By Kenneth V. Reeves

Jesus referred to the chief of devils, our arch foe, as a liar and a murderer. If he is a liar and a murderer, it will pay us to avoid his snares at all costs. Yet, Jesus called the hard-hearted Jews of His day, especially the scribes and lawyers of the Pharisees and Saducees, children of this devil. It is to religious people that Jesus is talking in John 8:44. “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.” They were Abraham’s earthly descendants, and presumably heirs of God’s promises to Abraham and his seed. They felt that they were the best that God had or perhaps could have. Just like the devil, they were lifted up with pride, feeling that they were a credit to God and society. However, Jesus did not compliment them, saying that they were of their father, the devil.

According to Jesus in the above scripture, the devil is a liar, is lustful, and is a murderer. The devil is then characterized as a total liar and a creature bent on murder. Scripture also implies that he would do anything he could to satisfy his apparently unlimited lust.

Now this devil, called the Serpent, began his trail sometime from the beginning. This had to be sometime between Genesis 1:1 and his appearance in the Garden of Eden. While his outer appearance is not described in Genesis, chapter three, he must have moved otherwise than upon his belly, as he was forced to do after he succeeded in bringing about the fall of man. From descriptions given in Ezekiel, chapter twenty-eight, and the false transformation that is his capability in II Corinthians 11:14, it seems that he must have been very attractive, or could appear to be so.

It is Satan, Diablo, Lucifer, or Beelzebub that is referred to when the term Serpent is used as above. He is no small or insignificant member of the family of devils, but the very chiefest of devils. He is a fascinating liar and a killer. He is simply a lustful brutish character. He craved those things that should not have been desired, such as equality with God, worship, authority, and other things that did not belong to, nor were suitable for anybody but God. He was very possessive and grasping.

Some light may be gathered from the Apostle Paul ‘s letter to Timothy concerning the office of a bishop. (I Timothy 3) The devil was not only greedy, but was a novice lifted up with pride, when he made his attempt to take over where he had no business. He was unprepared in the management of the things he tried to take by force. The Apostle Paul warned the ambitious type of person who wants to be a bishop, that he should be turned down because he was likely to fall in the same condition and status as the devil. The statement of the Apostle is that the novice could fall into the condemnation of the devil due to being lifted up with pride. The devil was a proud and grasping opportunist, trying to take hold of what did not belong to him.

There are some things we should know about this devil, lest we at some time or another fall into his toils and deceit. He is an angel; a fallen angel, but a very superior angel. He is also very clever. Do not make a mistake. He is very shrewd. Please do not underestimate him.

From what may be discovered, he cannot, nor can angels among themselves, procreate other angels. In short, they appeared to be sexless, as to procreating other angels after their kind. The angels who followed the Serpent in the rebellion are calculated or numbered in excess of fifty million. God’s angels who were in John’s vision in the Revelation, are ten thousand times ten thousand, plus thousands of thousands, or one hundred million angels, plus. Inasmuch as a third part of the stars were brought down with the Serpent (Revelation 12:4), and stars have been likened to angels, it is felt that the devil attracted one third of God’s angels to his side. This would account for fifty million plus fallen angels mentioned above. Inasmuch as God’s angels are actually innumerable (Hebrews 12:22), we are also not able to pinpoint the number of fallen angels involved.

If they could not reproduce among themselves, then they could not increase their number by procreation. Their numbers, if increased at all, would have to be by persuading other angels to follow the Serpent, or an altogether different way would have to be devised. Man could multiply and replenish the earth, but angels were not so commanded. By the same token, in the resurrection, man and woman will not further multiply their numbers by procreation. Hence, it is implied that angels do not procreate, even as mankind will not after the resurrection. Fallen angels were not told to procreate in any shape or form after the order of angels, that we know of.

Almost everything of a biological nature, such as animal and vegetable life, is commanded to multiply by means of seed within the animal or plant life. If you name any plant or animal, then seed is the means of increasing the number of the species. This is the order God set forth in the first chapter of Genesis, as well as in some parts of Genesis, chapter two.

All of this created a dilemma for the Serpent, as to increasing his group. There was one way the Serpent could bridge this gulf; if he could manage to win over a new species called Man, or Adam. Though man could not become an angel, he could be approached and offered an alternative to God’s command concerning his actions.

How could the Serpent do this? There appeared to be only one way. Man was told that he could eat of every tree that bore fruit, that had seed in itself, or at least that the tree had seed in itself. (Genesis 1:11-12, 29) This meant that if a tree that bore fruit did not have seed in itself, man was not to eat of it. Therefore, this must have been what was distinctive about the one tree in the midst of the Garden of Eden called, “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil”. (Genesis 2:17)

If man could be enticed to eat of this forbidden fruit, then it could be that the seed of man’s own body would be adopted to reproduce the nature of that tree in his offspring. Hence, the seedless fruit would be given to the male seed of man to carry the effect of this tree into subsequent generations. All one need do is read Romans, chapter seven, to see that man, though desiring to do good, always has evil present. Thus, good and evil is transmitted from generation to generation by man through the process of procreation. Man does not look like a tree, but neither does fruit of a tree look like the tree.

