated “Dragon” by the early translators: Huge Snake); the Lawless One; the Imposter; the Deceiver of all the Adamic Races; the Deceiver of the Entire Civilized World; the King of Tyre (as a type); the King of Babylon (as a type); a Fallen Star; the Thief, as the Sheep Stealer; the King Over the Lowest Level of the Pit-the Bottomless Part; the Tree filled with Thorns, the Second Beast in Revelation 13; a Roaring Lion; the False Prophet; the Deranged Serpent/Snake, Leviathan; the Son Who Brings Destruction; the Man Who Brings Sin; Murderer; the Devil who Moves about Like a Raging Lion; all synonymous names for the Serpent in the Garden and all terms and names the Devil is called in the Scriptures. Note: Some of the above were in the genitive construction, all of which require some work to bring into English so readers can appreciate their true meaning. I have fully translated them instead of using the English word, “of” (as the early translators did and that most every translator since has done), for which there is no equivalent in either Hebrew or Hellenistic Greek. The closest would be “ek,” which has the core meaning, “out of,” in Greek. Lilly Bloom

It would be nice to have Dr. Heiser on IP’s channel. We would probably hear some great topics between those two.

This is a wonderful briefing. Excellent work!

I love all the long format videos/series! Why don't you make them anymore?

This is so helpful! Genesis 3:1 was really bothering me because to me it didn’t appear to reference satan at all! Now I know why 😄 the whole winged serpent thing totally lines up with descriptions people have given me when they seen demons too so this is all very interesting to me! I love that this was taught in a theological and informative way and not darkness glorifying in any manner! It’s rare to find something like that these days!

Awesome! Been getting some downloads about this as well... And do believe that these dragons/seraphs/jinn are a race of beings created before us humans as the 'keepers of earth' with free will and the ability the replicate, but are made of 'fire'/spirit/qi and hence non-physical. Dust, sheol etc. Also refer to 'the desert' which is a metaphysical place in the underworld which is characterized as a place without the presence of God... Death, dryness (no water of life) etc. You will see this place referenced many times as the 'desert' or 'wilderness' and where demons go and where Jesus was tempted after his fast...

Absolutely love this video! The best from IP imo so far. This gives me hope for the future of christianity: more sounds contextual Bible reading instead of YEC erroneous interpretations.

Now this, is a very good study. Congrats on putting this video together. So we have a triple entendre, since the audio is very nice! Shining one-Radiant, Supernatural, Snake. Eve was entranced, she was beguiled!

your videos are filled with very good analysis. thank you.

The shiny one is a much more precise translation for Lucifer instead of The light bearer.He was also a Seraphim.

Nachash (the rebel of Eden), the shining one. The mighty cherub. The precious stones were his covering. No wonder Eve was beguiled.

"Seraph were considered a type of cherub". Thankz this clarifies a lot.

I have learned a lot from just reading some of the books that Michael quotes from. People like Heiser and Walton. And others. However I don't remember everything as Michael seems to do in some of his debates..he is blessed with an amazing knowledge and recall of the scriptures and important books. Good for us.

I always leave your videos with a new perspective.

Excellent video as usual. I'm always interested to hear your insight on topics like these. The word "entendre" ( 1:49 ) is pronounced "ahn-tahn-druh", by the way.

Ive seen other interpretations where nachash it interpreted to be a dragon and not a snake. Winged divine serpent sure sounds like a dragon

The septuagint records the serpent was crafty above all but when YHWH pronounced judgement He calls the serpent a Brute, something lacking wisdom or intelligence and becoming lower than the beasts of the earth. Interesting...

Good job. I’ve seen Heiser dissect this before and your video captures everything he covers.

your videos always have me pondering! excellent work

A snake can only be a snake. A serpent can be many things.

Seraphim: Winged serpentine creature, firey, gem covered.... So you're telling me the angels are dragons?? Awesome :,) :D

The only thing I would ask you to look into more is Lucifer falling before humans, and not at the same time.

Thanks for your perspective. It builds on a lot of what I was already aware of, and takes it a step further.

I was really looking forward to see this video. God bless you.

What didn't Walton agree with? Really informative video, thanks.

I've heard a few times that the "wings" of a nachash was the hood of the cobra. Is there anything to that?

No disrespect man but not a lot of folks here know about or even heard of the divine council. I think you should make a video. Officially explaining what that is.

Hey, Ip do you have any deductive arguments about the existence of experiencers?

13:55 are you saying that Lucifer’s fall was that he tricked humanity? I thought he had already had his fall before this, as described in Ezekiel. Just as a genuine question (great video)

I've seen some lectures by John Walton, & you explain his books better than he does.

That old serpent the dragon 🐉 Cast out of heaven for his rebellion against God almighty.

"Now the serpent was more (crafty, subtle, devious) than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made." Did the Lord God foreknow this? Did the Lord God predestinate this? Everything God made was good or very good. What is good or very good about this being, created with an edge on or advantage over the rest of the created animals and that subtlity is not challenged but appears to be commended?

Hey IP, now I'm confused. I thought Isaiah 14 was a proverb against the king of Babylon. Could you please help me understand better how it has any link with the serpent in Genesis 3? Also is satan really lucifer or lucifer was referring to the king of Babylon?

After reading the description, I'm curious, what was John Walton's problem with your points?

This is very interesting. I wish you would do a video on Hebrews 2:14 about how Jesus overcame this devil for those who are Christians. That is the rest of the story I think.

Bible never mention Lucifer as a name for Satan.

Thank You Jesus Christ for crushing the snake 2000 years ago! Blessings to you and your family ✝️🌹✝️

Excellent. You Put These On DVD & I'd Get Em. Like A Series Of This, The Fall, & Others Like It On DVD 📀

This is exactly what i was looking for. Thank you!