Genesis 3 - The Fall of Man (Part 1)
 1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
Several things to notice.
First, the serpent was not the only crafty wild animal the LORD God had made… just the most. I see this as an interesting precursor to later in Genesis, when the Sons of God slept with the Daughters of Man. Angels were always able to possess to living beings. However, at some point, possession of animals appears to have ended. I suspect (but am not sure of) this, not because of others’ commentary I have read, but because when we read of possessed animals (I think for the last time) in the Bible, Jesus is exorcising Legion (for they were many) from a man to a herd of pigs… but Legion requested permission to go into the pigs, instead of the fate that Jesus may have had in mind. It is not clear to me when God stopped giving permission to Satan and demons to possess animals, but it would seem that they did it freely back in the Garden. After all, the animals in the garden were brought to Adam as helpers for him to name. A speaking animal would make more sense than a non-speaking one (considering that Adam was not engaged in agriculture yet)… but I if this were true, then they were only speaking because God allowed angels (both fallen and not) to possess them.
In any case, being the most crafty of the wild animals, the serpent would appear to have been possessed by Satan, and Eve was not surprised…
 2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ “
Now, this was the the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. In other words, mankind did not have knowledge of good and evil. Therefore, when evil incarnate came to her in the body of a snake, Eve did not recognize him as such. Nor did she realize that what she was going to do was evil. However, it is clear that until this point, she believed God and was obeying him. Until this point, she was living in righteousness. It was her basis for righteousness that Satan messed with…
 4 “You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Satan preyed on Eve’s ignorance. The reason Eve’s belief was so easy to mess with is because she did not know that spiritual death was the death God spoke of… but it didn’t matter. Such an experience would be like death to her… when she disobeyed, there really was a part of her that she felt died. The distinction between physical and spiritual may not have mattered much to her when she eventually realized what she ahd done.Â
Eve’s belief and obedience were what mattered, and look at what Satan did. He messed with both by getting at the root, preying on her ignorance. He told here a truth, they she would not physically die, and that she would now know good and evil, and that this would make her like God… and it was absolutely true, as far as it went. But it was a lie even if it was literally true, for the death Satan meant was not the death that God meant, and knowing good and evil was already something Eve was capable of. She just would not know it until she committed evil. And so, in her ignorance, Satan tricked her.
To be continued…