That particular tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, was not to be multiplied, as the tree of life could be multiplied. Notice in Revelation 22:2, “….and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life…” The species called the tree of life was on both sides of the river of life. Therefore, only one tree was without seed in itself, and that was the tree that bore the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. What a unique plan to sidetrack all future generations into a category of lost and damned, subject to the voice of the devil. Thus, man was saddled with the burden of generating a race of fallen creatures under the devil, by using his seed to continue the nature of that objectionable tree.

How could the devil reach man to seduce him? Of course, by the woman, if at all. It seems that woman was created after God made the animals. Genesis 1:24-28 seems to place the creation of
man and woman after the animal kingdom creation. Yet Genesis 2:18-25 I 8-25 indicates that man had been created already and named the cattle, animals, and fowls before God made Eve. If this be true, then Eve did not hear God tell Adam to avoid the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It is clear, however, that Adam must have told Eve about this rule. She seemed not to remember to quote the rule exactly as God had given it to Adam, inasmuch as she is inaccurate in her conversation with the Serpent in Genesis, chapter three. As such, she was not a separate person from Adam when Adam was given his first “thou shalt not”.

When the Serpent’s trail led him into the Garden of Eden, he talked with the woman, though apparently the man was with her during the conversation. The Genesis record tells us that after Eve took the forbidden fruit, she “…gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat”. (Genesis 3:6) There is no record that Adam said anything to Eve to hinder her in any way from taking the forbidden fruit, though he, was present to object and correct both her misquotations and the Serpent’s misdirections. He could have altered the whole dialogue, but did not. He did not help his wife avoid the deception, for she was deceived. The first lie told the human race was told to the woman at this time. The Serpent lied about God’s motive in forbidding the fruit. He also lied about the results of the act of taking this particular fruit. The Seed of the Serpent was a lie, just as the Seed of God is truth. As the father of lies, the Serpent planted the seed of untruth in Eve’s heart and mind. She conceived this lie in her heart and mind and brought forth a deed of sin.

Adam was not deceived. Therefore, he sinned as a direct act of disobedience. Eve was deceived. God gave her the promise that her seed would bruise the Serpent’s head. Adam was given no such promise. While God had not directly forbidden Eve to partake of the forbidden fruit, He did directly tell her that her seed would bruise or crush the Serpent’s head. The command not to eat was a threat of death for so doing. The promise to crush the lying head of the Serpent was a promise of ultimate victory. There was hope for mankind through Eve’s seed.

That seedless fruit tree should have remained seedless forever. But, when it got into man, the knowledge of good and evil got into man. Every child born of man since that time has been tainted from that seedless fruit. Nakedness, shame, and knowledge of good and evil followed immediately after it was eaten.

From then on for twenty-four hundred years, death reigned from Adam to Moses. Sin is not counted where there is no law, so until the law of Moses, it is death that is said to have reigned. (Romans 5:14) However, it is sin that is said to have reigned after the giving of the law (Romans 7), bringing judgment for sins that were not counted before the law. The law defined the outward ways of sin in the nature of man, but did not create sin. Sin or disobedience caused man to fall, and the nature of sin is expressed by the law in various forms or expressions thereof. Law explains good and evil in the fleshly feelings and practices of man. This nature of good and evil is carried to all flesh born of flesh and blood by means of the male seed.

Adam harkened unto the voice of his wife to be sure, but knew better. She persuaded him to disobey, but he did not have to do it. Eve seemed to believe that Cain was the promised seed who would bruise the Serpent’s head. If so, how much more can a person be deceived? “And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD.” (Genesis 4:1) This may have been why Cain killed Abel, when he learned to his dismay that Abel was favored instead of himself. It may be that the Serpent thought Abel was the promised seed who would bruise his head; and perhaps this is why he urged Cain to kill Abel. At any rate, the results of the fall began to show in the next generation after Adam, and from there on.

How then was Eve’s seed to continue down through the ages to lodge in the body of the Christ? It is clear that Seth was the I line through which this seed of her body would travel, down through Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, Shem, Arphaxad, Cainan, Sala, Heber, Phalec, Ragua, Saruch, Nachor, Thara, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, Phares, Esrom, Aram, Aminadab, Naasson, Salmon, Boaz, Obed, Jesse, David, Nathan, Mattatha, Menan, Melea, Eliakim, Joanne, Joseph, Juda, Simeon, Levi, Matthat, Jerim, Eliezer, Jose, Er, Elmodam, Cosam, Addi, Melchi, Neri, Salathiel, Zorobabel, Rhesa, Johanna, Juda, Joseph, Semei, Mattathias, Maath, Nagge, Esli, Naum, Amos, Mattathias, Joseph, Janna, Melchi, Levi, Matthat, Heli, Joseph (actually Mary, found in Luke 3).

