Hello Tony,
Thanks for taking the time to comment.
You said:
I am no Bible scholar but for some reason I find this disingenuous and twisted so much it is crazy.
We don’t have to be Bible scholars to discuss the text.
You ask some good questions and raise some good issues. Let’s dig in.
You said:
Here are just a few examples:
1. How is it an attack? Just because it points out what it actually shows? Just because you don't like what the text says?
It’s an attack because Satan wants to separate them from God. They are fully submitting to God, enjoying paradise, enjoying God and each other.
After Satan’s attack, they are separated from God, blaming each other, losing Paradise, losing the enjoyment and life they had previously enjoyed.
Satan’s attack worked. It destroyed their lives, their relationships, their very natures.
It’s an attack because he sought to cause destruction and pain.
You said:
2. “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?”
Satan asked a question. That is what the question mark is for. The Bible conveniently leaves out the rest of the conversation prior to the question. Was Satan there when Eve was told? Did she ask him? Do we know anything really? It is interesting that you know what God’s focus was and even if Eve understood the point?
Satan asked a question, but twisted God’s words.
He wasn’t interested in her answer, but rather in giving her a false answer. When she responded, he lied. His interest was never seeking information, but giving her false information.
He lied to her and tricked her into committing an act that lost her Paradise.
You said:
3. How is she in a defensive posture exactly? It seems someone is twisting the text to what they want to hear. Satan asked a question and she answered, correcting Satan’s misunderstanding. It is also amazing you got -“Satan’s focus is limit, denial, lack”
How much can you possibly read into a statement without any context at all?
She thought she was correcting him, but she gave incorrect information.
Satan certainly focused on limit, denial, lack. He focused her attention on what she lacked, according to him: being like God. He focused on God denying her that, and promised a way to get it.
You said:
4. I see nowhere in the text that Eve even knows what death is? And it is very clear she doesn’t know what good or evil is. So telling someone to not eat of a tree or else ..&^^(#&$)&)& will happen doesn’t mean much does it? Well if you twist it sure it would. Lol
She knows what good is. Good is God. Good is everything God gave to her. Good is everything she has ever experienced.
Eve had every reason to trust that God was telling the truth in telling her to avoid that tree. God gave her every possible reason to trust Him. He was her life, the source of all her goodness, the giver of everything good.
She had no reason to trust the serpent.
She was well equipped for the fight. She had the clear command of God. She had every reason to trust God.
She had also been warned by God that she would have to put things under authority in Genesis 1. God gave humanity dominion in two kinds. One was kabash -- which is the dominion to put things under submission that resist it.
Adam and Eve had warning they would need to put rebellious things under authority.
When the serpent started questioning God’s word and God’s goodness, they should have put him under authority, corrected him, and resisted him.
They didn’t.
You said:
5. “serpent’s re-interpretation” How is this a re-interpretation? I think you may have issues with the English language.
The serpent twisted God’s words.
God said to avoid only one tree, that specific one.
He questioned, did God say you can’t eat from any tree?
Once Eve responded, he re-interpreted God’s words, saying that God gave this command to keep things from him. That was his false interpretation of God’s words, and it led to their downfall.
You said:
6. “Satan says the same thing God says: they will know good and evil if they eat from it. He tries to pass this off as secret knowledge God hid, yet it’s in the very description God Himself gives of the tree.”
WOW! That paragraph was sooo disingenuous.
God called it the tree of knowledge good and evil and that it NO way explains anything to someone that doesn’t know the meaning in itself.
It is all in the name.
God gave them everything good. They knew good. Good was everything God gave them: Paradise, every need met, beauty, satisfaction, love, relationship, peace.
All they knew of evil was that it was not good. They loved good. They enjoyed good. Evil was not that.
We can use different words to make it clearer.
They loved X. They enjoyed X. All of life was X and it made them happy.
God warned them that if they entered the dangerous area, life wouldn’t be only X anymore. It would also have Y, and Y is not X. You love X. You like X. And Y is not X.
You said:
“She likes red and blue” Yet if you don’t know what red or blue even means yet, how does that help even a little? By definition God said they don’t know so how could they know? This seems insanely simple.
If I have a folder that says “Top secret diagram of a —--” and I do not allow you to open it and then you saying you know what the diagram is of is ridiculous.
That would indeed be ridiculous.
But that’s not what it’s saying.
Eve didn’t know evil by experience.
But she knew that it was not good.
She knew that the God who loved her, created her, and provided everything for her warned her away from it.
That’s all she needed.
You said:
7. Satan claims they will not die upon eating, contradicting God. –I agree and Satan was obviously correct.
Satan lied.
They were immortal, sinless, deathless.
They became mortal, sinful, bound to die.
Eating the forbidden fruit was functionally the same as ingesting poison. It led directly to their physical deaths.
You said:
8. Why is there shame exactly? Is being naked evil? They now know good and evil…sooo which is it now that they have shame? Is shame evil? I am unsure how shame has anything to do with it.
