I don’t think so. The tree actually represented their freedom, or a higher level of freedom than they would have had if the option of disobedience wasn’t theirs. The option of being able to disobey God’s will makes them potentially a being of a higher order, closer to His own level, in fact, which is what He wants for us.
So then, atheists evidently believe there is a God, and that God rigidly predestines human beings?
Trust or humility, I would say. The way the serpent tempts them seems to play upon a desire to be greater than God or to take before He can give.
Because ‘love’ that’s forced or not freely received is not love at all.
It’s an allegory for physical existence in the world. In the real world – and even in the ‘garden’ that the inspired writer chose to use as his allegorical tool – it’s not the case that “all options are good.”
No. Atheists would make the claim that, if this were true, then ‘God’ wouldn’t really be God. In other words, that this conception would prove that the notion of God is paradoxical and untrue.
yes, I understand. I’m making the point that the case for atheism needs the straw man.tomo_pomo:
Because ‘love’ that’s forced or not freely received is not love at all.
It’s an allegory for physical existence in the world. In the real world – and even in the ‘garden’ that the inspired writer chose to use as his allegorical tool – it’s not the case that “all options are good.”
No. Atheists would make the claim that, if this were true, then ‘God’ wouldn’t really be God. In other words, that this conception would prove that the notion of God is paradoxical and untrue.
But they were lied to. The devil tricked them. They didn’t choose freely. If they had no knowledge of good or evil, how would they have known to be on guard against deception?
We can’t fly-on-our-own even though we can will ourselves to fly. Does this violate our free will? Of course not.
They knew that God didn’t want them to eat the fruit.
The question reminds me of the the old saw about a glass: is it half full or half empty?
They freely chose to listen to the devil and to believe that it was God who had lied to them.
They did have knowledge of good and evil. The Church teaches that A&E had preternatural gifts, including infused knowledge.
Ahh, but that would’ve violated the devil’s free will, no?
No more than “not-being-able-to-fly-at-will” violates our free will.
Some Catholics believe this, but it is not an infallible church teaching.
And? It is a very human thing to believe the latest thing you’ve heard
That distinction is only meaningful if you presume they couldn’t tell the difference in value between the words of God and the words of the serpent.Inquiry:
They knew that God didn’t want them to eat the fruit.
I mean, my point was already that they didn’t have the tools to distinguish deception.
The serpent contradicted God and they believed it. Their “sin” is gullibility when they lacked the knowledge of good and evil in the first place.
There’s no difference between those statements though.Inquiry:
They knew that God didn’t want them to eat the fruit.