# The Story of Adam and Eve

*Exported from [Holy-Writings.com](https://www.holy-writings.com/) on 2026-06-18 — 1 clipping.*

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Karl Weaver, The Story of Adam and Eve, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> The Story of Adam and Eve
> 
> Karl Weaver
> 
> 2025
> 
> This describes the explanations of the story of “Adam and Eve” from the Book of Genesis as
> given by ‘Abdu’l-Baha, and then further speculations about it on my part.
> 
> To reflect on this story, it is necessary to go back to the story itself in English translation. The
> copy I am using is from the “New Oxford Annotated Bible”, also called the “New Revised
> Standard Version”, which is extensively annotated. I am picking up the story beginning in
> Genesis Chapter 2 verse 4:
> 
> In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, when no plant of the
> field was yet in the earth and no herb of the field had yet sprung up – for the Lord
> God had not yet caused it to rain upon the earth and there was no one to till the
> ground; but a stream would rise from the earth and water the whole face of the
> ground – then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed
> into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. And the Lord
> God planted a garden in the east; and there He put the man He had formed. Out of
> the ground the Lord God made 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 the
> knowledge of good and evil.
> 
> [Here I mention a few of the annotations. There was a “word play” originally in ancient
> Hebraic with the term “adam”, which meant a human being, and the word “adamah” which
> meant ground or soil – emphasizing the idea that man’s body is formed from the earth and it is
> the “breath of God” which brings it into physical and/or spiritual life. The term “Eden” meant
> “delight”, and was the source word for this original “garden” from God. The ancients believed
> that the tree of life conferred eternal life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil
> conferred wisdom.]
> 
> A river flows out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it divides and becomes
> four branches…
> 
> [The four branches are not important for our purpose, but they were conceived as watering the
> four corners or four directions of the middle east, although two of the four run closely aligned
> for much of the way: the Tigris and the Euphrates]
> 
> The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.
> And the Lord God commanded the man, “You may freely eat of every tree of the
> garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the
> day that you eat of it you shall die.”
> 
> Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him
> a helper as his partner.” So out of the ground the Lord God formed every animal of
> the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would
> call them; and whatever the man called the creature, that was its name. The man
> gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every animal of the field;
> but for the man there was not found a helper as his partner.
> 
> [The annotation notes that the term translated as “helper” did not have the sense of a servant
> or slave, but a relationship of mutuality and interdependence; a partner. There seems to me
> an inherent tension already in the potential understanding of the scripture concerning the
> relationship between man and woman: on the one hand she is to be his “helper” but on the
> other hand he is created first, and she is created afterward to be his companion.]
> 
> So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, then he slept; and He
> took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God
> had taken from the man He made into a woman and He brought her to the man.
> 
> [The annotation notes another word-play immediately below here, with the word “ish”,
> designating a male, and “ishah”, designating a female. So now, gender distinction clearly
> comes into play. The annotation also observes that having been created from a rib, the
> woman bears an intimate relationship to the man which is not shared by any of the other
> animals, which were all created independently of man.]
> 
> Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one
> shall be called Woman [ishah], for out of Man [ish] this one was taken.” Therefore a
> man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one
> flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked, and were not ashamed.
> 
> [The annotation suggests that this verse indicates the sexual, procreative impulse is not sinful
> but was created as a God-given impulse for a man and a woman to join together…therefore
> the relationship between them, and between them and God was so far without guilt.]
> 
> Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the Lord God had
> made. He said to the woman, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the
> garden’?” The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in
> the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the
> middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die.’” But the serpent said
> to the woman, “You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will
> be open, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
> 
> [The annotations note that here there is a suggestion, with the serpent, of evil already existing
> in the world. The serpent begins by insinuating some doubt as to what God actually
> commanded, and proceeds to cast suspicion on the true motive for God’s prohibition. The
> annotations also state that in the Septuagint version the phrase here is “you will be like gods
> (plural)” - the “divine beings of the heavenly court”]
> 
> So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to
> the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit
> and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate.
> Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they
> sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.
> 
> [The annotations suggest that “knowing good and evil” symbolizes the “entirety of knowledge”
> and that their bodily shame indicates the loss of an innocent, trusting relationship with God
> and each other.]
> 
> They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden at the time of the
> evening breeze, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the
> Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, and
> said to him, “Where are you?” He said, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and
> I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.” He [God] said, “Who told you
> that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not
> to eat?” The man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me fruit
> from the tree, and I ate.” Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that
> you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent tricked me, and I ate.” The Lord
> 
> God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you among all
> animals and among all wild creatures; upon your belly you shall go, and dust you
> shall eat all the days of your life. I will put enmity between you and the woman, and
> between your oVspring and hers; he will strike your head, and you will strike his
> heel.” To the woman He said, “I will greatly increase your pangs in childbearing; in
> pain you shall bring forth children, yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he
> shall rule over you.” And to the man He said, “Because you have listened to the
> voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You
> shall not eat of it’, cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all
> the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat
> the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread until you return
> to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall
> return.”
> 
> [The annotations have comments here – among them the observation that the serpent
> originally did not “crawl on its belly” but that this was its punishment; also this suggests an
> explanation of man’s seemingly innate fear of serpents, and an observation about the pangs
> of childbirth – apparently being related to the woman’s carnal lust for her husband, being as a
> punishment for this. Another punishment was her now being explicitly placed in a
> subordinate position to him, rather than in “the ideal equality of creation”. They also note that
> man must now “work” for food; also that “work” is not inherently evil, but it becomes “toil”
> when man’s relation to God is broken. They note that the mortal nature of man was “implicit
> in the circumstances of origin from dust”, but it now becomes a known inevitable fate, which
> haunts humans throughout life due to their disobedience. They note that beginning in chapter
> 3 verse 17 (“and to the man He said”) the word Adam has shifted from a generic term for
> human beings into a personal name for this man. Much more, not in these annotations, must
> be covered in order to discuss the concepts of “original sin”, of “knowledge” and of
> “mortality”.]
> 
> The man named his wife Eve because she was the mother of all. And the Lord God
> made garments of skins for the man and for his wife, and clothed them.
> 
> [Annotations: the Hebrew for “Eve” sounds much like the Hebrew word for “living”. In
> providing “garments of skins” the annotations suggest that this showed God’s care for man,
> even at a time of judgment.]
> 
> Then the Lord God said, “See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and
> evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and
> eat, and live forever – therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of
> Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken (ie, having been formed out of
> dust). He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden He placed the
> cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life. (this
> ends Chapter 3, with the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the garden of Eden).
> 
> [Annotations: Here “like one of us” more explicitly suggests the idea that man would become
> not like the Lord God, but like the “divine beings of the heavenly court”. Note that the
> temptation story itself only deals with eating the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil,
> although the tree of life was also mentioned in the beginning. The cherubim were conceived
> to be winged creatures, half human and half lion like the Egyptian sphinx, and statues of them
> were often placed as guardians of sacred places. Note that the “flaming sword” is not stated
> as being wielded by the cherubim, but rather is placed near it or them, “to warn banished
> human beings of the impossibility of overstepping their creaturely bounds”]
> 
> Now let us turn to an explanation of the symbolism by ‘Abdu’l-Baha, found in “Some Answered
> Questions” Chapters 29 and 30.
> 
> Chapter 29 briefly touches on Adam and the notion of original sin as follows: “But the
> majority of the Christians believed that Adam sinned and transgressed by eating from the
> forbidden tree, that the dire and disastrous consequences of this transgression were
> inherited for all time by his descendants, and that Adam has thus become the cause of
> the death of man. This explanation is irrational and clearly mistaken…”
> 
> This is followed by a more detailed discussion of the story of Adam and Eve in chapter 30.
