The garment supposedly symbolizes the coat of skin given to Adam and Eve after they were found naked in the garden, having eaten that most delicious deadly fruit. Traditionally, we believe that God gave Adam and Eve garments of animal skin when he found them naked in the Garden of Eden. But that garment of skin could be their mortal skin.
You may notice in the Bible the different translations: “coats” of skin and “garments” of skin.
Unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins, and clothed them. (Genesis 3:21) King James Bible
The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. (Genesis 3:21) New International Version
So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. (Genesis 3:22-23)
Did God give Adam and Eve animal skins to wear?
I had always thought the coat of skin given to Adam and Eve in the garden was made from an animal — that God gave them leather skins to wear when they became naked. In artwork, artists often show Adam and Eve wearing leather clothing after their Fall. But did someone kill an animal in the garden and clothe them? Where would this skin have come from?
One artist’s rendition of Adam and Eve in animal skins
The coat of skin could have been sheepskin or the skin from a serpent. But those skins given to Adam and Eve may have been their “mortal skin” — their flesh.
Adam and Eve had bodies of light before the Fall.
Adam and Eve did not have bodies of mortal flesh when they were living in the Garden of Eden. After they ate the fruit, something happened to their bodies. The First Book of Adam and Eve picks up where the Genesis account ends. It tells how Adam and Eve became distraught when they left the garden and saw the “broad earth spread before them.”
Adam wept bitterly when he “looked at his flesh, that was altered.” (Ch IV: 2) He laments that their “eyes have become of flesh; they cannot see in like manner as they saw before.” (Ch IV:9). God explains that their “bright nature was withdrawn” (Ch. VIII: 2). Adam confirms, “thou madest us both with bodies of a bright nature.” (Ch.XXXIV: 16). After the Fall, their bodies are different — they can’t go by the cherub and flame of fire because it could scorch their flesh. (Ch. XXXVI: 4 and Ch. XLIV: 9).
Did God clothe Adam and Eve in a skin of flesh?
Reading on in the Book of Adam and Eve, it sounds possible that God gave them a skin of flesh — perhaps their mortal skin after the Fall:
But when I heard of thy transgression, I deprived thee of that bright light. Yet, of My mercy, I did not turn thee into darkness, but I made thee they body of flesh, over which I spread this skin, in order that it may bear cold and heat.(Ch. XI: 7)
Did Adam and Eve wear skins of sheep?
Going back to the account in Genesis, it tells us that God clothed Adam and Eve in a garment or coat of skin. Now that could have been their mortal skin because, at one point, Adam says that “their flesh was dried up” (Book of Adam and Eve, Ch. XLIX: 13). According to this account, Adam and Eve then looked for something to cover their bodies, but they didn’t know how or what to do. The Lord told Adam to go to the seashore where he would find the skins of sheep, killed by lions, and that an angel showed them how to make clothing or a garment. This may be the account of when and how Adam and Eve began wearing animal skins:
Then came the Word of God and said to him, “O Adam, take Eve and come to the seashore where you fasted before. There you will find skins of sheep that were left after lions ate the carcasses. Take them and make garments for yourselves, and clothe yourselves with them. (Chapter L:7)
One artist’s rendition of Adam and Eve in animal skins
Skins of a sea monster or reptile
Another tradition of Jewish origin says they wore “garments of light” made from a sea monster (Midrash in Minhat Yehukh, Genesis 3:21 in Tvedntes). But in the Book of Adam and Eve, the serpent is the one who stripped them of their light (Ch. XXXVII: 1)
This is he [Satan] who was hidden in the serpent, and who deceived you, and stripped you of the garment of light and glory in which you were. (First Book Of Adam and Eve, Ch. LI)
One artist’s rendition of Adam and Eve in a glorified state
Other sources say the garments were made from a reptile — specifically the serpent snake that deceived them in the garden. (3 Baruch, ibid). You can see how this idea of the light and the serpent skin got mixed up in the story. [This artist makes it look like skins of feathers]:
An artist’s rendition of Adam and Eve in skins
Did Adam and Eve have garments of light?
The Midrash Rabbah called them garments of light, not of skin. The Hebrew words for light and skin are similar. But tradition often says that Adam and Eve had garments of light before the Fall. When they ate the fruit, they lost their garment of light. A garment of skin replaced their glory or light. Perhaps that garment of skin was their own skin, and later animal skins.
