Two persons lived in a place of unparalleled delight. There were rivers, orchards of fruit-trees from which they ate, animals that were not afraid of men, the toil of labor never tired them, and every evening they walked with God. The only restriction in this most perfect of worlds was a ban on eating the fruit of one tree. According to the Bible, all the subsequent fate of our human race, all the long history of good and evil, was determined by the one tree and the question asked about it. This question is presented to the first people in the Bible in the mildest of forms: "Did God say…"
A Garden Called Delight
And the Scripture tells us that God created a paradisiacal garden in Eden for the first human pair. Eden was apparently located in the east; the name means delight in Hebrew. God created trees in this garden "pleasing to the sight and good for food," among which were trees "of life" and "knowledge of good and evil." A river ran from Eden, and it was divided into four: two are known to us – the Tigris and the Euphrates – and the other two have been lost. The man was created from the dust of the earth ("adamah"), with some kind of poetic connection to the earth, but then he received the breath of life from God and became a living soul. He was commanded to "work and take care of" the garden – a command, by the way, that does not contain the slightest hint of coercion. For the man thus created, labor was evidently not a punishment but a privilege. Then God created a woman for the man, and the chapter closes with the words familiar to us all: "they were both naked, but were not ashamed."
One Tree Too Many
In the middle of the garden, there grew two trees – the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God told his command to the man about the tree that he could not eat the fruit of: "You may freely eat of all the fruit of the trees in the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat, for on the day you eat of it you shall surely die." What could have prompted God to give such a commandment has been explained many times in the history of the Bible. The simplest and shortest answer has already been given to us, perhaps, in the text itself. "God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God," – said the serpent. Love alone gives a person full life; it is the only criterion, the only measure of true humanity. Therefore, there had to be in man the full and free love of everything around, including himself. But to choose, to decide on the one path that leads to love, was not given to him. Only to exclude, only to avoid the one harmful tree from the abundance of good things that God has prepared for people, the first humans had to be able to decide on their own. This is the beginning of all subsequent choices throughout the history of humanity in general and each soul in particular. One has to choose, and this choice itself will determine the path and fate of each – just as it did for Adam and Eve at the very beginning.
Adam and Eve could eat from any tree in Eden except one.
The Craftiest Creature
The Scripture does not tell us anything about the looks of the serpent, except that he was cunning. But this single attribute, in fact, serves as a full characterization of the whole episode. The serpent's speech is notable for its three peculiar features – distortion, denial, and baiting. The distortion consists in the fact that the serpent attributes to God a command that does not belong to Him: "Did God say that you must not eat from any tree in the garden?" But God did not forbid eating from all trees, but only from one. By saying this, the serpent is distorting God's will, making Him look greedy and unreasonable. Then the serpent denies what the woman says to him: "God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." The woman repeats to the serpent what God said, but he immediately contradicts her and denies it. Third, the serpent baits, pointing out that God withholds the knowledge of good and evil from them: "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." Thus, he highlights the benefit that they will receive if they agree to give up the tree's fruit, and the harm that God will suffer. It is noteworthy that the serpent does not force the woman to give him the fruit of the tree. He does not even ask her to taste it. He only gives her a new interpretation of God's commandment and points out what wonderful prospects await her if she listens to him. And since, from now on, the choice belongs to man, as was shown already in the commandment with the tree, the first person to fall under the serpent's spell is a representative of the first human pair, no less influential than the man himself. This is where people often fall, too, under the serpent's spell, listening to themselves rather than God.
The Bite That Changed Everything
The Scripture tells us about the woman's choice in more detail, since it was her example that convinced Eve of the rightness of her actions. Seeing the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Eve saw three things: that it was good for food, that it was desirable to look at, and that it was something that would make one wise. She took some of the fruit and ate it, persuading herself and the man to do the same. She gave some of the fruit to her husband, and the text does not leave us in doubt about what he did. It says that "the man ate also." Before reading this line, we were told that Adam was not deceived about the ban, while Eve was deceived. But that does not seem to be entirely true! "The woman whom you gave to be with me," – says the man to God when He talks about the fall, but that does not mean that he did not know about the tree and was unable to understand what was happening. He saw the woman, who was with him, and ate from the fruit – and he ate too. These words of the man tell us that the responsibility for the fall was not on one side but on both sides. No one of them went to the tree alone; no one was deceived. If Eve was convinced that she was right to take the fruit, so was Adam. It is easy for us to understand that God did not mean by his words "on the day you eat of it you shall surely die" that Eve died immediately after eating the fruit, or even Adam, or even both of them on the same day. But what is remarkable is that the Scripture does not tell us what happened to them when they ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge. All the words of the Scripture, which describe the further course of events, are silent about it as well. The Bible tells us first of all that "their eyes were opened," they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together to cover their bodies.
