Adam אדם הראשון
the first man, created on the sixth day
Adam is created last on the sixth day, formed from the dust of the earth and filled with the breath of life. The sages stress that humanity began with a single person so that no one could claim a nobler ancestry, and so that each person would know the world was worth creating for his sake alone. His first act is not rule but speech: he names every animal, understanding the world by naming it.
Placed in Eden to work and guard it, he is given one prohibition — and breaks it that same day. Asked «where are you?», he answers by blaming his wife. Exile, hard labour and mortality follow.
He fathers Kayin and Hevel, lives through the world's first murder, and at 130 fathers Shet, through whom the line runs to Noach and Avraham. Adam dies in the year 930. Tradition says he gave seventy of his years to King David, which is why he fell short of a thousand.