Adam, Eve, and the Serpent

Pagels re-creates the controversies that racked the early church as it confronted the riddles of sexuality, freedom, and sin as embodied in the story of Genesis, showing how what was once heresy came to shape our own attitudes toward the body and the soul.

"A stunning book...[that] refreshes our view of early Christianity."
--Christian Science Monitor

"Pagels has taken a complex and seemingly arcane subject and made it fascinating and accessible."--Wall Street Journal

"This virtuoso study may disquiet some readers and refresh others; the debate it opens is not likely to leave any reader unmoved."--The New Yorker

Contents

Introduction

1. "The Kingdom of God Is at Hand"

2. Christians Against the Roman Order

3. Gnostic Improvisations on Genesis

4. The "Paradise of Virginity" Regained

5. The Politics of Paradise

6. The Nature of Nature

Epilogue