על גחונך תלך' (בר' ג, יד): המראה החיצוני של נחש גן-העדן בפרשנות היהודית העתיקה'

The present article examines the ways in which early Jewish exegetes envisaged the physical form of the serpent, before God's curse upon it, to: 'Crawl upon your belly' (Gen. 3:14). Four different conceptions in ancient sources were discovered: (1) according to some of them (Josephus, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, Pirqei de-Rabbi Eliezer and Deuteronomy Rabba), the serpent had legs (a quadruped?); (2) in other rabbinical sources the serpent is seen as having hands and feet like a human being. This interpretation might have had its origins in an oriental mythological tradition of human-like serpent portrayals or, as it seems to have been shown at least in R. Hoshaiah's case, in philosophical tradition; (3) in some apocryphal books (Life of Adam and Eve, Apocalypse of Abraham; cf. also Apocalypse of John), the serpent has a dragon-like form, i.e. it has hands, feet, ears and wings; (4) finally, R. Simeon ben Eleazar's suggestion of the camel-like aspect of the serpent seems to have been an intentionally de-mythologized proposal directed against the apocryphal exegesis, inasmuch as the dragon was considered an idolatrous symbol by the rabbis. The article has two appendixes, Appendix A: 'The physical aspect of the serpent in modern exegesis', and Appendix B: 'The serpent in ancient oriental iconography'.