“After the clothing of fig-leaves they put on clothing of skins, and that is the skin of which our bodies are made, being of the family of man, and it is a clothing of pain.” (The Book of the Rolls) [Priestly Clothing in Bible Times, John A. Tvedntes]
Artist’s rendition of Adam and Eve in Fig leaves
The Hebrew root for nakedness is related to the word for skin. So we have skin, light, and nakedness somehow related.
Several sources talk about Adam’s body being created “bright and brilliant” and that he and Eve were placed in the garden where
“God clothed them with glory and splendor.” But when they ate the fruit, they were “stripped of the light with which they had been clothed…they were naked…[and] they made to themselves aprons of fig leaves” (Temples of the Ancient World, p.653)
“When God created me out of the earth along with Eve your mother, I used to go about with her in a glory which she had seen in the aeon from which we had come…” (Apocalypse of Adam)
Adam and Eve by Hinterglasbild AuBergfield
The serpent beguiled Eve, and when she and Adam ate the fruit, they lost their glory or skin of light, and this loss of light became their nakedness, which was replaced with a garment of skin — this mortal skin we all wear. Then came the animal skin clothing when they realized they needed more protection from the elements.
“It is those who wear the [flesh] who are naked.” (Coptic Gospel of Philip, Tvedtnes)
The Fall of Man and The Lamentation by Hugo van der Goes
The skin garments are a sign of our fallen nature. Too bad artists always show Adam and Eve in the garden in their garments of skin — their nakedness — before the Fall. But then, how do you portray the glory that was about them before they ate the fruit? It is unclear why they chose a fig leaf to hide their loss of light (fig leaves are very scratchy with little sharp fibers on their leaves.)
Perhaps this is when another garment comes into the story, after the skin of flesh — the garment that is fashioned by God and is handed down to the sons of Adam — perhaps one made from the skin of animals — to replace the not-so-good fig leaf.
Adam and Eve in the Garden, “Paradise” by Andre Normil
Did God give Adam and Eve mortal skin after the Fall?
When I think of the garment I wear, which may symbolize my skin — I realize there are many similarities to our mortal skin.
The skin is protective. It is the largest organ of our human body. It protects us from infectious microbes and the elements, helps regulate our body temperature, and permits the sensations of touch, heat, cold, pain, and pleasure. Our skin makes vitamin D from the sunlight. It guards our underlying muscles, sinews (tendons &ligaments), bones, and organs.
Skin illustration
I don’t know what the skin of light was like. But Adam and Eve were quite distraught without it and noticed immediately after they ate the fruit from the tree of knowledge that they were now “naked.” Even though they tried to cover themselves with fig leaves, it wasn’t the same as the glorious skin of light.
The Koran has something on Adam and Eve losing their light as well:
“Let not Satan seduce you, even as he turned your parents out of the garden, stripping them of their raiment that he might show them their nakedness.” (Temples of the Ancient World, p.654)
We could be talking about several different garment skins —
- The original one of light (in the Garden of Eden, the Paradise)
- The one of our own flesh (after the Fall, the Telestial world)
- The fig leaf covering (hmmm…not really skin, but covering)
- And another one that had priestly connections and was passed on. That may be symbolic of another kingdom and body of skin.
The Archangel Raphael with Adam and Eve, by William Blake
Hebrew word meanings for skin, shine, garment
- ע֖וֹר (o wr) is the Hebrew word that is translated “skin” in the Bible (Hebrew Concordance)
- א֖וֹרִי (o wri) is the Hebrew word that is translated “shine” (Hebrew Concordance) as in arise, shine for thy light has come.
A garment protects us, whether that be our own skin or the clothing we wear. The word “garment” is an Old French word, garnement, which comes from the verb garnir
garnir:
- to protect
- (by extension) to arm (provide with arms)
- (by extension) to armor
- (by extension) to clothe
Etymology:
From Middle French garnir, from Old French guarnir (“to protect (oneself), armour up”),
from Frankish *warnjan (“to ward, take care of something”),
from Proto-Germanic *warnijaną (“to worry, be careful, take heed, refuse, withhold”),
from Proto-Indo-European *wer- (“to close, cover, protect, save, defend”).
Works Cited
John A. Tvedtnes, Priestly Clothing in Bible Times. Temples of the Ancient World.
The Lost Books of the Bible, The Book of Adam and Eve.
Originally posted 2013. Updated 2022
