Genesis 3:14-19 (NIV)
14 So the LORD God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this,“Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he shall crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” 16 To the woman He said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” 17 To Adam He said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’“Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. 18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. 19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.”
To understand the curses spoken by God in the verses we are studying today, we must understand what a curse implied in the Old Testament days. Curses were the opposite of blessings. Blessings are positive, and in the Bible they are shared with friends and leaders. Blessings are for peace and health and prosperity. In stark contrast, curses are for harm and even for complete destruction. Spoken curses were believed to have the inherent power to carry them on to completion. In this case, emphasis is added because the words were spoken by God—the God of creation who spoke the universe into existence. The theological term is Ex Nihilo, meaning “out of nothing.” Here, the God whose words led to creation speaks words of curse to the first woman and the first man.