Did Adam and Eve know Good and Evil before they ate the fruit?

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Did Adam and Eve knew good and Evil before they eat the fruit? Bible doesn’t say they knew.

Genesis 3:22 And the LORD God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” (SIV)

GOD said ‘NOW man become knowing good and evil’. I think, before eating the fruit, Adam and eve didn’t know good and evil. Because knowledge of Good was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17. In both case, whether they did know or didn’t know good, they didn’t know what evil and its temptation is. How could Adam and eve be responsible for what they did, which they didn’t know that it is a sin, since it was the result of the temptation of serpent and Adam or Eve didn’t know how to handle the evil temptation? How could GOD consider them as sinners for something that they didn’t know?
 
Khalfan:

They were armed with a base knowledge of moral knowledge and moral duty called conscience.

AndyF
 
The LORD God gave man this order: “You are free to eat from any of the trees of the garden except the tree of knowledge of good and bad. From that tree you shall not eat; the moment you eat from it you are surely doomed to die.”
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Genesis 2:16-17
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God gave Adam specific instructions on the tree of knowledge. To go against God’s word, is that not evil? Is God’s explanation of the consequences not clear enough to come to the conclusion that eating fruit from the tree of knowledge is an evil act?
 
Khalfan said:
How could Adam and eve be responsible for what they did, which they didn’t know that it is a sin, since it was the result of the temptation of serpent and Adam or Eve didn’t know how to handle the evil temptation? How could GOD consider them as sinners for something that they didn’t know?
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Consider that Adam and Eve had an intimate relationship with God before the serpent entered the scene. Trust was established between Adam and Eve and God. The serpent chipped away at that trust and that was what did them in. It didn’t matter whether or not what the serpent offered was good or evil, what mattered is that they trusted the first-time-we-ever-met serpent over their long-standing creator, and doing so broke the trust which up until then provided them everlasting life.

It’s not as though God did not give them ample and clear instructions about the fruit of that tree…he even told them exactly what would happen if they ever touched it. The knew enough to recognize what the serpent was saying was not in line with what God said.
 
The word used for “knowledge of good and evil” is the same word used for “knowing men” or “knowing women”. In other words, an intimate knowledge, gained by experience.

There’s a lot of difference between knowing about something nasty and knowing it from having done it. I’m sure we all have learned that, to our sorrow.
 
of course Adam and Eve knew good in that their entire experience before the fall was perfect. I doubt they defined their experience untill the serpent presented an alternate. Hence their experience at the tree may have been the dawning of defining experience as good or evil. Unfortunately for us and them, the birth of this paradigm within human consciousness was breech.
 
briang72 said:
God gave Adam specific instructions on the tree of knowledge. To go against God’s word, is that not evil? Is God’s explanation of the consequences not clear enough to come to the conclusion that eating fruit from the tree of knowledge is an evil act?
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Genesis 3:22 And the LORD God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” (SIV)

GOD said ‘NOW man become knowing good and evil’. I think, before eating the fruit, Adam and eve didn’t know good and evil. Because knowledge of Good was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17. If you say they had the knowledge of good and evil, that is against Bible.

As you said, may be it was an act of evil. But did they knew, what they are doing is evil? that is my question.
 
Khalfan said:
Genesis 3:22 And the LORD God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” (SIV)

GOD said ‘NOW man become knowing good and evil’. I think, before eating the fruit, Adam and eve didn’t know good and evil. Because knowledge of Good was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17. If you say they had the knowledge of good and evil, that is against Bible.

As you said, may be it was an act of evil. But did they knew, what they are doing is evil? that is my question.
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Of course. God wouldn’t hold them responsible and impose punishment on them and humanity if they didn’t know.
 
YinYangMom said:
Consider that Adam and Eve had an intimate relationship with God before the serpent entered the scene. Trust was established between Adam and Eve and God. The serpent chipped away at that trust and that was what did them in. It didn’t matter whether or not what the serpent offered was good or evil, what mattered is that they trusted the first-time-we-ever-met serpent over their long-standing creator, and doing so broke the trust which up until then provided them everlasting life.

