onship between man and God. As a result of the serpent tempting woman the faultless Garden of Eden had been devastated, a choice that would affect men (to be PC, and women) forever. In this story the serpent is not the devil, it is impossible because the Old Testament is not aware of Satan until after the Babylonian Exile some four centuries later (Joines 27). In fact, often times in the Christian religion the serpent is a symbol of prudence (Becker 343).
             However, there are other origins of the serpent's evil. The serpent has also been the cause of evil and chaos in the Nordic myth of Raganrok, the final war between the Gods and the Giants. During this final war, Thor, the mighty god of thunder, died fighting the great serpent Midgard. Although Midgard was killed by Thor's hammer, the venom of the dead serpent was so strong that the poison spread over the earth and polluted the air. Breathing in the poisonous air, Thor died. Not one of the Gods or the Giants survived Raganrok (Cirlot 385).
             Another example would be the Persian tradition where the supreme god Ahura Mazda had discovered a plant called the haoma that gave immortality. Ahura's antagonist Ahriman created a serpent to damage the extraordinary plant (Simon and Schuster 371). Thus bringing about havoc upon earth.
             Further along in the Bible the serpent not only signifies chaos but also death and evil. Numbers 21: 4-9 tells of the Israelites in the desert that accuse God and Moses of bringing them out to the desert to starve. God sends upon the Israelites serpents which "bit the people so that many of them died (Numbers 21:6)".
             In Egyptian culture the serpent plays many roles, one of which is an evil being. The Egyptians believed that fire-breathing serpents armed with knives inhabited the underworld (Simon and Schuster 372). As a result, incantations from "The Book of the Dead" were cited to protect the pharaohs from the...