Throughout the Bible the serpent typifies evil. In the allegory of Adam and Eve, the woman at first accepts the serpent's lie that man can disobey God, but later admits her error and prophetically bruises the serpent's head (see Gen. 3).
Mary Baker Eddy interprets this allegory in the chapter entitled "Genesis" in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," and on page 533 she notes that the woman is first to confess her fault. Mrs. Eddy writes of Eve: "She says, 'The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat;' as much as to say in meek penitence, 'Neither man nor God shall father my fault.' She has already learned that corporeal sense is the serpent."
A profound lesson awaiting the whole race is the teaching of Christian Science that corporeal sense, familiar to all as the five physical senses, is the only devil or evil. Because corporeal sense presents at best a limited view of God's creation and at worst the trials of sin, sickness, war, death, this contradicting sense must be understood as godless and untrue. Christian Science thoroughly uncovers the falsity and deceptiveness of senses which have no relation to God, inasmuch as they are incapable of cognizing Spirit or the moral and spiritual forces that emanate therefrom.
