The story as we read it in Genesis has about it a dramatic power it is hard to match. But putting dramatic power aside, we may say that the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden, the forbidden fruit, represents all those things that would tempt Adam and Eve s descendants throughout the ages. And that brings us to the point I chiefly want to stress this morning. On the face of it, this question of Jesus could be just a question leading to some pleasant conversation. This is rank pride, and Jesus counters it by what he says and what he does.
All sin is a species of pride.
All sin is disobedience, and disobedience is a manifestation of pride. Adam and Eve both sinned by disobedience to God s precept, and, apt pupils as their descendants have always been, they too sin by disobedience to God s precept, and that is pride. Few saints or spiritual writers have had the insight into these questions that Saint Benedict had. His Rule for monasteries makes humility the basis of all monastic spirituality, and he does this because he so well understood that pride, nothing else, pride, lies at the heart of all sin, and humility is the virtue that drives out pride. And he makes obedience the chief manifestation of humility.