It’s not as though God did not give them ample and clear instructions about the fruit of that tree…he even told them exactly what would happen if they ever touched it. The knew enough to recognize what the serpent was saying was not in line with what God said.
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Consider you have a five year old child. You told him not to enter in a particular room in your house. You told him ‘if you enter you will die’. After you leave the home, one your cousin came and told your child that it OK to enter the room. Your son may have told him that dad restricted to enter. But when your cousin said ‘it is OK, I will manage dad when he will know about it’, your son entered the room. Now my question is how you gonna deal with your child? Will you claim it sin and kill him? Or will you just advise him what is right and what is wrong and fogive him as considering his mental capability of understanding good and bad?

Please, I prefer reference of Bible rather than interpretations.
 
LilyM said:
Of course. God wouldn’t hold them responsible and impose punishment on them and humanity if they didn’t know.
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Genesis 3:22 And the LORD God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” (SIV)

Why GOD said ‘NOW man become knowing good and evil’ if they knew good and evil before? Do God lie? I think, No. Before eating the fruit, Adam and eve didn’t know good and evil. Because knowledge of Good was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17.

I told you, if you say, they knew what they were doing is evil, that is against Bible.
 
Mintaka said:
The word used for “knowledge of good and evil” is the same word used for “knowing men” or “knowing women”. In other words, an intimate knowledge, gained by experience.

There’s a lot of difference between knowing about something nasty and knowing it from having done it. I’m sure we all have learned that, to our sorrow.
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Genesis 3:22 And the LORD God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” (SIV)

You also have to agree that, the process of learning from experience is complete when God said ‘man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil’. Man became like God. God doesn’t learn new things from experience, but we do. In short, what you said ‘knowledge, gained by experience’ is wrong. Because I can’t say God is wrong.
 
Benadam said:
of course Adam and Eve knew good in that their entire experience before the fall was perfect. I doubt they defined their experience untill the serpent presented an alternate. Hence their experience at the tree may have been the dawning of defining experience as good or evil. Unfortunately for us and them, the birth of this paradigm within human consciousness was breech.
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Why GOD said ‘NOW man become knowing good and evil’ (Gen 3:22) if they knew good and evil before? Before eating the fruit, Adam and eve didn’t know good and evil. Because knowledge of Good was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17.

I prefer Bible reference rather than interpretations or assumptions.
 
Khalfan said:
Why GOD said ‘NOW man become knowing good and evil’ (Gen 3:22) if they knew good and evil before? Before eating the fruit, Adam and eve didn’t know good and evil. Because knowledge of Good was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17.

I prefer Bible reference rather than interpretations or assumptions.
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It’s as simple as the fact that there is more than one type of knowledge. A lot of European languages have more than one word for ‘know’ for this reason. English doesn’t.

If I read about snow in a book, or someone tells me about snow, I can have knowledge of it, even if I’ve never seen it. If I live in the North Pole, though, I know about snow through personal experience, which is a different type of knowledge to just reading or hearing about it.

Obviously before disobeying God Adam and Eve in theory knew what evil was - only in theory, never having experienced it. Otherwise the very word itself, which God used to them when telling them which tree not to eat from, wouldn’t make sense to them. After eating the apple they had personal experience of evil and knew it more deeply.
 
LilyM said:
It’s as simple as the fact that there is more than one type of knowledge. A lot of European languages have more than one word for ‘know’ for this reason. English doesn’t.

If I read about snow in a book, or someone tells me about snow, I can have knowledge of it, even if I’ve never seen it. If I live in the North Pole, though, I know about snow through personal experience, which is a different type of knowledge to just reading or hearing about it.

Obviously before disobeying God Adam and Eve in theory knew what evil was - only in theory, never having experienced it. Otherwise the very word itself, which God used to them when telling them which tree not to eat from, wouldn’t make sense to them. After eating the apple they had personal experience of evil and knew it more deeply.
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I think you forgot again. I prefer Bible reference rather than interpretations or assumptions.

