Reggie Jackson Genesis
The Bible is the world’s bestselling book and most likely the worlds most referenced to. There is a lot of controversy around how to interpret the bible, whether to take it literally or take it as a combination of stories. Both ways could be constructive towards learning, because it helps understand people’s ideals. When reading literature knowing biblical stories provides a greater understanding of what you are reading, and in some cases the reader may miss the whole point of the story without in background of the bible. The Bible has affected many aspects of life such as law, literature, and morality all over the world and without it, it would be much different.
When interpreting the Bible as a book of stories there are many different ideas that can arise from them. For instance the Bible has God creating everything. God is omniscient and is supposed to be all good. Yet God places a tree of knowledge of good and bad and bans Adam and Eve from eating from it. There is an obvious lesson that comes from this when God punishes Adam and Eve for defying him. It is bad to not listen to your superior and will result in consequences. This is a very clear lesson. But if you question the story more you may get a different story. Adam and Eve did not know of good and bad, because they had not partaken of the fruit yet and God had only told them not to and the consequences. So in essence were Adam and Eve still children? They are comparable to children in this story. They have everything provided to them by god the parent figure. They know nothing of good, or bad, or that they are even nude, which just like children they don’t mind until they learn. Adam and Eve are children and are not perfect, so why would God punish them so harshly. We can relate this to our own lives, how many times did our parents tell us not to do something when we were children yet we still did. What was our punishment? It surely wasn’t death or pain and suffering. Because our parents understood that we are children and we do not know better, therefore we cannot be held accountable for our actions. If we look at the story in this way God seems to be too strict with man.
Another side of the story of the forbidden fruit was that God did not want us to be burdened by knowledge. After eating the fruit, life became harder for Adam and Eve. They lost their world of leisure and comfort to embrace the cold world. Some would say this is what God was trying to save them from. But ultimately God is omnipotent and can do anything “he” wants, so if God wanted to he could make Adam and Eves lives very easy regardless of the fruit.
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