Adam

Adam (Hebrew: אָדָם‎, Arabic: آدم‎) was, according to the Book of Genesis and the Qur'an, the first man created by God and noted as such in subsequent Jewish, Christian, Islamic and Bahá'í traditions and literature. In Hebrew ׳āḏām, meaning "human" coupled with the definite article, becomes "the human"; its root is linked to its triliteral root אָדָם (A-D-M ), meaning "red", "fair", "handsome". As a masculine noun, 'adam means "man", "mankind" usually in a collective context as in humankind. The noun 'adam is also the masculine form of the word adamah which means "ground" or "earth" and is related to the words: adom (red), admoni (ruddy), and dam (blood).

See also:

Adam and Eve

Eve

Lilith

Quotes from works of literature of the character "Adam"

• While God created Adam, who was alone, He said, 'It is not good for man to be alone. He also created a woman, from the earth, as He had created Adam himself, and called her Lilith. Adam and Lilith immediately began to fight. She said, 'I will not lie below,' and he said, 'I will not lie beneath you, but only on top. For you are fit only to be in the bottom position, while I am to be the superior one.' Lilith responded, 'We are equal to each other inasmuch as we were both created from the earth.' But they would not listen to one another. When Lilith saw this, she pronounced the Ineffable Name and flew away into the air.
  • Adam and Lilith in Alphabet of Sirach

• This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
  • Of Eve, Genesis 2:23 (KJV).

• And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?
  And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.
  And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat?
  And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat.
  • Anonymous authors of Genesis (sometimes attributed to Moses), Ch. 3:6-13 (KJV).

• Lord of the world, must I and my ass eat at one crib?
  • Upon being told that he would have to eat the herbs of the ground, as reported in The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (1886) by Charles Taylor, p. 14.

Sorted alphabetically by authors or source

• Adam lay ibounden,
  Bounden in a bond;
  Four thousand winter
  Thoght he not too long;
  And all was for an appil,
  An appil that he tok.
  • Adam lay bound,
    Bound up in a bond.
    Four thousand winters
    He thought not too long.
    And all was for an apple,
    An apple that he took.
    • Anonymous, "Adam lay ibounden", line 1, as quoted in Early English Lyrics ([1907] 1972) by Sir Edmund K. Chambers and Frank Sidgwick, p. 102, Translation: Joseph Glaser Middle English Poetry in Modern Verse (2007) p. 85.

• Only the soul that is naked and unashamed, can be pure and innocent, even as Adam was in the primal garden of humanity.
  • Sri Aurobindo, Thoughts and Aphorisms (1913).

• In the time of the First Manifestation the Primal Will appeared in Adam.
  • Báb, Dalá’Il-I-Sab‘ih (The Seven Proofs).

• Adam
  Had 'em.
  • Strickland Gillilan, "Lines on the Antiquity of Microbes", also known as "Fleas" (often misattributed to Ogden Nash).

• And [mention] when We said to the angels, "Prostrate to Adam," and they prostrated, except for Iblees. He was of the jinn and departed from the command of his Lord. Then will you take him and his descendants as allies other than Me while they are enemies to you? Wretched it is for the wrongdoers as an exchange.
  • Quran, 18:50

• That man, the unsubmissive and first, stands in the opening chapter of every legend mankind has recorded about its beginning. Prometheus was chained to a rock and torn by vultures — because he had stolen the fire of the gods. Adam was condemned to suffer — because he had eaten the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Whatever the legend, somewhere in the shadows of its memory mankind knew that its glory began with one and that that one paid for his courage.
  • Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead (1943), part IV.

• When Adam sinned it was not he who cried, 'God, where art Thou?' It was God who cried, 'Adam, where art thou?'
  • Aiden Wilson Tozer, Worship: The Missing Jewel.

• Encyclopedic article on Adam on Wikipedia
• The dictionary definition of Adam on Wiktionary
• Media related to Adam (Biblical figure) on Wikimedia Commons