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When Eve Ate the Tangerine

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Jonathan Walkerin

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mmksparbud said:
God could do only what maintained free will. He does not force compliance.
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Certainly even you can see that He could just as easily have set up a scenario where Eve would have made a different choice.

Free will. Sure.

Story wise. If He didn’t want mankind to fall why would he set it up so that a single woman (of course) without a clue could just damn entire humanity with a single bite ?

Like giving a bored teenager nuclear launch keys. Nobody would care about her free will, we would care about her not messing up so nobody in their right mind would give the clueless a chance to make decisions that had an outreach far greater than they could determine.

It is just another creation myth penned up by patriarchal society needing another reason to oppress women.

“Hey you lot drove humans from paradise. You are working extra shift at the fields today and be quick about it.”
 
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grasping the after wind

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Dale said:
They had access to the Tree of Life in the Garden. Doesn't that make them immortal?
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They were kicked out before they ever ate from the tree of life. I guess that they just never got around to eating that fruit though God had not forbidden it to them.

Genesis 3:22

And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”
 
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GraceBro

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God would have just created another woman.

Grace and Peace.
 
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mmksparbud

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Good grief---you are hell bound to make God out the evil one here. What Did He ever do to you? You are going to believe whatever you want about this and you want to make God out to be cruel and evil. OK---enjoy your misery.
 
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Dale

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I'm not sure that we know that they didn't eat from the Tree of Life. My understanding is that they would have to eat from the Tree of Life regularly to be immortal.
 
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Dale

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GraceBro said:
God would have just created another woman.

Grace and Peace.
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Great! This is the best suggestion yet. What if God created another woman and she messed up as well? Or would the second woman have been forewarned?
 
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GraceBro

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Dale said:
Great! This is the best suggestion yet. What if God created another woman and she messed up as well? Or would the second woman have been forewarned?
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As long as there is free will there will be sin. And God's plan of redemption would still be in effect. Nothing would be any different today other than the details.
 
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Dale

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I am not trying to poke holes in scripture, as you seem to think. I am pointing out the limitations of the creation story that most Christians have been taught.

I was taught that the snake in Eden is the Devil, that the snake is Satan. Genesis doesn't say this. The Old Testament doesn't say that the snake is the Devil, either. Jesus did not say that the snake is the Devil. Paul didn't say it either. Only in Revelation, the last book of the Bible, and the last to be written, we find:

9 The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.
Revelation 12:9 NIV

Even in Revelation we still don't know for sure that the "ancient serpent" identified with the Devil is the same as the tempting snake in the Garden of Eden.

The fact is that the creation story that people are taught has had interpretations injected into it that were not in the original story.
 
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coffee4u

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And what or who would you have the serpent be?

The Hebrew says 'serpent' not snake. Revelations identifies the serpent twice as the devil or Satan. Rev 12:9 and Rev 20:2

He is identified again in
2 Corinthians 11:3
But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.

If this is not enough scriptural backup for you, then yes you are poking holes. The serpent/devil/satan/ancient dragon/Father of Lies is all one and the same. He is the adversary of man along with the other angels that fell.
This is also why the devil tempted Jesus in the desert. The Old Testament is a shadow of the NT. A perfect man had to be tempted and succeed to be the saviour. Where Adam failed Jesus succeeded. This is why he was tempted by the devil and why he is called the second Adam.
Unless you have another answer to why he was tempted and why the Bible calls Jesus 'the second Adam'?
 
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Dale

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Coffee: "The Hebrew says 'serpent' not snake."

It's the same thing.

Coffee: "Revelations identifies the serpent twice as the devil or Satan. Rev 12:9 and Rev 20:2."

You are correct on the verse numbers. It would be better to say that Revelation compares Satan to a snake. Take a look at the following verse. The situation is that some Pharisees are warning Jesus that King Herod wants to kill Him.

32 He [Jesus] replied, “Go tell that fox, ‘I will keep on driving out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach my goal.’
Luke 13:32 NIV

Jesus says that King Herod is a fox, or he compares Herod to a fox. It is a way of speaking. Foxes are clever animals, good at sneaking into hen houses and evading detection. In calling Herod a fox, Jesus is saying that Herod is crafty, a skilled deceiver, a man with a hidden agenda. Herod has the skills of a con man. Revelation comparing Satan to a serpent or snake has the same purpose.

Creationists say that the serpent in Genesis was a literal snake. The serpent that Satan is compared to in Revelation is a figurative serpent. It doesn't mean that Satan is an animal, it means that Satan is a deceiver.

Coffee: "This is why he [Jesus] was tempted by the devil and why he is called the second Adam."

Everyone is tempted, so the temptation of Christ doesn't need any special explanation.
 
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Dale

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6 Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. 7 And the people came to Moses, and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. 8 And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and every one who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent, and set it on a pole; and if a serpent bit any man, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.
Numbers 21:6-9 RSV

The NIV uses "snake" instead of "serpent" here.

All snakes mentioned in the Bible are poisonous, with the possible exception of the one in Eden. This is one sign that the Bible is not a science text, it takes no account of non-poisonous snakes. Most snakes are not poisonous.

Snakes are not consistently identified with Satan in the Bible. In this passage in Numbers, God tells Moses to put a bronze serpent on a pole. Surely God would not have Moses put a symbol of the Devil on a pole at the center of the Israelite camp. The Israelites did not associate snakes with the Devil at that time.
 
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