Being naked with each other was good. They were naked and felt no shame at the end of Genesis 2.
Shame caused them to cover up.
Shame didn’t exist before sin, because there was nothing to be shameful about.
Shame was how they tried to deal with their sin.
You said:
9. “Before they ate…” This paragraph and your idea of all that is taken from which scripture? Obviously not every desire was fulfilled was it? I mean that is literally the point of this whole thing. You are just adding your own thoughts when it doesn't say it.
I’m trusting that the text means what it says.
Their desires were met.
Shelter? They lived in Paradise. The weather was so good they could walk around naked.
Connection? They had intimate relationships with God and each other, unmarred by sin or shame.
Hunger? They had every edible plant at their disposal.
Significance? They had purpose designated from God to steward the entire world and bring it under their authority.
Entertainment? They had an entire world to explore and uncover.
Wisdom? They had personal access to God, to whom they could ask any question.
What desire was there that wasn’t being fulfilled?
You said:
God knows the future and what is going to happen, he knew that they would sin, he knew they would eat from it, he made the situation for it all to happen, and to blame it on Adam and Eve is crazy.
Like you buy a puppy, you put it in a cage, you then tell the puppy if it eats the steak you toss in that you will shoot it and then you leave the room. You know you set up the situation, the dog has free will, and then you blame the dog.
Your puppy illustration is horrible, but not at all what God commanded.
God gave them absolutely everything good, an abundance of plants and trees to eat from. They had no reason whatsoever to eat from the forbidden tree, and they weren’t interested at all until the serpent called their attention over to it.
God wanted Adam and Eve to learn dominion. He repeated it twice in Genesis 1.
He would rather they have the chance to try and fail then never to learn at all.
You said:
10. Where exactly are they blaming each other? I am pretty sure Adam said the woman gave it to him…umm she did. He stated a fact and I see nowhere does she say he did it. She said the serpent told her to. I am unsure how this is all blaming the way you make it out to seem.
That is the blaming.
Instead of Adam taking responsibility, he blames Eve. He doesn’t say “You’re right, I did it, and I’m sorry.” Instead, he says “She gave it to me.” It’s blame.
You said:
11. “Genesis 2 describes humanity as both physical and spiritual.” I am unsure how humanity has anything to do with life. It is obvious life is NOT the body itself since we have dead bodies lol. AND to say “In Genesis 3, Adam and Eve’s bodies do not die immediately — but their souls do.” Is just plain comical. So now you can live without a soul huh? LMAO! THEN to say “In the grand scheme of things, spiritual death is far more difficult for God to heal than physical death.” It is more difficult for God??? Yeah we don’t want to strain this all powerful being. This is so crazy and comical.
We don’t live without a soul.
People live with dead souls.
Thus Paul can say “You were dead in your transgressions and sins...” in Ephesians 2:1.
To be “born again” is to have your soul brought to life. Read John 3 for Jesus’ explanation.
As for physical death being easier to heal than spiritual, it’s clear.
Jesus can raise the dead fairly easily. He does it often.
But to pay the penalty for spiritual death, so that we can be born again, Jesus had to suffer Himself and pay the penalty for our sins -- the same sins and transgressions in which we were dead.
Jesus had to die to pay for them, to remove them, so that our souls can be reborn.
This is laid out plainly in the New Testament epistles, especially Romans.
You said:
"Yet out of everything Satan said, one lie stands above all:
““…you will be like God…” (Genesis 3:5, ESV)
This is the whispered promise inherent in every temptation to sin: by rebelling against God, you can become like God. You don’t need to bow down to God. You can become your own God.”
How about the actual full quote??
(Genesis 3:4-5, ESV)But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. 5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Which is VERY obvious it wasn’t "you can be your own God"
To be like God is to be your own God -- in the context the serpent provided.
They were already like God in terms of creation. They were alive, they had minds, they had independent wills.
The serpent tempted them with the promise of being like God in terms of knowledge and power: to know good and evil, and to therefore be like God -- more knowledgeable, and because you're more knowledgeable, more powerful.
And because you're more knowledgeable and powerful -- more independent of God. More able to rule your own life instead of letting God rule it.
You said:
(Genesis 3:22, ESV) Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil.
What you didn’t bother to read when God himself said it the EXACT same way that Satan did?
The same phrase is said, but with completely opposite meaning and emotion.
The serpent promises "the knowledge of good and evil" as if it's a good thing.
It's not. It's a tragedy.
Before, they knew only good.
Now, they corrupted their lives with evil.
God says the same phrase, but as a lament. His children have done evil, suffered evil, and will visit evil on each other, now that they know what it is.
You said:
Stop twisting everything and read. I can't keep going on with this, so much blatant twisting and adding to what the scripture actually says,
Good luck
My friend, you ask good questions.
Let’s keep this as a dialogue.
Let’s not make this an avenue for personal attacks.
