But why would they want to be separated from their creator, to whom they owe their entire existence to, the thing who satisfies and loves them more than any other thing can?
Perhaps they did not expect that to happen. Do you think that is possible?
I don't see any sensible reason for their decisions.
I think they must have at the time, but it is clear in hindsight that their decision was not the most sensible. We should expect that though, since knowledge is acquired over time.
If the God of the Bible is so satisfying as the Bible proclaims, then there is no reason for anyone to ever feel the need to betray him.
What does the bible proclaim about this, that you have in mind?
You make them sound uneducated and unaware of God.
I did not mean to. I meant to make them sound uneducated and unaware of the effect of disobeying God.
So who is really to blame for them screwing up?
You could ask them, or at least look to the way they responded. They hid from Him, they knew that they had done something wrong. They did go on to blame others though.
If God didn't have time to plant them with a half-decent brain why kick them out for not having a half-decent brain?
I think their brain is just as decent as can be expected of a human. I actually think the real problem is fundamentally due to the nature of time. You can't know something for sure until it has happened, then you can't change what has happened.
Shouldn't they have had all information presented to them before making the decision?
I think sufficient information is all that is needed, but the story says that they were presented with conflicting information, and they chose to trust that instead.
Maybe a sticky note that said: Hey, your in a place with everything you'll ever want and need and best of all your with me, if you eat this one utterly pointless and meaningless fruit (which you really have no good or compelling reason to do), all those free goodies will go away! Who presented with this information could possibly chose wrong?
Allow me to quote this again, you seem to have missed it the first time:
"For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
.. this is basically the problem of human greed. You cannot seriously expect everyone to be satisfied with what they have when they have an opportunity to have more. Humans just don't behave like that, they love to have good experiences.
What was the thing lacking that compelled them to abandon eternal paradise and betray God?
This bit:
"the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise"
If a life with God forever in eternal paradise is not the best life imaginable, then please go ahead and inform me on what is.
A life being master rather than slave always seems more appealing. I don't know of any person who would say otherwise. It appears by considering the assumption that Satan chose to become the prince of this world (
John 14:30), that he imagined his life would be better by doing that. Let me just emphasise that I am challenging the word "imagine", which you might have chosen incorrectly.
It seems that way.
What else could it mean? God wants you to do something and you do something different. You have been disloyal to his command. You have betrayed him.
That is interesting. It makes good sense. Do you think it is possible that sin can be defined even if God has not given a command that defines it as sin?
You asked this question:
How would one come to the conclusion that serving one's own flesh is a good idea?
I answered this:
Basing one's belief of an expected outcome on past experience of serving one's own flesh having had a positive effect, I think.
The reason I said this, is because when one comes to a conclusion that serving one's own flesh is a good idea, they are choosing to believe that serving their flesh is a good idea. There is of course the potential to believe that serving one's own flesh is not a good idea, but in this case, the person has chosen to believe that it is a good idea. Then I look to see why someone would form that belief, and I see that it is a calculation based on probability, just like every decision we make. There is no way to know for sure what the outcome of a decision will be, so all we can do is predict it. Sometimes that prediction is very reliable, but sometimes it is difficult to judge. Doesn't change the principle of my point though, that we are making our decision based on an expected outcome. When we choose to trust one expected outcome over another, we look for patterns to prove that we can rely on that expectation. So if there is a pattern of serving one's own flesh having had a positive effect (eg, eating when hungry, smoking when craving, etc), then it is likely that because past experiences of serving one's own flesh have had a positive effect, then we will be quite comfortable about basing our belief that the expected outcome of our decision will have a positive effect, on what seems like a reliable pattern of past experiences proving that we can rationally expect our decision to have a positive effect again.
