Page 118 - Foundations

Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher, Paris Hilton (who has now evidently returned to the Roman Catholic
faith), Britney Spears, Mick Jagger, Rosie O’Donnell, and others. The influence of so many
celebrities embracing the teachings of Kaballah has helped open a doorway for its beliefs and
doctrines to become more widely known.

Not all Christians who have embraced doctrines found among the Gnostics and Kabbalists have
directly studied the writings that serve as source texts for these ideas. Over time as ideas become
promulgated, people lose connection with the source from which these teachings derived. They may
have heard of the serpent seed doctrine from another Christian, who heard it from another Christian,
but the trail eventually leads back to Gnostic or Kabbalist teachings.

In my ministry I have noted an increase of Christians who have embraced, or are considering, the
serpent seed doctrine. William Branham, a Pentecostal minister who was very active in the 1940's up
until his death in a car crash in 1965, was one of the better known men who promoted this doctrine.
Since Branham’s death, Arnold Murray of Shepherd’s Chapel has become one of the leading
advocates of this doctrine. There are additionally, many lesser known teachers of this doctrine, many
of whom have websites where this teaching is disseminated. One of these men whom people often
mention when writing to me is Bob Schlenker who has The Open Scroll website and blog.

What all of these teachings share in common is the belief that the Serpent/Satan/Samael had sexual
intercourse with Eve in the Garden of Eden and that shortly thereafter Adam also had sexual
intercourse with Eve. She became pregnant by both beings simultaneously, a rare occurrence that is
known as heteropaternal superfecundation, and she consequently gave birth to twins. This alters the
traditional Biblical narrative significantly, for no longer are Cain and Abel understood to be brothers
born consecutively through the union of Adam and Eve. Cain is declared to be the seed of the serpent
and Abel the seed of Adam.

Anyone familiar with the account of Adam and Eve’s temptation by the serpent in the Garden of Eden
will recognize that the serpent seed doctrine is at great variance with what is recorded in the book of
Genesis. To persuade someone to accept this doctrine, the person promoting it must convince another
person that the meaning of various words in the Genesis account mean something other than the
normal sense that a reader would derive from the text. For example, when the Bible says that the
serpent “beguiled,” or “deceived” Eve, the teacher of the serpent seed doctrine suggests that the word
should actually be understood to mean “sexually seduced.” When Eve admits that she “did eat” the
fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we are to understand that she actually was saying
that she “had sexual intercourse.”

In some versions of this doctrine, the tree of knowledge is taken to be a symbol of Satan, and that Eve
eating of the tree is merely a mystical way of describing her having intimate relations with the
serpent/Satan. In other versions of this doctrine, some suggest that Eve’s transgression was two fold,
that when she said “the serpent beguiled me and I did eat,” that she is saying, “the serpent sexually
seduced me and afterward I also ate of the forbidden fruit.” This latter version is offered to defend
against the argument that if eating of the fruit means having sex with Satan, then Adam must have
had sex with the serpent too, for we are told that Eve gave of the fruit to her husband and he did also
eat. Some with scruples about suggesting that Adam engaged in sex with the serpent being find it