See my edit. No where in the Bible does it say that it was Adam’s job to keep the snake out of the garden. His failure in defending the garden was in his pride and choice to eat the fruit himself. When Adam ate THAT is when the curse ensued. It wasn’t UNTIL he ate that they realized they were naked. Both could just have easily said no to the serpent and been on there way. The serpents presence there was not Adam’s responsibility.
Thanks for sharing that experience! You actually support my argument. Men are equipped to protect women but not all use that equipment to do so. That means sometimes you have to rely on God for the strength to do what a man should do for you. Remember, spiritually you are no different than men and vice versa. All of us however often forget about the spirituality of our being and think we are only male or female. Spiritually we are both like God (male and female) as we are made in His image.*Hi again Silentfactor,
So in short I truned to God and understood that He gave me man to protect me and and when I turned to man for the protection I needed he failed me bigtime. For the longest time I used to blaim myself for what happened that I should never have trusted in a man to protect me to begin with so I was culpable of having sex with him even though I did not want to. I am sure you do not mean this and I am sure my story is not quite the same as the Creation story regarding what happened between Adam and Eve but then again maybe it is?
The reason I am telling you this is because I believe that we really have become a people that likes to try and exploit each other instead of a people that tries to help each other. We seem to get-off at being able to get-something out of everything.
Personally I believe it starts with our understanding of “sex.” Every one seems to believe that it is for gratification to satisfy our passions. This is not what I understand sex to be for. I understand that God Creates Life through sex. This is what sex should be for. To help God in His wanting to share His Life with us. The way I see it sex, when it is rooted in sacrifice and love is life giving and works to raise each other up with respect and dignity for God and each other. Sex rooted in self gratification of the passions is rooted in plundering, using, exploiting, manipulating and raping each other to the point of killing. This is epitomized in Abortion.
I also see our passions of this world as being what allows this world, Eve, to seduce us and allows us to fall just like Adam did. When we turn to self gratification we are actually raping each other and the world and it shows in the way things are in the world today. Not only do we rape each other but we are also rape the world and all its natural resources. We as a people are not being good keepers and helpers of each other or the garden because we have been seduced by the things of this world, Eve, and instead of protecting and giving our lives to protect Eve we rape, pillage and plunder Eve so that we can satisfy our passions of greed, lust, power, thirst for knowledge…
Anyway sorry to ramble on here…just thought I would add more food for thought to the discussion I so hope and pray it makes some sense and that I am on the right track here in understanding more clearly the story of Adam and Eve…to put it as simply as I can I believe that when our love for this world, Eve, becomes greater than our Love for God this is when we turn to raping, pillaging and plundering Eve, the world instead of protecting her, Eve, the world.
Any thoughts?
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I do enjoy all this talk about gardening and male and female jobs.
My guess is he probably delegated that to Eve since he was “in charge of everything.” I mean even God didn’t expect Adam to do EVERYTHING! Poor guy…I hope MichaelHowling meets him in heaven. Will be an interesting conversation.
Then hopefully you won’t mind if I post without having read the thread. I’m a very slow reader and the thread is growing faster than I can catch up! So here I go:Really, I started this Thread to be playful and antagonistic. It was meant to be less serious.
Alan, That was brilliant! LolThen hopefully you won’t mind if I post without having read the thread. I’m a very slow reader and the thread is growing faster than I can catch up! So here I go:
In the garden, Eve was a total manipulator. Adam was caught in the classic trap that women like her love to put men into, with Eve leading the pack!
First of all, she knew very well that she and Adam were not supposed to eat the apple, but she went off without Adam and ended up listening to some silver tongue devil who was saying the things he knew she wanted but wasn’t allowed to have, were within her reach. He told her that God and Adam really had put a “glass ceiling” on her, because they wanted to keep her barefoot and pregnant, and not have any role in things that involve knowledge. Not only that, but the devil told Eve that Adam and God were probably over there eating of the tree when she’s not looking, because they want to keep her clueless that she’s even missing out on anything.
Adam, of course, was oblivious to his own alleged plans for keeping Eve down. Then suddenly here comes Eve with a problem… “you know Adam that tree we weren’t supposed to eat? Well guess what some amazing wise dude just told me what you were really about. This guy could read you like a book. So you can just forget about dominating me because now I ate some of that tree, too.”
Adam asked, “too? What do you mean, too?”
Eve said, “don’t lie to me Adam, I know you and God have a deal going to keep me from the tree, and that you have eaten of it.”