> In this session, or chapter, Laura Cliford Barney asks ‘Abdu’l-Baha to explain “the truth of the
> story of Adam and His eating from the tree?” ‘Abdu’l-Baha explains some of the symbolic
> meanings in the story. He states, “These verses of the Torah have...numerous meanings.
> We will explain one of them and say that by Adam is meant the spirit of Adam and by Eve
> is meant his self [the human condition]. For in certain passages of the sacred scriptures
> where women are mentioned, the intended meaning is the human self. By the “tree of
> good and evil” is meant the material world…in the material world light and darkness,
> good and evil and all manner of opposing realities are to be found. The meaning of the
> serpent is attachment to the material world. This attachment…led to the banishment of
> the self and spirit of Adam from the realm of freedom to the world of bondage…By the
> 
> “tree of life” is meant the highest degree of the world of existence; that is, the station of
> the Word of God and His universal Manifestation. That station was indeed well guarded
> until it appeared…In the all-highest Paradise the tree of life alludes to…the universal
> Manifestation of God. For from the days of Adam until the time of Christ, there was little
> mention of life eternal…This tree of life alludes to the station of the reality of
> Christ…attachment of the spirit and self to the material world – which is sin – was
> inherited by His [Adam’s] descendants. This attachment is the serpent…Note that if
> these words were taken literally…it would be sheer injustice and absolute
> predestination” [ie, that all the generations of Adam’s descendants would also be punished
> by God for Adam’s sin]
> 
> He concludes with the statement, “This is but one of the meanings of the biblical account
> of Adam. Reflect, that you may discover the others.”
> 
> This is an invitation for us all to meditate on the meanings in scripture – for in many cases, in
> the stories, allegories and parables the meaning is not meant to be found in the literal
> account, but they are rich with multiple symbolic meanings, which are relevant for all time. At
> this point then, I should explicitly state my general view of this story of Adam, Eve and the
> garden of Eden. I think of it as both divine and human – I’m tempted even to say “divinely
> human”.
> 
> The surface layers of the story can be read as an “explanation” for many aspects of life in this
> world. Why do many people fear snakes? – this is a fairly common fear (as is fear of spiders,
> or of darkness, of heights, of dangerous animals, etc.) Why is childbirth so painful (and in the
> past, it was often even fatal). Why must mankind struggle, “by the sweat of our face” to eke
> out our existence and eat bread from the grain we painstakingly grew and harvested, threshed,
> ground, and baked – while all the other animals find their food seemingly with little efort on a
> daily basis? Why, in most cultures, were women subordinate to men? Was this only due to
> the superior brute strength of the men – or could some greater rationale be invoked? Why
> must we die? If God loves us, then why are our lives so hard? These are some of the
> questions which, in the literal reading, the garden of Eden story seems to address – and for
> much of history, most people did not look further than the literal or the surface story. Today
> however, many people dismiss religion altogether, due to the seeming absurdity of stories like
> this one, when taken literally – yet still without meditating on what deeper meanings can be
> found in it. ‘Abdu’l-Baha assures Laura Cliford Barney, and through her, all future readers that
> other meanings also exist in this story, and that we may discover some of them by meditating
> deeply in a prayerful way on the verses. With this in mind, I will ofer some further thoughts,
> step by step, in reviewing the language of this story as quoted above.
> 
> Note that the story begins very briefly with the creation of the earth, noting that there was not
> yet rain nor any living, growing things on the earth, but water was on the “whole face of the
> ground”. Interestingly in modern scientific views of the origin and development of the earth, it
> is thought to have gone through an early, very hot phase – in which the surface was all molten
> like lava [it was called the “hadean” phase – literally “hellish”] and then a “late heavy
> bombardment phase” between 4.1 and 3.8 billion years ago, in which huge quantities of water
> were dumped on the earth by comets and asteroids as our young solar system rearranged
> itself. It is thought that at the end of this “late heavy bombardment phase” the whole surface
> of the earth in fact was covered by water – an idea hinted at by this language, that there was
> not yet rain nor any growing things, but the water was coming from the ground and it covered
> “the whole face of” the earth.