The particular seed of Eve traveled through each generation, alone and unborn until Abraham. Then it traveled with the seed of Abraham until it lodged in the body of the virgin Mary. When we use male names in genealogies, it is because they are the names we have found recorded. There is every reason why the seed of Eve could pass through the body of a female. It must have in the case of Sarai, for no other woman could be the mother of Isaac, thus excluding Hagar. If the seed had been in Abram, Sarai’s half brother, then Sarai would not have been essential to Isaac’s birth. Necessarily, both the seed of Abraham and Eve would have to pass through the body of Sarai as to the birth of Isaac. Even though the particular seed of Eve and Abraham was not born as Isaac, both seeds passed into the body of Isaac, then into Jacob. This is why God loved Jacob more than Esau. The two seeds, along with the promises, were in Jacob’s body. This is why God put up with King David as much as he did. The seeds of Eve and Abraham were in his body.

Why did God wait until Abraham’s body was dead as to procreation before he made him able to father Isaac? Because the seed of his body that could procreate must be dead, and then raised from the dead in order to overcome the judgment of God upon Adam to die. Abraham’s seed died and was quickened from the dead at age ninety-nine, so that he became a father when he was about an hundred years old. (Romans 4:19)

While Sarai’s womb was dead, the seed of Eve was lying dormant. Whatever the unknown may be, the resurrected seed of Abraham was joined to the seed of Eve within Sarah, not to be born at that time, but later, of the virgin, Mary. (Please note that Sarai’s name was changed to Sarah by the LORD, when He promised to bless her with a son.) Levi was in the loins of Abraham before his body went dead as to procreation. (Hebrews 7:10) All of Abraham’s future generations were in his body, but only one seed of his body was to be joined to the seed of Eve. Later, both seeds were found in the body of Jacob. The seeds of Eve and Abraham that were in the body of Jacob passed into the body of Judah. In short, the two joined seeds simply passed into the chosen body, unborn, with the seed that did germinate to be born. This continued until the virgin Mary. (Matthew 1; Luke 2)

Christ is not the only seed of Abraham, but He is the only seed of Abraham that is joined to the seed of Eve to be the promised Seed, around which hinges all of the promises of God for the human race. Abraham’s seed died while he was yet breathing. If God had not quickened it, there would not have been special flesh that had seen death and had been raised from the dead to live again. This was the seed germ that contained the germ of life in the flesh of Jesus. After all, Eve was to die, and so was her seed when He crushed the Serpent’s head. The seed of Abraham had already died, so being in the seed of Eve was the resurrection hope for her flesh in the body of Jesus. If you plant any seed in the ground, all will die away except a germ in that seed, which will spring up in resurrection. Thus, Eve and Abraham’s seeds are resurrection seeds; that of Abraham when he was nearly an hundred years old, and that of Eve on the third day after the crucifixion of Jesus. Thus, both male and female seeds were involved in the death and resurrection of Jesus.

There is another seed that tied the seed of Eve and Abraham together, which is the WORD of God. This WORD was made t to in the conception under the Holy Ghost that overshadowed Mary, and was then born in due course. That is, Jesus was made of a woman and under the law, Galatians 4:4 tells us. He was born of a woman, of the seed of a woman, and thus was born under the law which decreed death. Therefore, the seed of Eve was to die, but not until four thousand years after her death. This was to carry out the sentence of death that passed upon all men for eating of the forbidden fruit. The seed of Eve died in four thousand years. Abraham’s seed died in his body about two thousand years after Adam was created, but was quickened to live with the seed of Eve until her seed should die.

The death of Abraham’s seed in his body while he yet was breathing, cut off the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil from that seed. The death and resurrection of Abraham’s seed was the beginning of a new male seed, free of that fruit as to that one Seed alone. The promise to Eve was before Adam knew her and Cain was born. Hence, the particular one seed of Eve that was to be preserved, was never touched by the seed of Adam. It may be well to recognize that there are many seeds in both male and female bodies, but only one seed of Eve and one seed of Abraham was reserved for the conception of Jesus Christ, in addition to the WORD. (John 1:1, 14) The
WORD IS THE THIRD SEED. “Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.” (I Peter 1:23)

The above article, “Three Seeds” is written by Kenneth V. Reeves. The article was excerpted from the fourth chapter of Reeves’ book The Angels, Demons, and People Vol. 1.

The material is most likely copyrighted and should not be reprinted under any other name or author. However, this material may be freely used for personal study or research purposes.