What Was the Forbidden Fruit?
2 October 2023 |
Dear Editor:
In her September 29 essay, “Why Did God Put That Tree in the Garden?”, Danielle Simmons informs us of how she was taught as a child of the placement of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the center of the Garden of Eden in the second chapter of Genesis, along with the commandment not to eat the fruit of this tree in Genesis 2:17: “The story of how the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil was placed in the center of the garden was often recounted as a test of humanity’s loyalty to God. Would we be obedient to God and not so much as touch the forbidden fruit?” The answer to the question is, of course, no. Instead of eating the allowed fruit from the Tree of Life in Genesis 2:16, they eat the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in Genesis 3:6.
But what fruit gets eaten?
They disobey the commandment—their first commandment—to “be fruitful and multiply [in the Garden]” before donning the infamous telltale fig leaf aprons after they become one flesh incorrectly by eating the allegorical forbidden fruit of pleasure from the allegorical wrong tree in the allegorical Garden’s center. Some would say they make a joke out of their marriage, and God responds accordingly.
Robert Hagedorn
Berkeley, California
