The Genesis Project
Genesis 1 Genesis 3

Most Crafty

143 words · January 11, 2025

There is a ranking of cleverness in the creatures God created.

The serpent (a creeping thing) is more crafty than the wild beasts, but not described as more clever than the cattle/livestock.

God said, “Let the earth bring forth every kind of living creature: cattle, creeping things, and wild beasts of every kind.” And it was so.
God made wild beasts of every kind and cattle of every kind, and all kinds of creeping things of the earth. And God saw that this was good.
Genesis 1:23-24 (The Contemporary Torah, JPS 2006)

Now the serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild beasts that God יהוה had made. It said to the woman, “Did God really say: You shall not eat of any tree of the garden?”
Genesis 1:23-24 (The Contemporary Torah, JPS 2006)

Some translations render this as "more shrewd than all…"

3 animals crafty serpent

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