A tale of two trees...

I don't know about you. I've always wondered what the real difference was between the "Tree of Life" and the "Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil" in Genesis (2:9).

 

Buckle up. This is going to be a little bit longer than I'd like. But if you stick with me, I promise it'll be worth it. This is a notion that can have a HUGE impact on how we understand pretty much everything else we read in Scripture regarding sin and grace.

 

Even when I was in seminary, the explanations I heard from some of my professors/teachers about the meaning of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil didn't feel right. Something in my gut told me their interpretations were incomplete, it was like they were grasping at straws.

 

It was like they were reading later ideas back into the Garden narrative. Whether those be ideas gleaned in later Scriptures, or from our own presuppositions, that's something we have to be careful about.

 

It's called an "anachronism," and we all do it (usually subconsciously) whenever we try to force our modern-day views/assumptions/interpretations back on texts written in a totally different literary and historical context.

 

I've always had a pretty good "instinct" for sniffing out off-the-mark or insufficient interpretations.

 

This is the "usual" or "most common" explanation for what the "tree of knowledge" represents.

 

It goes like this. Because man hadn't sinned before, once he disobeys, he'll finally know what sin is and it will be obvious in distinction to righteousness/obedience. He'll know the difference between good and evil because he's finally discovered what being evil is all about.

 

There's a big problem with that interpretation, though. It imposes later Biblical notions of "sin" on the text. It imposes a concept that's developed after the fall onto a pre-fall existence. And it doesn't seem to jibe with what happened. Not exactly.

 

I've also heard it explained as God's way of honoring free will. For man to be free, he had to give man a way he could choose disobedience.

 

Again, though, this is conjecture. Free will is a concept rooted more in later Greek philosophy and isn't a major theme in Scripture. A lot of people impose free will on texts in the Bible when the entire notion of a "free will" wasn't developed for centuries... and by another culture/people entirely. See my statement about "anachronism" above.

 

I'm not saying we do/don't have a free will (that's a totally different debate/issue). It's just not the way the original Hebrews who received/re-told this Genesis story would have interpreted it.

 

I think to understand the significance of the text and what the fall of mankind really involves we have to listen closely to both what God tells the primordial couple... and the way the serpent tempts them...

 

The serpent isn't a good source of information, of course. It's a deceiver. But the deceiver's favorite tactic isn't to tell outright lies... but to twist the truth... or to tell a partial truth and "spin" it like a reporter on a cable news network.

 

One of the biggest problems with the "common" interpretations of the two trees is that they focus on the good/evil distinction to the neglect of the word "knowledge." It's not just about good/evil... it's about a knowledge that's forever thereafter normed by the distinction between good and evil. 

 

Allow me to explain and justify this interpretation based on the context. 

 

First, God is the only one we've known so far who has declared anything "good" in the Bible. God makes everything in existence, declares it "good." A few verses after introducing these two trees God says that it's "not good" that man should be alone (Gen. 2:18).

 

I could write books (and some people have) about the significance of the creation of man/woman, and why it's only "good" for man to be in relationship... because that relationship is how man participates in the Divine relationship.

 

But the image of God is only realized in relationship.

 

It's this image/likeness of God that ties into the serpent's temptation.

 

We hear that man and women are made in the image and likeness of God (Gen 1:26-27). Then, when the serpent first addresses Eve, he tells her that God only told them not to eat because... "...God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil" (Gen. 3:5, NIV, emphasis mine).

 

In Gen. 1:26 specific words are used for "image" and "likeness" that have a much narrower meaning than the word for "like" that the serpent uses. In Gen. 1:26 the words "image" and "likeness" are צֶ֫לֶם/selem and דְּמוּת/demuth respectively.

 

Both words are pretty darn technical. An "image" in the ancient world is what someone who represents one's king might carry, a token of authority, that extends that king's authority to the messenger. If someone is carrying a king's "image" it means he's acting not on his own authority, but out the derived authority of the king. The "likeness" is similar. It implies a "similitude" but also distinction. To get what the "similitude" is... it's what God defines in these verses.

 

It has to do with exercising God's dominion. That doesn't mean that man and woman are supposed to "lord over" the creation like tyrants. It's quite the opposite. It means they are to be extensions of God's selfless love and service to the world.

 

As I said in yesterday's e-mail, to know what it means to have "dominion" one must understand the nature and heart of the "dominus" (Lord).

 

But the serpent doesn't use these words for "image" and "likeness." He uses a much broader preposition. In Hebrew, in fact, it's just affixed to the word it modifies. כְּ

 

That little word is so broad that any range of understandings are possible. Sure, it might be what God indicated when he used the terms "image" and "likeness," but the way the serpent uses it suggests that this is going to make man/woman on the level with God. It will make them not just God's representatives, the serpent tempts, but will make them like God in a way that gives man and woman the authority to declare things "good" or "evil" the way God alone did in Creation before. 

 

The serpent uses such a "flexible" word that it's not an outright lie. But the way he spins this it gives Eve (and Adam when she bids him to join her) the impression that God doesn't want them to take the fruit of the tree of knowledge because God is somehow afraid that it will make mankind his equals.

 

The creation can never exalt itself above its creator. But what this temptation involves... and what the tree of the knowledge represents... is a way of playing God.

 

It's an obsession with dividing the world into the categories of "good" and "evil" as we see fit. 

 

A way that tries to understand what's "good" according to our own nature... our own passions... our own desires...

 

But what God had called "good" was meant to come only by way of a gift. God gave man a gift of life. That's what the other tree was about. The one they were allowed (and encouraged) to eat from. It was given by God. To eat from the Tree of Life meant to understand that everything the have, know, and understand is a gift.  

