Garden of Eden thoughts

[Wertbag]

I'm always amazed when I re-read a part of the Bible which I thought I'd been over numerous times and I find new questions which I've missed previously.  Maybe its just a fresh look, or maybe something else I've heard recently has prompted my change of view but whatever it is it does make me realise that even areas I thought of as done and dusted, are still potentially worth another look.

 

The first thought I had was regarding the knowledge of good and evil.  Adam and Steve were ashamed of their nakedness so hid in the bushes.  That knowledge was meant to pass down through the generations, and yet children are not born with any shame.  Children will happily walk naked in public, will talk loudly about any subject and will discuss bodily functions with anyone who will listen.  There is no sign that a magical inbuilt knowledge of shame exists.  We have to teach that to them based on societies standards.  Some cultures have women bare chested while in the West it is considered taboo.  According to Christians both cultures came from the same source, yet they have come to different answers as to what is appropriate.

 

This thought then left me thinking, if the knowledge gained was "good and evil" then they are saying that nakedness is "evil".  Even though there were only two people in the world, and they were married/lovers so were well used to seeing each other naked.  So what evil was being done here?  There was no one else in existence to see them, so no one could be offended.  Surely a knowledge of evil would have meant they understood that harmlessly being naked is not a problem to be fixed?

 

So lets say they gained knowledge of good and evil, and yet in their utopia there was no death, nothing to steal and direct communication with God on a regular basis.  Really what evil was there in the world to concern them?  The knowledge that evil could be done wouldn't have changed the fact that none was being done.  Their lives would not have changed.

[1989]

Without my Bible in front of me...

 

It's all about control and ignorance.  Despite what Christians want you to think, God did want unthinking machines to worship Him and keep Him company and be playthings or whatever.  Without reference, Man wouldn't know if God was behaving immorally, since without the knowledge of right and wrong they'd be ignorant of the fact.

 

Another thought is that Truth has power.  After Man ate from the Tree, God hid the Tree of Immortality, lest the humans become "like us", whoever "Us" was.  Whatever power truth and immortality had, God definitely didn't want to share.

 

59 minutes ago, Wertbag said:

The first thought I had was regarding the knowledge of good and evil.  Adam and Steve were ashamed of their nakedness so hid in the bushes.  That knowledge was meant to pass down through the generations, and yet children are not born with any shame.  Children will happily walk naked in public, will talk loudly about any subject and will discuss bodily functions with anyone who will listen.  There is no sign that a magical inbuilt knowledge of shame exists.  We have to teach that to them based on societies standards.  Some cultures have women bare chested while in the West it is considered taboo.  According to Christians both cultures came from the same source, yet they have come to different answers as to what is appropriate.

 

A common thought I've heard about this is that since we live in a fallen world, children are born in rebellion against their parents, which explains their selfish nature.  Remember that a child could be executed in the Old Testament for disobeying their parents, so this is a big deal.  And while children are naked and selfish, most do have a level of empathy that a parent can't necessarily teach.  As far as different cultures are concerned, they may have come from the same source, but they don't all behave like the Christian God would want.  Think of Nineveh,  where they did so much wrong that God was going to strike them down personally.  Once Jonah preached to them they fell in line and were spared.  Is it any wonder that Christians now try to force their religion on foreign cultures to "save" them?