I can give you another interpretation of the same event according the verses in Genesis. I can make God a stupid. I can make Serpent a genius and very helpful who helped us to know Good in deep which God RESTRICTED. But, at the end, all that is just my opinion. It doesn’t have to make any sense to anyone else and I can’t force on anyone to agree on what I say. The very same applies to you as well.

So, if you have anything from The Bible to support, I would appreciate.

I couldn’t find any verse in Genesis which says, God have ever taught Adam and Eve about Evil and temptation of serpent. Once it happened with them, they were clearly confused what to choose as it is said in Genesis 3.

3:2: And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: 3: But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. 4: And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: 5: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. 6: And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food,

The woman was confused between offer of Serpent and restriction of God. What she knew is to choose something but didn’t knew if it is good or evil. They didn’t know obeying God is good and disobeying is evil, because the power to separate the deeds was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17. How could GOD consider them as sinners for something that they didn’t know?
 
Khalfan said:
Why GOD said ‘NOW man become knowing good and evil’ (Gen 3:22) if they knew good and evil before? Before eating the fruit, Adam and eve didn’t know good and evil. Because knowledge of Good was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17.

I prefer Bible reference rather than interpretations or assumptions.
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because ‘NOW’ not only had they experienced good, they knew it was good having ‘NOW’ known evil.
 
Khalfan said:
The woman was confused between offer of Serpent and restriction of God. What she knew is to choose something but didn’t knew if it is good or evil. They didn’t know obeying God is good and disobeying is evil, because the power to separate the deeds was in the fruit as per Genesis 2:9 and 17. How could GOD consider them as sinners for something that they didn’t know?
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Rubbish! They knew GOD, who created them and everything around them and organised it all for their benefit and their pleasure. In knowing him they knew goodness itself. That’s more than enough knowledge for anyone. They knew that what he told them was for their good as well. They weren’t confused, they KNEW that to disobey the one who created them was wrong.

If I’m a child and my parents tell me not to put my finger in an electric socket I don’t need to know exactly why it’s wrong to know that I mustn’t disobey. I don’t need to know why it’s wrong to deserve punishment if I do disobey!

Even if the only thing I know is that my parents always want what is best for me, then that is enough, and I will know that I must obey them, regardless of what anyone else tells me to do or not do.
 
Benadam said:
because ‘NOW’ not only had they experienced good, they knew it was good having ‘NOW’ known evil.
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Exactly. They didn’t know what is good and what is evil completly. Did they know even a little bit about evil? I don’t know. can you give a reference from Bible If they knew it?
 
LilyM said:
Rubbish! They knew GOD, who created them and everything around them and organised it all for their benefit and their pleasure. In knowing him they knew goodness itself. That’s more than enough knowledge for anyone. They knew that what he told them was for their good as well. They weren’t confused, they KNEW that to disobey the one who created them was wrong.

If I’m a child and my parents tell me not to put my finger in an electric socket I don’t need to know exactly why it’s wrong to know that I mustn’t disobey. I don’t need to know why it’s wrong to deserve punishment if I do disobey!

Even if the only thing I know is that my parents always want what is best for me, then that is enough, and I will know that I must obey them, regardless of what anyone else tells me to do or not do.
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Genesis 2:9 and 17 says before eating the fruit, the knowledge was in the fruit.

Genesis 3:22 says man became knowing good and evil only after eating the fruit.

You said, they knew good and wrong. (Even though you didn’t give me any reference)

Either Bible is true or you are true. both cannot be true at the same time. tell me who is true.
 
Khalfan said:
Exactly. They didn’t know what is good and what is evil completly. Did they know even a little bit about evil? I don’t know. can you give a reference from Bible If they knew it?
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Must you try everything first hand to know if certain things are good or bad? Is not trust good enough with the person whom you have a good relationship with?

That’s the way it was with AdamEve and God. They DID NOT TRUST Him after alllll He did for them. They didn’t eat the fruit for the sake of tasting it. No, it was an opportunity to be ‘like gods’ that the temptation was too hard to pass up. What arrogant !

Instead of becoming ’ like gods ', they became fools !
 
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