Irenaeus of Lyons · a new plain-English translation from the original language
...of our Lord back to Adam, he shows there are seventy-two generations, joining the end to the beginning, and signifying that he himself is the one who recapitulated in himself all the nations scattered from Adam onward, and all the languages, and the generation of humankind together with Adam himself. Hence Paul also called Adam himself a type of the one to come, since it was the Word, fashioner of all things, who had prefigured in himself the future disposition of the human race with respect to the Son of God, God having predestined the first man as an animal man, namely, so that he could afterward be rescued through the spiritual man. For since the one who would save already existed beforehand, it was necessary that there also come to be one who would be saved, so that the Savior should not be idle. Accordingly Mary, a virgin, proves herself obedient, declaring: Here is your handmaid, Lord; be it done to me according to your word. Eve, however, was disobedient, for she did not obey, even while she was still a virgin. Just as she, though she had a husband, Adam, was nevertheless still a virgin (for the two were naked in Paradise and were not ashamed, since, having been made only a little while before, they had no notion yet of childbearing; for it was needful that maturity come first, and only afterward increase), and having become disobedient, became a cause of death both for herself and for the whole human race, so also Mary, having a predestined husband and yet being a virgin, by her obedience became a cause of salvation both for herself and for the whole human race. And for this reason the Law names a woman pledged to a man as that man's wife, though she is still a virgin, indicating the recirculation from Mary back to Eve; because what had been bound could not be loosed otherwise than by the very windings of the bond being turned back on themselves, so that the first bonds should be loosed by the second, and the second in turn set the first free. And it turned out that the first bond was loosed by the second binding, and the second binding took the place of the loosing of the first. And for this reason the Lord said that the first would be last, and the last first. And the prophet signifies this same thing, saying: Instead of your fathers, sons were born to you. For what the virgin Eve bound through unbelief, this the virgin Mary loosed through faith.
It was therefore fitting that the Lord, having drawn near to the sheep that had strayed and having wrought the recapitulation of so vast a dispensation, and searching out the work of his own hands, would rescue that very man formed in his image and likeness—Adam himself—by filling up the time of his condemnation, which had arisen from disobedience, that condemnation the Father had kept within his own authority; since indeed the entire economy of man's salvation proceeded as the Father was well pleased to ordain, so that God should not be defeated, nor his workmanship rendered powerless. For if the man who had been made by God to live, upon losing life through the serpent that had corrupted him, were never to return to life but were cast off entirely to death, then God would have been defeated, and the wickedness of the serpent would have overcome the will of God. But since God is unconquered and magnanimous, he showed himself magnanimous both in the correction of man and in the testing of all, as we said before; but through the second man he bound the strong one, and plundered his goods, and abolished death by bringing to life the man who had been put to death. For the first vessel of his possession was Adam, whom he also held under his power, that is, by unjustly bringing transgression upon him, and by making, under the pretext of immortality, a means of putting him to death. For by promising that they would be as gods, which is not possible for him at all, he brought about death among them; so the one who had taken man captive was in turn, and justly, made captive by God, while the man once held captive was set loose from the bonds of condemnation.