> 
> After this very brief introduction, God is then said to have created Adam and placed him in a
> garden called Eden, which was “to the east”. God forms man from “the dust of the ground”,
> and then breathes life into him. Of course, our physical body is indeed from the earth and
> returns to it in death. As for the meaning of “breathing life” into Adam – here the meaning is a
> bit mysterious. Are we to take this as only bringing our physical life to us? [We are still
> struggling to understand how life even arose on earth]. Or is this “life” meant to be
> understood as a spiritual life – the existence of consciousness, of a soul, of an ability to
> recognize our Creator and understand the Creator’s wishes as to how we are to conduct
> ourselves in the world? Is this a reference to eternal life? Was “Adam’s” (or humankind’s) life
> intended by God to be an eternal life, once we are brought into existence? The story clearly
> seems to depict an idyllic or ideal state in which we were fully in harmony with the “Lord God”.
> The “garden of Eden” then, is but an external representation of this idyllic existence, in which
> all food is provided for Adam and Eve without any efort on their part.
> 
> Note that there is little mention of animals until the serpent appears in the story. There is the
> Lord God, Adam, and all kinds of wonderful trees with variegated fruit. We might even ask: are
> many of these “fruit trees” types which are now unknown on earth? If we saw a literal garden
> of Eden, would we recognize what we saw there, or would it look more like heaven than like
> our earth? The implication in the text is that there was no pain, no unpleasantness, no
> stinging, biting or other nasty critters – clearly a contrast with the curse later placed on Adam
> and Eve, that they would have to struggle with “thorns and thistles” and would earn their food
> “by the sweat of the face”, from tilling the ground rather than simply plucking from the trees.
> They walked nude in the garden with no concern about stinging insects, stepping on thorns or
> thistles, or anything at all requiring any sort of protection from the environment.
> 
> Also note that being formed from earth (dust) and air (the breath of God) refers to two out of
> the four “primal elements” which the ancients thought formed all things, these being earth,
> air, fire and water. These formed two pairs of opposites: earth (heavy) was the opposite of air
> (which is light) and water (cool) obviously is the opposite of fire (hot). So this story has us
> formed of two opposing primal elements: earth representing our material body, and air
> representing our spiritual nature, which is our true connection to the Creator.
> 
> Why is this garden designated as being “to the east”? There may be actual historical reasons
> for this designation in the story – some scholars have even attempted to place an actual
> approximate physical location for the “garden of Eden” on a map of the Middle East – but as
> Baha’i writings also observe, historically many great religions have arisen in this area and then
> spread westward (and spread further eastward too) – but note that Mesopotamia, Persia,
> Arabia etc. are all located east of what is now Israel. Many of the prophets of history and in
> the Old Testament, prior to the time of Christ actually did live “to the east” of Israel – as also
> did Mohammad after Him - thus we can also contemplate this direction, “to the east” as
> symbolizing not necessarily a physical place, but as the origin of spirituality, of a state of
> connectedness between humanity and the “Lord God”, via His prophets and messengers.
