The Knowledge of Good & Evil
What Gives?
God instructed Adam and Eve to avoid the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good & Evil. So let’s think about that title for the tree for just a moment. This means, prior to eating the tree’s fruit, Adam & Eve had no concept or perception of good or evil. They were just there, with God. Which may spark a few questions.
Were they living in “good” but just no name for it because it just was?
Did evil exist outside the Garden?
The serpent must have had knowledge of “good & evil,” or he would not have been able to persuade Adam & Eve to disobey God.
Why did God make the tree in the first place?
A New Perspective
Maybe the devil wasn't lying to them, as many of us have been taught in Sunday School. He told them they would “become like God,” and who else would have such great knowledge of good & evil but God Himself?
So when they ate the forbidden fruit, “their eyes were opened,” meaning they saw both good & evil. So in a sense, the serpent was correct. This perception of what is good and what is bad was God's, making Adam and Eve more like God when they ate this fruit.
Soteriology is a fancy term used by theologians to describe the study of salvation. There are plenty of excellent resources out there on that, but I wanted to flesh out this thought experiment in less of a rigid educational sense and more of an awe-and-wonder kind of way. The end result of soteriology brings us back to our state in the Garden, prior to the fall and the eating of the forbidden fruit.
Is heaven just an ignorance of good & evil?
Will the new heaven and new earth have forbidden fruit?
To answer the first question, we just don’t know. We do know there will be no sin, death, or sickness. But that existed prior to the two shmucks who ate the fruit in the first place. Will there be more “forbidden fruit” in the New Heaven and Earth? I don’t think so, the bible makes it pretty clear that a time will come when He will triumphantly and finally destroy evil.
Without getting lost in the weeds, we can make a pretty important observation. That is, humanity was never intended to bear the burden of knowing things like good and evil, because without it, we are free to experience the beauty of life with God, uninhibited. If you do happen to look into soteriology, you will learn that there was an intention behind the tree existing in the first place. God wanted a people that would choose him, not people who were forced to choose him. That is not love, and hearing praise from people out of fear is very different from hearing it out of love and intimacy. The former is an endless mining of a “good,” and the latter is a mutual exchange of gifts and admiration.
A Whole New World
Thinking about this always makes me wonder what life is like in the New Heaven & Earth without having to carry the burden of confronting evil regularly. One day, we will truly know that feeling, but until then, we do have this knowledge of good and evil. Thankfully, we have the work of the Holy Spirit and God’s Word to begin exchanging bad for good. Piece by piece, we can participate in building heaven on earth.
This is a bonus piece that wasn't originally part of my prep for this post, but hey, it’s my blog, and I can do what I want. So if this seems a bit random, well, I have ADHD, so just go along with me, please.
I am currently reading a book called Garden City by John Mark Comer, which explores this idea of life in the Garden and life now. I made a link to it on the title, so I encourage you to click it, buy it, or save it for later. The premise is that God created Adam and Eve with two mandates. Be fruitful and multiply (thank God we can still do that part), and to subdue the earth and rule over it (aka work). Both are a part of our designed purpose. Each one of us has something we do, it is what we were made to do, and it is all for God’s glory. Imagine we are in heaven, Jesus has come back, and we had a big party, ate at the table, and the next day we get up and go do our jobs. What would your current job look like in heaven? It does not matter if you are a student, a stay-at-home parent, or a doctor; your job has the potential to be as it is in heaven, in the Garden. Comer’s point is not that you have to hand out tracks in the hallways of your school, or to blast Christian music while you are flipping burgers. The point he argues is that whatever profession one is in, do it to the same standards that God himself would do it. When Jesus was a carpenter, what was the quality of his work before he started his ministry?
Even though we have been burdened with this knowledge of good and evil, we can still strive for the good. Go out and do what you do, and do it so well that people take notice. They don’t just notice your skill in your craft; they notice your demeanor. They notice your motivation for doing something so well is not for yourself, but for the love of God and the craft he has you working. Let your life be distinctly different, in contrast to the evil that has distorted so many things, so that people take notice, and the only explanation is God.