Week 3: Paradise Lost

 

Eve was a nice gal.

Adam rather liked her; in fact, within moments of her appearance, he was rhapsodizing over her. You could argue that Adam did not have much of a choice and was making a virtue out of necessity – you know …. the TINA thing. But I rather suspect that, had he the powers to create a woman, he might have crafted a cross between Keren-happuch and Jezebel, an unsustainable hybrid of the beauty and the beast!

But it was God Himself who fashioned the female, keeping in mind that Adam needed a help “meet” for him. To be honest, Eve too did not have a choice, and was generally hanging around Adam (for want of something better to do?). And Adam told Eve everything, including God’s warning that:

¹⁷ 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. Gen. 2

Now, Eve being an independent woman was not going to take Adam’s words at face value. She had a mind of her own you know. After all God did not speak to her directly and she was yearning for some confirmation of what she was told. She looked at the fruit again-curiously, suspiciously, longingly.

The serpent, subtle as it was, was monitoring the happenings with growing interest, for it detected an opportunity for foul play, his specialty. Looking at the two humans, it picked Eve as the more vulnerable and also susceptible to easy manipulation since she was already on the look-out for a voice other than Adam’s. Also, the serpent knew that once the woman was in the net, man is automatically drawn in – hook, line and sinker (the poor wretch).

Having conceived the scheme, the serpent sidled up quietly and watched Eve, watching the fruit.

Alert: It looks as though the devil is interested in knowing what your interests are and he is fully aware what visuals rivet your attention. Enough material for him to prepare the opening statement: Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? Gen. 3:1

So far, no beast had ever spoken. Rather than being amazed at this phenomenon, Eve was taking it in her stride, counting it as a kind of answer to unuttered prayer. The curiosity surrounding the tree of the knowledge of good, and evil was now at its zenith. Here was someone suggesting that the mystery could be unlocked with no serious consequences. Exactly what she wanted to hear, something that was contrary to what Adam (her husband) told her.

I guess wives derive some special pleasure in contradicting their husbands!

It only took 5 verses of conversation with the serpent (interesting that there is no mention of Eve actually speaking to Adam) for Eve’s outlook to be completely changed. To make light of God’s commands; to even modify God’s words and show Him in poor light (“neither shall ye touch it” – something that was not said). To look at everything with a selfish desire that was now breaching all bounds. To negate what God had said and put Him completely out of the picture and seat the devil in the throne.

She saw the fruit again.

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. Gen. 3:6

That the tree was “pleasant to the sight, and good for food” was already stated in Gen. 2:9. But how the Dickens did she surmise that the tree was to be desired to make one wise?

Oh, the little “adds on” by the devil, rationalizations, exaggerations, amplifications, taglines, attractive graphics, buntings, banner headlines…………..

And before you say, “what,ho?” Eve was biting into the (mist moistened, sun-kissed) forbidden fruit. To boot she shared it with Adam, in with an intent to prove him wrong.

Adam, poor sod, did not demur. Instead of chastising his wife for such a blatant misdeed and trying to limit the damage, he went along like a lamb.

Result: A schism between God and man.

Solution: A God provided Mediator to restore the lost estate.

Listen to this song by the Harmonics:

 

 

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