God now addresses the man.
And to Adam: Adam is written here in Hebrew without the article. Accordingly Hebrew Old Testament Text Project recommends translating as in Revised Standard Version. This is the first use of the proper noun Adam in Revised Standard Version. Good News Translation on the other hand has “the man” here and uses Adam for the first time in 3.20, at the point where Eve’s name is given. For translators in other languages, how and where the name of the man is introduced into the story will depend as much on the features of storytelling in their own language as on whether or not the article is used in Hebrew. Please refer to the discussion in the section “Translating ʾadam” in “Translating Genesis,” page 11.
Because you have listened to the voice of your wife is the reason for the man’s punishment. Listened to the voice means “listened to what she said and obeyed her.” It is not listening as a passive act, but rather doing what he hears her say. This may be translated “Because you have done what your wife told you” or “Because you have listened to your wife and obeyed her.” For wife see 2.24.
And have eaten of the tree is better expressed as in Good News Translation, “and ate the fruit.”
Of which I commanded you: commanded is the same verb as used in 2.16. See there for comments. The content of the command is contained in the words given in direct quotation in Revised Standard Version: You shall not eat of it. Good News Translation uses indirect quotation as a more natural means of making a summary statement.
Cursed is the ground because of you: God now puts a curse on the ground that will produce food for the man. For cursed see verse 14. Although it is the soil that is cursed, in fact it is the man (and his descendants) who suffer, because they will depend on the soil for their food. In some languages it may be necessary to express what cursed means in the case of the ground, and say “I am going to make the ground unproductive” or “I will make it hard for you to grow plants in the soil.” Examples from two existing translations are “I am going to spoil the ground and make it no good” and “I am going to make the ground hard.”
Good News Translation has taken because of you here to be expressing the same thought as because at the beginning of the verse. But while this may be a possible way of understanding the verse, it rather oversimplifies the complex Hebrew sentence. Because of you is literally “on your account,” and thus, according to other translations and commentators, it supplies a purpose for the ground being cursed. Cursing the ground is the means by which God punishes the man. The curse is applied to the ground in order that the man will be punished for eating the forbidden fruit and so disobeying God. In translation it may be necessary to place this purpose clause first: “In order that you will be punished, cursed is the ground” or “You must be punished for listening to your wife and obeying what she said to do, and therefore I am cursing the ground.”
In toil you shall eat of it: in 2.9 God caused the ground in the garden to produce food, and man was put there to cultivate and guard it. Now, however, the man will have to toil, which translates the same word used for “pain” in regard to the pain of pregnancy and childbirth inflicted on the woman in verse 16. In other words the man must now do “painful work, hard labor” to produce his food.
For all the days of your life, see verse 14.
Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Genesis. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .