8And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden.
9And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?
10And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.
11And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat?
12And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat.
13And the LORD God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat
I wish that I could read these passages out loud to you so that you could understand better. Lets begin by getting some simple things out of the way. Adam and Eve hid themselves; but, they didn't even understand what was going on. They ate the fruit and knew good from evil; but, they were children and all they could see that was evil was that they were naked. Why would that bother them?
Can you imagine going from being a child to an adolescent in less than a minute? That would be very confusing. The first thing that Adam and Eve noticed was that they were not physically the same. They noticed their body parts were different. They had no children prior to eating the fruit of the tree. What a wonderful explanation of puberty. The bible can be used to see how we progress (learn) as we grow as people and societies.
Adam and Eve discovered that they were separate individuals and separate from God, that they were all different from one another. Two kids who for the first time have learned that they are not perfect.
Adam and Eve did not understand how much more God is than they were prior to eating the fruit, they did not feel a need to hide from him. If there is none good but God (as the bible says) then if Adam and Eve did not know good and evil until they ate the fruit then they didn't really understand God, they did not know him on any sort of significant level. They did not understand his nature.
Here is what I want you to consider. A couple of children ate a piece of fruit from a tree when they had been told not to, it appears that God punishes them for it and rather harshly even punishing all that would come from them, sounds a little harsh doesn't it? Well, maybe there is more going on than is immediately apparent.
Let's get back to the story. So God calls to Adam and asks him where he is. I am just guessing here; but, I am guessing God knew exactly where Adam and Eve were and what had happened. The whole story sounds like a father talking to a couple of two year olds. He was. Their intent was curiosity and being naughty in the smallest amount, just like any other children. Here is where you can really begin to understand.
To God we are like children growing up. He is going to let them grow up, he is going to let them get burnt, he is going to let them learn and exercise free will and he is going to do it with as little interference as possible. He knows how the game ends, everybody wins, life on earth is but a vapor. After God "curses" them he is no longer in front of them all the time, just sort of checks in. Can you imagine the pressure to do things it would be if you knew that God was watching you every second and knew your every thought, that is a lot of pressure and might influence your decisions.
It is too much pressure for children. I believe we all need privacy, Adam and Eve needed privacy, they needed privacy in their minds, they needed to know that they could think freely and not be judged on every passing thought, they needed to be free to be themselves and that is what God gave them; but, there is a price tag, separation from God for a time, time to define themselves by their free will choices and that meant they were going to be challenged. How could God explain that to children? The lack of privacy leads to "group think", it leads to going along to get along.
Anyways, God "finds" Adam and Adam says that he hid because he was naked and God asked Adam who told him that he was naked. Now, again, I think God knew that nobody had told Adam that he was naked. So, why did God ask Adam the question? Could he have just been being funny, did he find Adam's predicament amusing? Being a father my guess is that he asked it to give Adam a chance to repent, to admit what he did and address it. Being an intelligent father, he knew that Adam was new to lying and would come up with an excuse and Adam did, Adam blamed his sister (so to speak).
Adam's excuse is classic two year old, he says that God gave him the woman and she made him do it, everyone's fault but his own. He blames God and takes no responsibility, he blames God for creating the woman and the woman for giving him the fruit; but, he ate it and knew what he had been told. It is painfully obvious to anyone with children what is going on, God is not mad at them, he is giving them a chance to give themselves up, admit what they did and take responsibility; but, that is something teenagers don't do, that is what adults do (hopefully).
Back to the story, Adam blames God and Eve and Eve then blames the serpent. Was Satan to blame for Eve's eating the fruit? Not in my opinion. I don't blame the devil for my bad decisions, I blame immaturity. I blame not having enough understanding and I blame urge driven choices that we make as young adults. It is all part of growing up. God did not create us to remain children, he created us so that we could grow to our limits, not his, ours. We only get there if we are challenged, if we stretch ourselves as hard and as far as we can and that is what we are supposed to do morally and spiritually. Do the right thing for the right reason and do it against all comers, against all challenges, push your boundaries.
We all fall short, we are all human and God knows that. Life is not about becoming perfect, God see us as sinless when we have the heart of Christ, when we understand that we are all less than perfect.
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