Greetings to all...

For a long time I have had a difficulty with the notion of what constituted the "Original Sin" as described in the book of Genesis.

Quoting from the KJV:

Genesis 2:9

And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Genesis 2:16,17

And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Genesis 3:2-7

And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden:

But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:

For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.

Ok.. So, the "original sin" is that Adam & Eve defied God and ate from the tree that God forbid them to eat from, right?

Wrong.

Here's why:

The tree is the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Prior to eating from it, A&E had no knowledge of good or evil. It was only after they ate from it that they realized they'd done something wrong.

My argument is that: if one has no knowledge of good nor evil, then any act one does cannot be considered "good" or "evil" - it is neutral in the context of one's knowledge.

For example, if a one-year-old baby finds a Zippo lighter laying around and manages to set the house on fire, this cannot be considered an "evil" act because there was no intention of doing evil. On the other hand, a teenager - who knows what a lighter is and the danger of fire - who deliberately (not accidentally) lights the house on fire has committed an evil act because they knew what they were doing.

Since A&E had no conception of good nor evil, they couldn't possibly know that it was wrong to disobey God. How would they?

Therefore, disobeying God by eating from the tree was not an "evil" act and, therefore, cannot be considered the "Original Sin".

If anybody has any insight into the conundrum, I'd love to hear it. I've brought this up to several people over the years and have yet to find an exception to logic that I can agree with.

-ITL-

I know you won't believe this, but you can do an evil unintentionally, where "evil" just means a very bad thing to do. The baby did a bad thing. Not morally bad, of course, but something that was harmful and dangerous. A person can do something good unintentionally. So why can't he do something bad unintentionally? But it seems you have a "fix" that the term "evil" can be used only of an intentionally bad action. And, consequently, there is no way out of the conundrum for you. You have zipped yourself in.

One matter that might have to be considered is, that of the scope of our investigation. Are we only looking at Genesis here? or are we comparing, and interpreting that in light of all the theology which comes afterward?

Of course, once again, we'll have to pay at least some attention to the Hebrew wording, as well. (will do that later, since I don't have the time at the moment...) The word which we are assigning our English 'sin' to, is a matter of missing the mark of a standard. As far as I can recall, that word does not come up in that story.

We can see traces of an understanding, from much later works (especially some earlier Christian works), that it became somewhat (at the very least) common to see Adam's having disobeyed YHWH, as having been that 'missing the standard of obedience to YHWH' (otherwise termed 'sin') If my memory serves me well, the RCC's adoption of this 'original sin,' was something along the lines of having copulated with Eve? was it?

At any rate, I am pretty sure we'd find that it would be wrong to think of the story as having been designed to give the immediate and direct audience the idea that any other thing other than having not obeyed YHWH, was the error of those two. (and recall that some Christian voices in the first century seemed to have wanted to pin it on the female [and extend that to an 'at large' degree].)

Not much time but things to consider.
The story is in the first book of the Jewish Bible. It is a Jewish story.
It has never been understood as a story about original sin or sex in the Jewish traditon.
It is a story about alienation and separation from god about breaking the law.
There was some discussion about man originally being immortal and becoming mortal after being cast out from Eden since they did not die immediately when they ate the fruit.
The "original sin" interpretation comes out of the Chrisitan tradition about 300 years after the death of Jesus as Christians poured over and reinterpreted the old testament (Jewish Bible) in light of Chrisitan theology Creation, Fall, Redemption. The Fall being original sin and the Redemption being the coming of Christ. I usually prefer the Jewish interpretation of Jewish stories.

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The truth is easily vanquished but a well told lie is immortal (Mark Twain)

Unless you simply assume that all evil must be intentional, there is no problem.

I find it interesting ITL that you are only focusing on the good & evil part when there are so many other things wrong with the story.

My question is, why did god put the stupid tree there in the first place?

Think about it. I have made a metaphor before to describe how silly it is for god to place the tree there in the first place. Let's say you run a daycare for children and in your backyard you have dug a deep pit and covered it with sticks and grass to blend in with the rest of the yard. You then allow the children to play freely in that yard knowing that eventually one or more will ultimately fall into the pit that YOU put there.

So the arguments I get in rebuttal to this parallel is god being like a parent and wanting its children to avoid dangers. So even though god put the pit there it was an attempt to teach it. But that reasoning fails too, why? Because parents would love to get rid of the dangers in the world so their child will never have to face them. But since human parents are powerless to get rid of dangers, they only have one option and that is to warn-teach their child to avoid it.

So was god powerless to the placement of the tree? He never intended for the tree to be accessible by them? Why did he not foresee that they would eat of it anyways regardless of what god told them? Perhaps it was his plan all along for them to disobey, and he intentionally set them up to fail.

If I would have been god, I wouldn't have placed the danger of the tree where they could have access to it.

It was intended to give them choice, a choice between, evidently, choosing the good path or the bad path. At least that's how the story is told, I think.

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I object.

Using ITL's own reflection here, that choice couldn't be made realisticly because they didn't know prior to their acting.

Remember my metaphor? Like children playing in a yard careless, unknowingly they fall into the pit YOU dug. Is that really a choice? If you are unaware of the option to chose?

I think them even being told not to partake of the tree, was in fact an invitation to partake. Anyone who has kids would clearly understand that what you tell your kids is often an invitation for them to do it. Sorta like planting the thought in their head prior to it being there as if had you NOT said anything about it, they might not even considered it.

The TRUE choice in my opinion, would have been saying nothing at all. Letting the tree be, and seeing just what they would do.

According to the story, these two people were not children.

If a woman said to a man, "Don't rape me", and the man raped her, you are saying the woman was actually giving the man an invitation to rape her? Have fun trying to prove that in court

Eh, whether or not the choice was "TRUE" or not, doesn't matter. It was still a choice. They weren't forced to choose either way, even if they desired the tree more after God said don't touch it. We can still make our own choices, despite influence, can't we?

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I do not remember anyone mentioning "evil" or "intention" but the problem is not just "sin" but "original sin". The notion that Adam's sin is passed down to every subsequent generation such that the natural state of man is sin (fallen from grace). This notion subsequently leads to such absurd doctrines as that unbaptised infants go to limbo or purgatory not to heaven. That dying without absolution of sins (last rites) results in exclusion from heaven, etc. That salvation can only be obtained through Christ and through the Church excluding all other faiths and all other traditions.

The other problem is the notion that "original sin" involves sex or sexuality between adam and eve and that eve is primarily at fault (led adam astray) resulting in centuries of the deeming of sex and of woman.

None of these original sin notions or notions about women and sex are found in the Jewish tradition which is curious because the story is from the Jewish Bible and was "originally" a Jewish not a Christian story.
So there is still a problem not just "sin", intention or evil but "original sin".

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The truth is easily vanquished but a well told lie is immortal (Mark Twain)