> 
> Next in the text, after the creation of Adam and the placing him in this garden, we have a
> comment about the tree of life being planted “in the midst” of the garden, and then also the
> tree “of the knowledge of good and evil.” Later the location of this latter tree is even specified
> by Eve as being “in the middle” of the garden – not tucked away in some remote corner which
> they might not frequent, but prominently placed, and not to be missed. The location of the
> “tree of life” however is not specified so it is left to us whether to think it is immediately
> adjacent to the tree of the “knowledge of good and evil”, or at some distance away from it. I
> think it is important to note that the tree of life is mentioned first, and immediately after it is
> mentioned the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This brings us to the heart of what I think is
> perhaps the most important metaphor in the entire story. Before they ate of the fruit of the
> tree of knowledge of good and evil, Adam and Eve were like the other animals: they were in a
> condition of “natural grace”. Not knowing of good and evil (like the animals) they could not
> alienate themselves from the grace of God. This is the essence of what distinguishes what we
> call “man” from the other animals – our ability to recognize that we have a Creator, and that
> the Creator asks certain behaviors from us and prohibits other behaviors. This means that we
> become conscious of a “moral imperative”. When we violate it we can become even worse
> than the animals, who sometimes kill each other out of instinct and natural emotions – but
> when we recognize God and strive to obey His commands, we become something far greater
> than the animals who are not able to do this. Thus God warns Adam that if he ate of the fruit
> “on that day he would die”. Note that Adam and Eve both ate of the fruit and they did not
> physically die on that day, or on the many succeeding days: they produced ofspring, and they
> lived for a very long time according to the scriptures. No – this refers to a spiritual condition –
> that once they recognized good and evil, the purpose of their free will became apparent. If
> they disobeyed or ignored God they could spiritually die, by having separated themselves
> from Him. To be human is no longer to be in a state of “natural grace” but to strive for
> consciously-chosen grace – to draw closer to our Creator, through our thoughts and deeds.
> The fruit of the “tree of life” is the life of eternal progression toward God in a way which is
> unique to “man”, unlike the animals who do not even understand that they have a Creator.
> Thus the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil leads to both possibilities: spiritual death in
> turning away from God, or an eternal life in striving to approach nearer to “Him”. The literal
> text leads one away from this true meaning, in my opinion: God did not “fear” that they would
> eat of the fruit – indeed God knew that they WOULD. This was the actual purpose of this fruit.
> Nor did God fear that by eating the fruit of the tree of life they would become “too much like
> Him” or even like the angels – indeed the fruit of that tree of life (which named first in the story)
> actually comes only after having first eaten of the other fruit – the knowledge of good and evil.
> One might say that the fruit of the tree of life was the most important thing about the entire
> garden and the reason that man was put there – but first came the knowledge of good and evil.
> Without that knowledge, Adam and Eve – though they had an awareness of God in this story
> which the other animals did not – did not yet have much awareness of God’s wishes for them,
> and thus no way of “gaining or losing God’s pleasure” – to put it into human terms. In this
> sense, the “garden of Eden” represents some pre-existing state of nearness to God, which we
> all have in our full innocence before birth, and our being “driven out” of this garden is the
> whole point of our life on earth – which is an endless test and a struggle to draw nearer to that
> condition of nearness to Him, which we will only reach in its fullness after death – which is
> indeed an inevitability for us all.
> 
> Note that the text does not make explicit whether or not Adam and Eve would physically die
> even if they never ate of the fruit of the tree of good and evil. Some believe that because their
> bodies were material, inevitably they would have died anyhow, but they did not yet have an
> understanding of this – just as most animals seem not to understand, until near the end of
> their life, that they will die. They live each day without worrying about tomorrow, whereas we
> are constantly thinking about the future and also aware that our lifespan is limited. Thus, one
> might say that along with the knowledge of good and evil, they also became aware of the
> reality of death – on that very day, they realized that their life on earth was finite. I believe this
> is a story about why we are in this world, how we are diferent from the other animals, the
> nature of our free will, of the knowledge of God, and about the consequences of our choices.
> The importance of the story is not about the garden itself, but about how “Adam and Eve” (how
> all of us) must leave the garden and live among the “thorns and thistles”, and struggle with the
> “sweat on our faces”, until we die to this world in the end.
> 
> But this is getting ahead of the text. Let’s turn back to the chronology. After creating Adam
> (man) and placing him in the garden, God creates all the other animals and asks Adam to
> name them. This story is told in a more beautiful fashion in the Qur’an, in which God asks the
> angels the names of all the animals and they do not know. Then God asks man, and man
> gives them names. The angels then realize that man has some creativity in him, which they do
> not have, as they only follow God’s instructions. And it is true: we do give names to each type
> of animals. God did not dictate to us any names for them. The animals also do not seem to
> have any “names” for other animals. They recognize which ones are like them and which are
> not like them, but without any names. And man also individually names some animals who
> come into close contact with him (like our pets) and they learn our names for them, which
> they had not for themselves before. One might say that when God “names” something, it is a
> creative act, bringing it into being (as in the beginning of Genesis when God says, “let there be
> light”, and there was light). When we name something, we do not create it, but we do
> distinguish it and analyze it and its relationship with other things in the world.