Adam was like, “ummm… so you say I ate of the tree? Well, my love, since I hold you above all other of God’s creatures, then I will immediately eat of the tree to defend your honor.” So Adam ate of the tree as well, because he couldn’t let Eve take the hit for her own sin. He was in the classic, “do I go with what I believe, or with what the woman wants me to do” scenario? Basically she forced him to choose between her and God, and since after all she was his mate, he knew that he had to choose her even if it meant being punished by God. So he decided to go with the woman because he was emotionally whipped by her and for all sorts of other reasons men do stupid things to try to impress women, and let the second Adam (ref 1 Cor 15:45) clean up the mess.
So Adam ate, and said, “hey tell me where you were today that I may meet this silver tongue devil you speak of.” So Eve led him into the brush where she had first evaded him but now welcomes him since he is “part of the gang” who is as smart as God, now. Eve introduced Adam to the devil and said, “well here we are, we already feel like we’re learning new knowledge.” The devil said to them, “the next step is to find coverings you can put over yourselves, so that others may not know you except by the outer wrapping. This way you may fool others about your own true nature and present yourself to them however you want to appear, and not just the plain old way God made us.” So Adam and Even started making clothing out of their outfits so that they may adorn themselves with many labels and shiny objects.
So when God asked where they were, they called out from the brush, “don’t look yet we don’t have our outfits ready.” God’s like, “what do you need outfits for? Did I not give you a perfect and eternal body, with skin that never sags or wrinkles?” Adam said, “but how will everyone know that we are the supreme beings in this garden if we don’t wear proper uniforms with credentials?” Eve added, “and besides, I have to get my hair dyed lest people think I’m a dumb blonde.”
God said, “oh, my. I was afraid of this… oh well I guess now we’ll go with plan B. OK Adam and Eve, have it your way, and be ready for a ride!”
Alan
P.S. I also have a theory that Adam was the first engineer. He just couldn’t stand using a perfectly good world without taking it apart to figure out how it works and add features.
Believe me, I am so guilty of it! 
Well I hope for your sake she submits to you every day and night as is REQUIRED of her per Collosian 3:18!!! It is a 2-way street my friend.
Whether God punished them or not the fact still remains that Eve (and women) suffered a worse fate than men. Although come to think of it, being in charge of a woman is probably the worst thing on earth. Maybe God made it to work that way to teach men what a pain disobedience is. Woman quickly went from a gift to a curse…literally LOLOLOLOLOL!!! That is probably why God never gave Jesus a mortal wife. God loved Jesus too much to make him suffer THAT fate! Jesus probably had a choice between the cross and a mortal woman so He chose the cross…being married to a mortal woman was just cruel and sadly usual punishment for the time (still is)! ROFL!!!
Whether God punished them or not the fact still remains that Eve (and women) suffered a worse fate than men. Although come to think of it, being in charge of a woman is probably the worst thing on earth. Maybe God made it to work that way to teach men what a pain disobedience is. Woman quickly went from a gift to a curse…literally LOLOLOLOLOL!!! That is probably why God never gave Jesus a mortal wife. God loved Jesus too much to make him suffer THAT fate! Jesus probably had a choice between the cross and a mortal woman so He chose the cross…being married to a mortal woman was just cruel and sadly usual punishment for the time (still is)! ROFL!!!
*[So is it because both Adam and Eve, aka Mankind aka Adam, did not choose to live in free submission to their Creator they then committed the Original Sin?
Are you saying that Mary and Jesus have the same spirit that she is no longer feminin and he is no longer masculin?
*Personaly I believe that the reason my rapist raped me is because he felt very vulnerable and insecure and in inflicting the control over me gave him some kind of security back so to me if a man feels vulnerable when he is “in love” with a woman I do beleive that it is not realy true love. *
So then this would be how it would be Adams fault no? If he had not eaten of the fruit then Eve would have been saved from her sin but because he did eat of the fruit then there was no sanctifying grace to save Eve so in a way I see what you are saying here as validating what Michaelhowling is saying.
Think about it, women learn what disobedience is like when (if) they have kids. Men have to deal with the woman AND the kids. Only us single guys escape that fate lol! If that isn’t suffering I do not know what is! God gave men a REALLY good reason to cry out for mercy!!! Maybe that is why most guys are happy to leave this world first! 80% of centegenarians are women…that says something!!
(gasping for air)
To the first part: No not at all! The spirit has both masculine and feminine traits as does God. There is no such thing as 100% male or 100% female. Yes the human body is one or the other but not really. Aside from our reproductive organs, we share quite a bit of the rest. In a way, men teach about the masculine (spiritual) to women. Women thus teach about the feminine (physical) to men. This article describes it well (catholic.org/hf/love/story.php?id=49277).
Indeed? The war of the sexes is just starting to boil over in the World today methinks. It was inevitable that such topic would… ahem… engender… such a* …stimulating debate.Really, I started this Thread to be playful and antagonistic. It was meant to be less serious.
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