 

To eat of the other tree is to reject the gift. To take what wasn't given. To spend a life "playing god" by doing something humans aren't constitutionally suited to do... to obsess over dividing things between what we think is "good" vs. "evil."

 

It reduces the world (as we see it) to two binary categories. An obsession with right and wrong... and the mistaken notion that getting right and wrong... well, right... makes us righteous.

 

But God's categories for us, the ones that are meant to define our existence between ourselves and God aren't "good" and "evil," but "gift" and "giver."  

 

To "sin" isn't just about disobedience to an explicit command. It's to claim what isn't given. To misuse what has been given and to bend it toward our own pathologically self-centered desires.

 

That's probably the best definition of sin... a pathological self-centeredness. 

 

And just like the serpent took something that God had said, something God had made "good" (the image/likeness of God in man) and twisted it into a deception meant to warp man toward this pathological self-centeredness...

 

That's where most "sin" becomes "sin." When it ceases to reflect the pattern of the gift/giver... the dynamic between a selfless and all-loving God who gives us every perfect gift... who receives it in faith... and the inward-focused, self-serving idea that we can "seize" what we want to satisfy our passions/selfishness/god complexes.

 

Biblical sexuality is good because it involves one person giving himself/herself to the other, and receiving the gift of his/her partner in turn. It's the pattern of gift and giver.

 

Sexual sin (in Scripture) is any ideology that bends/uses this gift solely for the pleasure of self. It's a misuse of the gift. That's why Christian sexuality often looks a little "strange" to the world. It's not about what we find attractive/desire, or what satisfies us. That's not our primary concern. It's a question of who has God given us... who are we to give ourselves to... and how can that experience draw us closer to God, closer to understanding the intimacy that God desires to have with us?

 

There's a beauty in that. It gets overlooked and is totally missed when Christians focus on certain behaviors and the "knowledge of good and evil" way of examining sexual sin. When we start condemning things like that, we miss the point. We're asking the wrong questions - questions we aren't given to ask.

 

And when we focus on trying to impose these "condemnations" or "justifications" on the world without the understanding of God's role in all of it... without emphasizing the gift/giver dynamic... well... we're playing God (to put it bluntly). We're doing a "Tree of Knowledge" kind of thing.

 

Murder is about taking someone else's life (a gift that was given to them, that we have no right to claim) and acting as if we're God... taking life when it's not ours to take.

 

This is huge. Jesus condemns the Pharisees for example for turning the sabbath into a burden... and using it as a litmus test to decide who is/isn't righteous... but it was supposed to be a gift. It was meant to be a day of rest (because rest is good!) (Mark 2:27).

 

It's also why under the "new covenant" (in the era following Christ) the prophet Jeremiah declared that the new law would be written on our hearts (Jer. 31:33). It was never about strict observance of rules/regulations/commandments. It was about understanding the nature of the gift/giver and living in that communion with God rather than self-seeking.

 

That means the way to "diagnose" sin isn't about proof-texting, or finding a specific text that we can use (usually out of context) to label something as inherently "sinful" or not.

 

It means examining the heart of the matter. Are we behaving within the dynamic of the giver and the gift? Or are we engaged in self-seeking? Are we "exploiting" or "using" others for our gain, envy, hatred, or pleasure... or are we receiving the gift of other givers (because we can "give" of ourselves since we are made in the image/likeness of God) and giving of ourselves in turn?

 

The word to "repent" really means - literally - to change your mind. You can see the roots in the world... the word "pensive" (which means someone who is thoughtful) is reflected in the Latin word "repent" (poenitet) which comes from the Greek word (metanoia) which means the same thing. "Meta" means "change" and "noia" (related to the word nous, or "mind") has to do with someone's thinking. 

 

In other words, "repentance" isn't merely about feeling really sorry... and stopping our bad behaviors...

 

But this usually accompanies true repentance. Because when we re-orient our minds... when we redirect our hearts... we usually do feel some remorse about our past actions and misdeeds. And such a change of thinking should invariably result in different behavior.

 

It means a reorientation of our mind. It means a "tree of life" recalibration of how we operate in the world, how we think... and a turning away from the self-serving, binary-thinking, us vs. them, good vs. evil "tree of knowledge" way of operating and thinking.

 

All of this isn't to say that certain things are or aren't inherently sinful. It is to say that when we're trying to decide what is or isn't sin by mere proof-texting, or condemnations, we are missing the point. We need the right diagnostic tools... the right lens... we need to understand the tale of these two trees.

 

A lot to consider. If you're like me, this understanding is like scales falling from your eyes. It allows us to see not only "sin" in a more Biblical way and to identify it in our own lives (how much self-seeking do we get away with and justify) and to examine the deeper meaning of grace and salvation.

 

Consider this passage:

 

[Christ] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.  And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. (Col 1:15–20, ESV).

 

The pattern of pathological self-centeredness is reversed in Christ who embraces the gift/giver dynamic in the most powerful way imaginable. God takes human flesh and dies... just as the first man and woman died (spiritually and eventually physically) when they embrace the tree of knowledge.

 

He gives of himself... and enters into our "cursed tree" by dying on a cursed tree of a sort (a Roman cross) so that the image of God can be restored in us through Him. So that we might see the path back to the Tree of Life... a tree where the gift/giver offers Himself to us... so that we might become gift givers to the world, living sacrifices, imitators of Jesus.

 

Yes... all that is wrapped up in the tale of two trees...

 

And if you're like me... it'll give you more than enough fodder to pray about/contemplate/meditate for a lifetime.

 

Amazing stuff.

 

Blessings,

Judah

 

 

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