[net.religion] Paradise was Hell

palmer (04/11/83)

    There has been a lot of talk on this net about "man's fallen
nature."  This all centers on the fact that man, woman, and snake
decided that the pursuit of wisdom was more important than the mindless
following of rules.

    Before the "fall", man spent his days doing nothing, all of his
needs were taken care of, and he was immortal.  He created nothing
(God had a monopoly on that), and he left no mark down through time.
So empty was this period, that the Bible doesn't even mention how long
it was, or what they did during this time.

    Then the snake came, and showed man a way out of his stagnation.
As a result, God got angry and turned them out of the garden, which, to
my mind, was the best thing he ever did.

    If a person does nothing, and leaves no mark, can he ever really be
said to have existed?

    Life today may not be paradise, but at least its something.

                    With thanks to the snake,
                    David Palmer

hutch (04/22/83)

David made a good point with his article, that we know relatively little
about what went on in Paradise.  As you would expect, I sort of disagree
with his assertion that it was an empty period.  At least some of the
role of Adam was that he was to name things, a mystical concept as well
as a linguistic one.  There are other Hebrew traditions about what Adam
did before the fall, as well as what Eve did.  (Perhaps if we promised
not to be too rude, someone who knows more about this could tell us what
some of the traditions are?)

Anyway, it was implied in the Fall that Adam was no longer fit for the work
which he was origianlly set for, and that the burdens of his life after the
fall might in fact have been those things which he was to do, before he fell,
now made onerous and unpleasant.

Hutch