> 
> Next in the story, God wishes to give man a partner like himself yet not exactly alike: so he
> causes a “deep sleep” to fall upon him, takes from him a rib, and out of that fashions Eve. This
> almost sounds like giving him anesthesia to perform surgery on him, does it not? Like a good
> surgeon, He even closes up the wound when He is done. And Adam delights in having a true
> partner, like himself but not identical. Some read this literally, as a scriptural designation of
> man as being somehow more important than woman. I believe this might be understood
> better as an acknowledgment that throughout history and in most cultures, men were in fact
> dominant over women in most aspects. That is, this is descriptive, not really proscriptive,
> regarding the relationships between the sexes. Furthermore as the annotations said, the term
> “helper” did not imply an inferior status -that only came later. Also note the verse,
> immediately after Eve’s creation, that “therefore a man leaves his father and mother and
> clings to his wife, and they become one flesh”. This is descriptive, not proscriptive,
> regarding men and women leaving their families of origin and bonding intimately with each
> other, thus forming a new family. Those words were not written as being God’s words, but they
> were a human reflection on the nature of society and civilization, which adds more credence
> to the idea that Adam being formed first and the one to whom God speaks first, essentially
> reflected then-current cultural concepts about men and women. “And they were both
> naked, and were not ashamed – here they were still like the animals, who do not wear
> clothing.
> 
> Now comes the story of the “temptation” and the eating of the fruit. Here the serpent plays
> the role of the “bad guy”, tempting Eve to eat the fruit. But it should be noted that in ancient
> cultures the serpent was not always seen as “bad”. Serpents are ancient symbols of power
> and wisdom as well – take for example the famous “staf of Asclepius” – which is still used
> today as a symbol for physicians and the healing arts – depicted as a staf with two serpents
> woven around it (a sort of a double helix, like the shape of DNA!). Other ancient drawings and
> traditions also attribute wisdom and power to snakes.
> 
> The snake approaches Eve – why? Is this because she is somehow more “weak-willed” and
> gullible than Adam? No, not necessarily so. Recall that God’s prohibition was given to Adam.
> Adam presumably passed this on to Eve, so for her this is second-hand information. How
> closely had Adam conveyed God’s command? [In a trial, this would be called “hearsay
> evidence” and usually excluded, because it was not heard directly]. First the serpent asks her
> exactly what did God say? Did he say don’t eat any of the fruits, or was it only this fruit? Eve
> replies that it was this specific fruit – and then goes beyond what the scripture records as
> having been told to Adam, by saying that they are not even to touch the tree. (Other traditions
> have her saying that they aren’t even supposed to look at the tree.) So the serpent having
> aroused curiosity (the desire for more knowledge), Eve examines the tree and the fruit. She
> finds that the tree is attractive, and the fruit seems to be good. Being thus encouraged, then
> Eve eats the fruit and gives some to Adam – who apparently is standing right next to her. If
> we were to blame Eve for breaking God’s commands, how could we not blame Adam equally –
> since he made no attempt to stop her, not even with any verbal reminder, and he himself
> seems immediately to eat when she hands the fruit to him. One might call them “co-
> conspirators”, if this was in fact some crime.
> 
> Now that they have eaten, they realize their “nakedness”. Well, apart from the fact that we are
> “naked apes” (as Desmond Morris put it in his book title) unlike most animals which are
> covered by hair, and we do need clothing for protection from the elements – there is also, I
> think, an implication that they now became aware of sexual impulses and of the procreative
> nature of their genitals. Even in cultures where only loincloths are worn, this may be in good
> part to limit indiscriminate physical desires for people of the other gender, and to encourage
> the choosing of only particular spouses with whom to share our most intimate physical
> aspects.
