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Genesis 3:17

וּ לְ אָדָם אָמַר כִּי שָׁמַעְתָּ לְ קֹול אִשְׁתֶּךָ וַ תֹּאכַל מִן הָ עֵץ אֲשֶׁר צִוִּיתִיךָ לֵ אמֹר לֹא תֹאכַל מִמֶּנּוּ אֲרוּרָה הָ אֲדָמָה בַּ עֲבוּרֶךָ בְּ עִצָּבֹון תֹּאכֲלֶנָּה כֹּל יְמֵי חַיֶּיךָ
And to Red-one he has said 'For you have heard to the voice of your woman, and are eating of the wood whom I have laid-charge to you, to say, You are not eating from ourselves, she-who-is-cursed is the Red-one in your crossed-one.140 In a sorrowful-one141 you all are eating of her the whole of the days of your living-ones,
141

Paragogic nun. Strong’s #6093, עִצָּבוֹן itstsabon. Afflicted one, sorrowful one

Hebrew תאכלנה. you all are eating (fem). The suffix "נה" (pronounced as "-na") in Biblical Hebrew is a third person plural feminine ending used for verbs in the perfect tense. It indicates that the action of the verb is performed by a group of females or by a noun that is grammatically feminine.

For example:

  • רָאוּ (ra'u) means "they (masculine or mixed gender) saw."
  • רָאוּנָה (ra'unah) means "they (feminine) saw."

So, "נה" is added to verbs to match the gender of the subject when the subject is a group of females or a feminine noun.

What tradition did here was to take the suffix for "her" second person singular "you are eating her." It is not only strange to say "you are eating her" in terms of the Ground (hence why they add the words "of it") but it deviates completely from the pattern of "eating from" used throughout this narrative.  The preposition מן (min "from out of" ) follows nearly every other instance of the verb "to eat" in the narrative.

Here are all the instances:

  • Genesis 2:16, "you are eating from" verb + prep
  • Genesis 2:17, "you are not eating from" verb + prep
  • Genesis 3:1, "you all are not eating from" verb + prep
  • Genesis 3:2, "you all are not eating from" verb + prep
  • Genesis 3:3, "you all are not eating from" verb + prep
  • Genesis 3:5, "your eating from" infinitive possesive verb + prep
  • Genesis 3:6  "and she ate." verb no prep
  • Genesis 3:11 "he ate from" verb + prep
  • Genesis 3:14 "you are eating dust" verb + noun
  • Genesis 3:17 "you are eating from" verb + noun