Exercising his power as Rightful Sovereign in control of his dealings with foreign governments, Jehovah God declared war upon the enemy sovereign. Showing supreme contempt for this Satanic sovereign, Jehovah God likened him to an earth-hugging serpent and said to him, as if speaking to the serpent whom the Devil had used to deceive Eve:

⁸ “I shall put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will bruise you in the head [like treading on the head of a serpent to crush its brains] and you [like a serpent lying in wait] will bruise him in the heel.”​—Gen. 3:1-15.

9. Warfare of what length did God declare against the foreign sovereign, and how did Paul indicate this in Romans 16:20?

⁹ Perpetual warfare Jehovah God there declared against the rebel sovereign and all those adhering to the sovereignty of this crafty rebel, who from the start tried to hide his identity from human creatures. Jehovah God has not forgotten his “foreign policy” of warfare against the enemy of both Him and mankind. More than four millenniums after the Great Adversary set up the foreign sovereignty at Eden, Jehovah God inspired the Christian apostle Paul to write to the congregation located at the seat of the Roman Empire: “The God who gives peace will crush Satan under your feet shortly. May the undeserved kindness of our Lord Jesus be with you.”​—Rom. 16:20. Compare Exodus 17:14; Isaiah 45:7.

10. (a) Who will be used to crush the Great Serpent underfoot, and how soon? (b) How was the bruising of the “heel” of God’s promised Seed accomplished, and how was there a healing?

¹⁰ The time for the crushing of the Great Serpent Satan the Devil and his “seed” “shortly” should now be near, after the passing of over nineteen hundred years. The principal one of the promised “Seed” of God’s “woman,” Jesus Christ, is now clothed with adequate power to crush this Satanic author of all earthly sovereignties foreign to Jehovah God, the only Giver of peace. Back in the first century of our Common Era, this “Seed” of God’s “woman” was bruised in the heel. This took place as the outcome of that conspiracy between the “peoples of Israel” and King Herod Antipas and the Roman Governor Pontius Pilate. The “heel” wound inflicted by the Great Serpent did cause the death of Jesus Christ on Passover Day of 33 C.E., but only a physical death. And, at any rate, Jesus had to die a sacrificial death, according to God’s purpose. But the sacrificing course did not go unrewarded. On the third day of Jesus’ death, the Almighty God raised him from the dead to immortal spirit life in the heavens. God seated him at His own right hand, to await the time for the Great Serpent to be crushed in the head.​—Heb. 10:12, 13; 12:2.

Satan the rebel sovereign has had his day in the bruising of the heel of the promised “Seed” of God’s “woman.” Now this Great Serpent, the heel bruiser, must have his own head bruised, and that affects all the “seed” of this Serpent at the same time. The same Second Psalm 2 indicates how the crushing of the visible “seed” of the Great Serpent would be done. In Ps 2 verses eight and nine, Jehovah addresses his Anointed Son, Jesus Christ, and says: “Ask of me, that I may give nations as your inheritance and the ends of the earth as your own possession. You will break them with an iron scepter, as though a potter’s vessel you will dash them to pieces.”