Genesis 3:15

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“And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; it shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”

At first examination, this verse is somewhat difficult to understand—even to determine what it is talking about. However, it is understood as the very first prophecy in the Bible about Jesus Christ. The “enmity” (hatred) between the woman (mankind or the New Testament Church) and the serpent (Satan) has always been a very real hatred. The verse addresses the serpent and has three applications of meaning:

(1) Most people—particularly women—do not like snakes.

(2) It reflects a duality of Satan vs. Christ and the children of the devil vs. the children of God within the world at large. See Romans 16:20 as a reference describing “enmity between your seed and her seed,” or the enmity in Satan’s world toward Christ’s Church.

(3) Most importantly, Satan had Christ killed—or the devil “bruised its [Christ’s] heel.” But, in doing this, Satan actually sealed his own fate, because a resurrected Jesus Christ will one day crush the devil’s government over this world. (The only way to kill a snake is to crush or cut off [“bruise”] its head.) Key: “it” refers to Christ and “you” refers to the devil.

It has long been recognized that the story of Achilles’ Heel comes from this passage. Interestingly, Semiramis, the mother of Nimrod (Gen. 10:8-10), would have known about, and been able to counterfeit, this prophesied “mother and child”—“your seed and her seed”—relationship (of Mary and Jesus), depicted by this prophecy.