Huh? Eve died. She’s not alive anymore. God did not say, “You will die immediately.”
God certainly said that you will die on the day you eat the fruit.
They all died. So, God was right. The serpent was lying.
You need to quote the exact verses from the OT proving His real intention.
“does all sort of Evil according to the scripture” is not enough information to know His real intention.
Yes, but not according to what God promised: You certainly die on the day you eat the fruit!
Isaiah 45:7 – “I form the light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity; I am the Lord, who does all these things”
And I said, who knows His real intention if He does evil as well as good!?
I didn’t say whether there is any verse in the Bible about God’s true intention. He certainly has evil intentions if He does evil. The act defines the intention.
Indeed, I did read your line of reasoning, and I’ll steelman it as follows: God is the one responsible for the original sin for a number of reasons; 1. God is the one who allowed the original sin to be possible by allowing the tree of good and evil to remain in the garden. 2. Adam and Eve couldn’t be held culpable, because they were fooled into committing the action by Satan, rather than having done so by malicious intent. 3. Satan could not be held culpable, because it is within his nature to vehemently despise humans anyways, and so may have been compelled, (Perhaps in an involuntary or instinctual sense), to have instigated the original sin. 4. God had infallible foreknowledge that the original sin would take place, and thus would be the one held culpable for it taking place, since it was inevitable.
This, as far as I remember, is your argument, and if this is your argument, then I’ve addressed it in depth in my first post, which you seem to not realize, because you’ve probably read no further than the opening quote.
Thank you very much for your post and understanding. I am glad to see that we are on the same page. And I read your post a couple of times.
They did die—right there and then—spiritually separated from God.
The Bible reveals that God is spirit:
“God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:24 ESV)
Man is made in God’s image:
“Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image…’ So God created man in his own image…” (Genesis 1:26-27 ESV)
God Himself is life:
“For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself.” (John 5:26 ESV)
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” (John 14:6 ESV)
And the Son is the light of men:
“In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” (John 1:4 ESV)
The tree of life was placed in the midst of the garden:
“…The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” (Genesis 2:9 ESV)
Adam was explicitly permitted to eat of the tree of life:
“And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, ‘You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat…’” (Genesis 2:16 ESV)
When Adam sinned, he was separated from God. Instead of walking with Him, he immediately hid from His presence:
“And 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 presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.” (Genesis 3:8 ESV)
As a result of their actions, they were cast out of the garden and lost access to the tree of life:
“Then the Lord God said, ‘Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—’ therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden… He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.” (Genesis 3:22-24 ESV)
So, when God said:
“for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Genesis 2:17)
He was talking about spiritual separation from God, who is life. Separation from life is, by definition—death!
This is made clear in the following verses:
“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins…” (Ephesians 2:1)
“And you, who were dead in your trespasses…” (Colossians 2:13)
In His mercy, God prevented them from eating of the tree of life so they would not live forever in their fallen and sinful condition (eternally separated from God). To live in this condition would be to live in hell:
“They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.” (2 Thessalonians 1:9 ESV)
Alright, if you’ve read my first post that thoroughly, and yet have shown no sign of having changed your mind in your last post, then what was it about my address to your OP that you found unsatisfactory?
That can be interpreted two ways: you will be condemned to die on the day you eat the fruit is certainly a reasonable interpretation. And that (acc. the story) is what happened, which makes that interpretation more coherent to the story than yours.
“But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, for on the day thou eatest thereof thou shall surely die.”
They certainly didn’t die. They lived a long life on Earth, made children, etc. If by death you mean spiritual separation from God, then that is your interpretation, which I don’t buy.
I am sorry, but I am lost. I didn’t say that anything was unsatisfactory in your post. I just asked what is your opinion about my OP.
Nowhere in Genesis is it mentioned that you will be condemned to die. It says that you will certainly die on the day you eat the fruit.
I didn’t say that you said that my post or any points in it were unsatisfactory, I stipulated that you didn’t find my post satisfactory because you questioned whether I followed your line of reasoning at first, which is an implication that you didn’t think my first response followed your line of reasoning adequately, otherwise you wouldn’t question it, or ask for opinions about it.
Yes, and I definitely agree there. I may be one of the further-from-Marxist members around here, but I can’t lay the excesses of Marxists at the feet of Marx himself. That’s also a good point.
Before he made Eve (2.21-22)God warned Adam not to eat of of the tree of knowledge. We do not know what Adam told Eve but what Eve told the serpent is not what God said to Adam. She says:
“…of the fruit of the tree which [is] in the midst of the garden God hath said, Ye do not eat of it, nor touch it, lest ye die.”
First, the tree in the midst of the garden is the tree of life, not the tree of knowledge (2.9). Second, God did not say anything about not touching it.
As Robert Sacks points out (A Commentary on the Book of Genesis) long before being written down the story was part of an oral tradition. From God to Adam to Eve to the serpent the story has changed.
It’s not merely my interpretation.
God Himself said they would die “in the day” they ate the fruit (Genesis 2:17). On that very day they hid from God’s presence instead of walking with Him (Genesis 3:8). The New Testament calls this exact condition death:
“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins…” (Ephesians 2:1 ESV)
This is the consistent teaching of Scripture, not a personal opinion.
God never said they will die on the day they eat the fruit. My Bible says “neither shall you touch it, lest you die.”
It doesn’t say, when they will die if they ate the fruit.
Can you tell us which version of the OT you were reading?
It depends on how you look at it. If God create calamity to the bad and evil folks, then it is not evil intention. He would be doing the right.
So God cannot possibly be doing evil, when He is God, with all the God qualities.
God cannot have evil intention, when God has all the God qualities. If you accepted God has the God qualities, then the qualities imply that all his acts are right, virtuous, and good. Mere humans cannot understand or judge God’s intention.
My Bible is “The Oxford Annotated Bible with Apocrypha” - OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1965
I was just wondering about your opinion on the OP. That was all.
Here, we are mainly discussing the story based on Genesis. I can certainly provide a stronger argument against God if you allow me access to the New Testament.