Household Tales · Chapter
Eve's Various Children explained
After being expelled from Paradise, Adam and Eve build a house and have many children, both beautiful and ugly.
What happens
After being expelled from Paradise, Adam and Eve build a house and have many children, both beautiful and ugly. When God announces a visit, Eve hides the ugly children and presents only the beautiful ones, who receive blessings to become kings, princes, and other high-status figures. Eve then brings out the ugly children, and God blesses them to become peasants, fishermen, and other laborers. Eve questions the unequal distribution of gifts, but God explains that all roles are necessary for the world to function, and Eve accepts his divine will.
Themes in this chapter
Social Class and Marriage
God assigns different social roles to each child, from kings to scullions, emphasizing a fixed social order where each class supports the others.
Virtue Rewarded and Vice Punished
The beautiful children are rewarded with high status, while the ugly children are assigned humble labor, though both are blessed.
Characters to notice
Key passages
“When Adam and Eve were driven out of Paradise, they were compelled to build a house for themselves on unfruitful ground, and eat their bread in the sweat of their brow.”
After being expelled from Paradise, Adam and Eve had to build a home on barren land and work hard for their food.
Sets the scene of hardship after the Fall.
“Eve, delighted that the Lord should be so gracious, cleaned her house diligently, decked it with flowers, and strewed reeds on the floor.”
Eve was happy that God was coming and prepared the house by cleaning, decorating with flowers, and covering the floor with reeds.
Shows Eve's eagerness to impress the Lord.
“The ugly children were, however, not to let themselves be seen. One hid himself beneath the hay, another under the roof, a third in the straw, the fourth in the stove, the fifth in the cellar, the sixth under a tub, the seventh beneath the wine-cask, the eighth under an old fur cloak, the ninth and tenth beneath the cloth out of which she always made their clothes, and the eleventh and twelfth under the leather out of which she cut their shoes.”
Eve hid the ugly children in various places around the house so they would not be seen by God.
Highlights Eve's attempt to control which children receive blessings.
“When Eve had heard all this she said, 'Lord, how unequally thou dividest thy gifts! After all they are all of them my children, whom I have brought into the world, thy favours should be given to all alike.'”
Eve complained that God was unfair in giving such different blessings to her children, since they were all her offspring.
Eve questions divine justice.
“But God answered, 'Eve, thou dost not understand. It is right and necessary that the entire world should be supplied from thy children; if they were all princes and lords, who would grow corn, thresh it, grind and bake it? ... Each shall have his own place, so that one shall support the other, and all shall be fed like the limbs of one body.'”
God explained that different roles are necessary for the world to function, comparing society to a body where each part supports the others.
God justifies the social hierarchy as a harmonious system.