EOB: Official Site of the Eastern / Greek Orthodox Bible (Old and New Testament)

Genesis 3:18

EOB (Eastern / Greek Orthodox Bible):

It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field.

EOB Footnote:

The MT includes the word “of the field” (hasadeh) after “plants,” specifying “plants of the field” rather than simply “plants” as in the LXX. The MT also reads “you shall eat the plants of the field” whereas the LXX has “the plants of the field” as the object without the additional specification. The phrase “thorns and thistles” appears in both traditions with substantial equivalence. The pronoun “it” referring to the ground producing thorns and thistles was retained as the subject is clear from context (the ground/earth addressed in the preceding verse).

Other Translations:

KJV (King James Version):

Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;

WEB (World English Bible):

It will yield thorns and thistles to you; and you will eat the herb of the field.

Benton LXX (Vaticanus):

Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herb of the field.

Douai-Rheims (Vulgate):

Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth.

Apostoliki Diakonia (LXX):

Thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, and you shall eat the plants of the field.

YLT (Young Literal Translation )(MT):

And thorn and bramble it does bring forth for you, and you dost eat the herb of the field.

BBE (Bible in Basic English):

And thorns and waste plants will come up, and the plants of the field will be your food.

EOB COMMENTARY:

EOB Commentary:

Thorns and Thistles: The Curse Transformed

The declaration that the earth shall bring forth thorns and thistles represents far more than agricultural difficulty. For the Orthodox Christian, this verse carries profound typological and spiritual significance that finds its ultimate resolution in the person of Christ.

Patristic Interpretation: The Church Fathers understood the thorns as a symbol of the cursed earth’s resistance to human cultivation, but more deeply as representing the spiritual barrenness that followed the Fall. Saint John Chrysostom teaches that before the transgression, the earth produced its fruits spontaneously and without labor, but after sin entered, creation itself became disordered and resistant. The thorns symbolize the painful consequences of sin that now accompany all human endeavor.

Christological Fulfillment: The connection between this verse and the Passion of Christ is unmistakable in Orthodox theology. When the Roman soldiers plaited a crown of thorns and placed it upon the head of our Lord, they unknowingly enacted a profound mystery. Christ, the New Adam, took upon His sacred head the very curse pronounced in Eden. Saint Cyril of Jerusalem and other Fathers see in the crown of thorns Christ’s deliberate assumption of the primordial curse, transforming the instrument of punishment into a royal diadem of salvation. The thorns that sprang from cursed ground now encircle the head of the King of Glory, and through His suffering, the curse begins to be undone.

Liturgical Connections: During Holy Week, particularly on Great Friday, the Orthodox Church contemplates this mystery. The hymns of the Passion services make reference to Christ wearing the crown of thorns, connecting His suffering directly to the reversal of Adam’s curse. The Akathist Hymn to the Passion similarly meditates on how Christ bore the thorns that were our inheritance.

Spiritual Application: For Orthodox spirituality, the thorns also represent the ascetic struggle. Just as Adam must labor among thorns to bring forth bread, so the Christian soul must struggle through the thorny passions to bring forth the fruit of virtue. The spiritual life is not effortless after the Fall, but requires the sweat of repentance and ascetic labor. Yet this labor is now transformed by grace, for Christ has sanctified human toil and suffering through His own labors and His wearing of the thorns.

The verse thus stands as a bridge between Paradise lost and Paradise regained, pointing always toward the One who would wear the thorns as a crown and transform the curse into blessing.

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