[Question:]{.underline} Why are there different translations of Genesis 3:15, some indicating that the woman’s seed will crush the serpent’s head, and others that His Mother herself who will do it?
[Answer:]{.underline} After the story of the Fall and of the punishment to be inflicted on sinful mankind, Almighty God curses the serpent and promises the Redeemer, seed of the woman, that is of the Blessed Virgin Mary, saying that He will place enmities between the serpent and the woman, and between his seed and the woman’s seed: “She will crush your head and you will lie in wait for her heel”.
Such is the translation of the Vulgate (ipsa), namely that she will crush the serpent’s head, as confirmed by the translator, St. Jerome, in his writings. Scripture scholars point out that the Greek text of the Septuaginta, and all the original Hebrew manuscripts except two, state that it is he, that is the seed of the woman, who will crush the serpent’s head. How can this be, you might think, since the Council of Trent guaranteed that the translation of the Vulgate is without error? How could St. Jerome have made such an obvious error?
Of course, there is no error at all, and St. Jerome deliberately translated it indicating that the Blessed Mother would crush the serpent’s head. Here his translation is guided by the Catholic Faith, and makes a little more explicit the role of the Blessed Virgin in destroying the serpent, which role is already manifestly contained in this very text. Clearly, if there is enmity between the serpent and the Blessed Virgin, and not just between the seed of one and the seed of the other, this means that the Blessed Virgin is perfectly united to Our Lord’s work of destroying the devil’s power. Together with her seed, she crushes the head of the devil. St. Jerome’s translation is consequently equally correct, and has the advantage of bringing out a little more clearly, the role of Our Lady. It was made in the light of the teaching of the Fathers, without whose interpretation we cannot understand Holy Scripture. Pope Pius IX uses the patristic application of this text to Our Lady to establish the Immaculate Conception (Ineffabilis Deus).
Answered by Father Peter Scott, SSPX.