Hiding From the Voice
That evening, as it says in the Scripture, "they heard the sound of the Lord GOD walking in the garden, in the cool of the day; and the man and his wife hid themselves from the LORD among the trees of the garden." God asks the first question to the first sinner: "Where are you?" This was apparently no coincidence that caused this question. God did not ask them where He was because He did not know where He was. He told them where He was to remind them and lead them to reflect on where they were. The same purpose should be served by this question to us as well. But people all the time turn away from God and hide, and so do their words when they find themselves in such a position. The man blames the woman and even God for giving him the woman: "The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me some of the fruit, and I ate it." The woman blames the serpent: "The serpent deceived me, and I ate it." Presumably, the serpent had no one to blame, so he did not say anything. Two sentences from the Scripture describe, with painful clarity, what goes on every day in the hearts of people who believe they are right to hide from God.
The serpent's three-step pitch: distort the command, deny the danger, dangle the reward.
The Price of Knowing
God speaks to the man first, pointing out that the woman gave him the fruit. "What is this you have done?" – says God to the man. "The woman you gave to be with me gave me some of the fruit, and I ate it." But it seems that the man finds it difficult to answer this question directly. "The woman whom you gave to be with me," – he repeats the words again and again, as if trying to convince himself that he chose a bad companion and fell with him by accident. But this cannot be the reason for his condemnation, says God. That is, she was the one who persuaded him to do it. "The serpent deceived me, and I ate it," – says the woman, and she blames the serpent. Presumably, she does not know that she deceives herself in blaming the serpent because she gave the fruit to the man on her own initiative. Therefore, she says she was deceived by the serpent when in reality she was just mistaken. "Cursed be the serpent," – says God, – "and I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel." It is not only the doom of humanity and the first condemnation of the serpent that meets the reader with this verse. Hidden in it is the first promise of salvation, a glimpse of the long road that was prepared by God for people in the time of the fall. It is no accident that right after God subjected the serpent to the curse, indicating that his evil influence would be opposed by the power of God, that there would be a struggle between the serpent's offspring and the woman's offspring in whom God would show His power. This struggle would last until the final destruction of the serpent's evil influence in the world. It must be noted that this verse contains many meanings that were and still are the subject of various biblical research. Most scholars, however, agree that, first of all, this is salvation from the power of evil, just the beginning of the long history of salvation that God began in the fall and humanity. Therefore, the narration about the fall in the Scripture contains, in addition to the words about the separation of humanity from God, words about hope and consolation, the promise that one day the evil in the world will be defeated, and a way out of the fall for everyone who falls. In other words, everything necessary for the salvation of people has been prepared by God in His infinite mercy, even in the words about the fall.
Exile from Eden — and a strange mercy: God clothed them before sending them out.
A Glimmer of Hope in the Curse
Even before the punishment was brought upon them, God prepared a measure of mercy for the first sinners. "And the LORD GOD made for Adam garments of skins and clothed him" – thus, God showed mercy to the first humans and provided them with clothing more appropriate to the new conditions. Even in banishment, the man still had the comfort and mercy of a Heavenly Creator. Not to be without clothing, without protection from the hot sun and cold night, God brought him clothing made of animal skin, presumably with special care and attention. After all, he was in the body that he brought upon himself by sin, the body that would return to the dust from which it was taken, and he had to feel comfortable in it. In addition to clothing, this episode demonstrates God's attitude towards the first humans, who had, unfortunately, fallen by their own choice. He did not abandon them but, on the contrary, cared for them, saved them, and showed mercy and compassion. Even when He drove them out of Eden, he ensured they would not feel anguish and suffer from hunger. And He drove him out of the Garden of Eden to till the soil from which he was taken. So it was not merely a punishment that drove the first humans out of the Garden of Eden. They themselves wanted to get away from the all-powerful and almighty Lord. They hid from Him because they did wrong, shameful, and dishonorable things. So they were driven out, but they left with the comfort and mercy of a Heavenly Creator. And even banishment from the most beautiful and best place could not be considered a final punishment for the fall if one considers that God gave them clothing of animal skins, which undoubtedly was a sign of special care and attention. Even the punishment was light for what they had done because it was not a permanent punishment. So God was infinitely merciful and kind, even to the first humans after their fall.
Echoes of Eden
It is difficult to imagine how many stories have been created in different cultures about how the first man and woman lost their wonderful home and the opportunity to live in the most magnificent conditions. Different versions of the story of the exile of the first people from the heavenly garden continue to be born and live even today. However, it is this story, and primarily its wording in the Scripture, that has penetrated into the cultural consciousness of mankind and continues to live in it. It is impossible to talk about culture and not mention the "fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil" and the "fig leaves" with which the first people tried to cover their nakedness. "Eden," which means delight in Hebrew, has become the name of the ideal world, the destination of every person. John Milton even wrote a superb poem about the first people and their fall, called "Paradise Lost." Theologians call the fall of the first humans, the event from which the long and devastating history of humanity knowing and constantly falling into sin begins, the turning point in the history of the world. Thus, the event described in the Scripture has played and continues to play a significant role in the development of theological thinking about the place of man in the world. But even if a layman, who knows nothing about theology, turns to this story, he will quickly realize that it inspires reflections on the most essential concepts of human life – good and evil. It is no wonder that the first humans' fall from a life of pleasure and ease into an unrestrained and hungry path for material pleasures resonates so strongly with people, having found its reflection in their cultural and historical development. After all, every person at least once in his life faced the temptation to do what he was told not to do, just because it was prohibited.
