From: Christian.Walters@p0.f14.n373.z1.FIDONET.ORG (Christian Walters)
Newsgroups: hsv.religion
Subject: re: adam and eve
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 92 23:46:48 CDT
Organization: FidoNet node 1:373/14.0 - The Aviation BBS, Meridianville AL

James Reed says:
>> God himself called it "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,"
>> which presumably humans did not have before the tree was eaten from.
>> Does this mean that, in spite of all the arguments for free will, God
>> originally planned for us to be puppets?
 
>No, He originally planned for Adam and Eve to trust Him enough to avoid
>something He instructed them to avoid.
 
Then why did he make such a tree and put it there? To test Adam and
Eve's faith? Doesn't God's desire for them to not eat from it symbolize
a desire to keep them from seeking knowledge? You'll probably touch on
all these in your WHY post, but I wanna be sure :)
 
>Whether or not she really understood the concept of a lie, she still
>knew what God had said.
 
Does God ever come out and announce himself as the Supreme Ruler to
them? She had no reason to trust God's word over anyone else's.
 
>Even if it is an allegory, you suggestions for what God should have
>done remove free will.  There was only one thing God prohibited.  Not a
>big long list of things.  One thing.
 
Have you never been in this situation before? Doesn't someone telling
you that you are not allowed to do something make you wanna try it? :)
 
>If there had been no prohibitions and no temptation, they would have
>been unable to exercise any free will in the matter, it would have been
>impossible for them to choose anything other than what God wanted.
>That's getting pretty puppet-like.
 
Sorry, but this sounds like overjustification to me. I don't believe the
ability to choose evil is a necessary requirement of free will. I wish I
could fly out of my chair unaided and swoop around the skies like
Superman. But I find that even after much concentration that I cannot.
Does this mean I don't have free will? Of course not. So if I can still
have free will while lacking the ability to fly, why can't I still have
free will when lacking the ability to do evil?
 
>> I believe that knowledge constitutes a good, and the capacity to have
>> that knowledge is the only thing that is distinctly human.
 
>What do you mean by "knowledge"?  Is it related to the ability to
>learn? Birds are learn where bird feeders are.
 
It's more the desire to learn than the ability, although they are both
integral. Birds remember where a bird feeder is more by training than
any type of reasoning - it's been there before, and there is food there,
so they return to it.
 
>I don't know that those aspects of civilization wouldn't have happened
>if the garden of Eden had turned out differently.
 
Maybe not, but that's the safe way to bet :)
 
>> Also, there's quite a list of punishments that God visited on A&E
>> beginning in Genesis 3:14. Ignoring the petulant attitude of "sins of
>> the father," why did he have to do that to Jessu? Isn't that being
>> punished for the same thing twice?
 
> I not quite sure I understand the question here.
 
Well, God did all of that stuff in Genesis 3 to A&E because they chose
evil instead of what God had intended. Then he does the same thing to
Jesus later on. There's no pleasing that guy :)


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