> 
> Now we have the rather strange and very literal image of God “walking” in the garden in the
> cool of the evening and calling for Adam. By the way, in a famous German novel referencing
> this story, God calls out to Adam not “Where are you?” but “Where were you?” [Lit: “Wo
> warst du, Adam?” Like a mother asking a child if he touched the cookies and knowing full well
> that he did – God doesn’t want the information – He already knows, and He just wants to hear
> Adam tell the truth. And Adam’s response is also instructive. He says that he was aware of
> God being in the garden, and they hid – not specifically because they feared God’s anger
> about their eating the fruit – but rather because they were aware of their nakedness, as being
> an undignified state in which to encounter God.
> 
> Next comes a “circle of blame” – which interestingly is incomplete. God asks Adam why he
> ate the fruit. Adam says in efect “well, it was Eve’s idea”. God then asks Eve why she did it
> and she in efect says, “well, it was the serpent’s idea”. Note that God doesn’t even ask the
> serpent why it prompted the act – had he done so, the serpent might have replied “Well why
> did You, Lord, place the tree smack in the middle of the garden then tell them not to eat from
> it – you must have known they would succumb to curiosity, so you have only yourself to
> blame!” Completing this “circle of blame” is entirely reasonable, but left to the reader to
> realize.
> 
> Then come the “punishments”. The serpent is punished most severely, as the instigator: arms
> and legs are removed; he must forever crawl in the dust and “eat it”, and from then on people
> will strike at the serpent, and the serpent will bite at them. Eve is punished secondarily, by the
> pain and danger inherent in childbirth (which presumably never would have even happened,
> had they not been awakened to the purpose for their genitals) and by explicitly being placed in
> a subordinate position to man, and then man is punished to a lesser degree by now having to
> toil for a living, eating the plants of the field [i.e. this is the origin of agriculture out of a hunter-
> gatherer society], amid “thorns and thistles” and by the “sweat of his brow (or “face”) shall he
> eat bread, rather than just gather fruits.
> 
> After this comes the naming of “Eve” (woman) with a name that sounded like “living”, because
> we are all brought into life by our mothers. After this comes the provision of clothing from
> animal skins – and note this is the very first implication in the story that mankind would eat
> meat, and not just plants and fruits, for the skin of animals comes after having slaughtered
> them for food! Presumably, prior to this they were vegetarian.
> 
> Then they are driven out of the garden, “to the east”, and both a cherubim and a “flaming
> sword” are placed to guard the entrance to the garden. Why are both necessary, and just one
> apparently is insuficient? Clearly in my mind there is more symbolism here. The “flaming
> sword” is a physical sort of object and the cherubim is more like an angel – a living creature,
> and an unworldly one at that. One interpretation may be that we do not return to the garden
> until we die (the flaming sword of death cuts us down) and then some angelic being must
> judge whether or not we are then worthy to enter the garden of paradise. In fact, the reality of
> death is strongly emphasized in the ending to this story – just a couple of lines prior to the
> mention of the cherubim and sword, God states that “to dust you shall return”.
> 
> It is fascinating how strongly this story continues to resonate in our collective consciousness
> thousands of years after it was recorded. Immediately I think of John Milton’s epic poem
> “Paradise Lost”; John Steinbeck’s novel “East of Eden”, which he considered his greatest work
> and which was adapted to a movie starring James Dean; the novel “Wo Warst Du Adam?” by
> Heinrich Böll; and the novel “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt”, also
> made into a movie - just to mention a few of the innumerable works of art and literature
> reflecting on the meanings in this ancient scripture.
> 
> –   Karl Weaver M.D.
> 
> January 2026
>
> — *The Story of Adam and Eve (Used by permission of the curator)*