Genesis 3 Part 3: After the Punishments

As I said yesterday, the very first thing Adam does after the punishment is declared is he renames his now pregnant wife; he names her Eve, which is mother of all the living. The very first thing God does after this is he provides clothing for Adam and Eve. The God-provided clothing is a great improvement to the fig leaves they had hastily made for themselves. God has not abandoned them or rejected them; He still cares very much for them. Why do they need clothing anyway? Before the Fall they had a child-like innocence so they could walk around naked and think little of it just like two-year-olds can do. Now that they have had sexual relations and have fallen from grace, they need clothes for a healthy sense of modesty and so they can get some work done.

"Then the Lord God said, 'Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and life for ever'--therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken." This translation does not fit well with my theory and understanding of what is happening in the first three chapters of Genesis. Of course, the first part of sentence does fit. The part that does not make sense to me is, "Now, lest he put..." I don't know Hebrew (although I wish I did), but I do have a number of scholarly Hebrew resources that I consult. I would change it to, "And now, lest both his will to do good be abandoned and his will to eat of the tree of life, and [lest] this situation be the case for now and forever."

God is not casting the man and the woman out of the garden and protecting the tree of life with an angel so they will not eat it and live forever. God wants us to eat of the tree of life, and He wants us to live forever. Adam and Eve have become like God for they have made a man. What God doesn't want to happen is that Adam and Eve, God's bride, give up entirely and stop trying to be good and draw close to God. God just lost His bride, and He is not giving up; He just promised a redeemer in the woman's seed; He just decided to send His Only Son to save man; He just clothed the couple; He just finished making all creation so that man would have a home; He just made man so that He could dwell in him and share His life with him; by no means is God giving up. His only concern is that man will give up and go over totally to the dark side. God wants man back. The next sentence would be, "God commissioned the man from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken, and sent him forth."

Chapter three ends: "At the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life." Since God does not want to lose man entirely and hopes for His turning back to Him, God wants to give the man another helper. At the front of the man, God's delight, He commissions an angel, powerful and equipped, to protect the tree of life so that the man may eat of it and have life in God. The rib lost her role in helping man to heaven, so God provides another helper who is commissioned for each of us to guide our hearts to the way of peace.

I think chapter three really ends with the first verse of chapter four; this one verse summary of the Fall states: "Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, 'I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord'."(Gen4.1). This relatively short entry tonight took me much longer than all my previous entries to date; I spent a long time consulting my Hebrew lexicons, etc.

One final note before I head off to bed (it is 1:30 A.M. right now): I think that the "punishments" given to the man and the woman were merely the natural consequence of what they did. God simply enlightened them about what damage they had just caused by their disobedience. God had planned a higher and better route for them to be fruitful and multiply, but since they had chosen the lower road, God simply told them what troubles they would find along that path.

I hope I made some sense tonight as I tackled this very difficult passage (the turkey is still keeping me going). If anyone who knows Hebrew reads this, let me know what you think. Are my "translations" possible?

Thanks for reading.
Copyright 2007.