Genesis 3:6-13
2006.Jun.18 22:04
And they saw they was naked. And it wasn’t so good.
Read Genesis 3:6-13 | Full Chapter
When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.
(Genesis 3:6-7, NASB)
The woman, convinced by the serpent’s Harvard-level education (har har), takes from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and eats. She then gives some of the fruit to her husband, who also eats of it. Beyond the fruit’s looking good and tasty, the humans’ main reason for eating of it appears to be that is desirable to make one wise (or maybe the main reason is that they haven’t eaten from it.) And boy do they get wisdom. The knowledge comes flooding in. The realize…wait for it…they’re naked!
Stars and garters, what will we do?
What they do is cover themselves with fig leaves and hide from Jehovah. Jehovah calls out to them, the man answers, stating he hid himself because of his nakedness, leading Jehovah to ask if they ate of tree of knowledge, and Adam, setting a precedence that lives on today, promptly blames the whole thing on his wife. Eve, sensing a conspiracy afoot, blames the serpent. The humans display a process of sin, but do one thing pretty unique, aside from it being the apparent first human sin. In this process, they sin, leading to shame (evidenced by their concentration on their physical nakedness), and then they try to justify their sin. The odd thing is that they’re actually pretty open about this to God.
The sin itself is the eating of the tree from which God commanded them not to eat. It is important to note that eating from a tree is not something we see as inherently bad, despite many Christians’ desire to prove that sin is bad for society–or at least “the children”. The sin is disobedience of God, regardless of whether the humans understood why God had so commanded. They disobeyed God, and in doing so, their eyes–as are all of ours–were opened to a world where they could challenge God and disobey him. This must have brought tons of images to their minds, all of which would have made their daily walk with Jehovah a bit uncomfortable, for now they could think of him as an adversary.
They are apparently ashamed by these thoughts, and hide themselves from God. The man and woman focus on their physical nakedness, both hiding behind trees and covering their loins (a word which could, I suppose, be used outside the context of clothing–though I can’t think that I’ve ever heard it used as such) with fig leaves. This is a pretty spectacular display, considering they’ve not seen clothing (unless Jehovah wore some). I can only suppose they are comparing themselves to the furry animals, and the level of their shame is such to compel them to find any sort of covering up they can. The fact that they have something to hide testifies to their sin. It is the woman and man who, having sinned, actively separate themselves from God. This is the essence, to me, of shame: We realize that we have done something that ought to offend another and actively separate ourselves from that relationship.
The humans, when questioned by God, admit to the sin, but do not take ownership of it. I do acknowledge their immediate confession, which I believe is the result of their having walked regularly with God. When we are in close relationship with God, we tend to be much quicker to admit the truth to him, knowing both that he is already aware and that he is kind and loving–perhaps best said: we are more comfortable with him. However, they also pass the blame. To say I did that action is one step, but it must, in the case of sin, be followed with the admittance that the action was a sin on my part. Adam and Eve, rather, pass the buck. And, so, sin enters into this world.
Genesis 2:8-17
2006.May.29 15:44
A home for humanity
Read Genesis 2:8-17 | Full Chapter
God makes a home for man, that is, the dust-figure. The sort of home he makes for man is a garden, which he names Eden (or, at least, that’s what we’ve decided he might have named it). The garden is full of trees and watered by a river which then divides into four rivers, including the Tigris and Euphrates–at least thus sayeth the translation. And, as it turns out, that’s nearly all this passage has to say about Eden. I can suppose that is quite beautiful and lush, filled with all sorts of vegetation and animals, despite, from my limited geographical reckoning, being in what is now a desert. Go figure.
What he places in this garden of particular importance are two special trees:
- The tree of life
- The tree of the knowledge of good and evil
I would guess that these are symbolic in nature. That is, the fruit of either tree is not particularly special, but by naming the trees as he does God sets them up to have meaning. The tree of life is only named in this chapter; it is not really discussed. However, in addition to God setting up a labor for man, to cultivate the garden, God instructs man not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Romans 5:20 says "”The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.”" (Romans 5:20, NASB) This is the first example of the Law. Because humanity, in my guess, wishes to be as God, wherever there is Law, we will try to break it as a statement of our own godhood. This fits with God’s plan because then he can offer us grace and if we humble ourselves and accept his grace, we can develop a relationship with him not disturbed by our trying to attain equal or greater status to him. And having committed one sin–that of taking of the fruit–humanity realizes this way of attaining a pretense at godhood and will now continue to do so, until we receive God’s grace and he has perfected us.
In other words, everything is beautiful and good for humanity but we desire to be as God and so the one thing forbidden is the one we will take to prove our power. Only in doing so, we reveal to ourselves our sin and separate ourselves from God. Could God somehow have sidestepped all the resulting havoc and heartache? I don’t think so, if we are really to be the bride of Christ. But it is sad to realize how much pain we put him through because of our pride.
