@acolytes:
For a J.W the question needs to be asked how can you say Adam was created perfect. He was created in a dying state, or why would he need eat from the tree of life.
Adam was created perfect, and not in a dying state. At his creation, no death penalty had been imposed upon him as was the case upon Adam's offspring after he and his wife joined Satan's rebellion against God, so there before him for the prospect of his living forever, not that he possessed the quality of immortality, for obviously he would not have died after 930 years had he been granted immortal. Adam's right to enjoy life was contingent upon his obedience to God, upon his obedience to "every expression" that came from Jehovah’s mouth.
Actually why do J.ws say Adam was created perfect. There is not one scripture in the bible that says Adam was created perfect.
At Isaiah 42:5, Jehovah is described as "the One laying out the earth and ... the One giving breath to the people on it, and spirit to those walking in it." Being that Jehovah is "the Creator," we read about Him at Deuteronomy 32:4 that "perfect is his activity" and that "all his ways are justice."
@Soldier77:
You bring out a good point, if Adam was created perfect, why did god put in the garden a "Tree of Life™?" He ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Bad™ first, and was punished by being banished from the garden so they could not eat of the Tree of Life and be like god, immortal.
What "good point" do you mean? You seem to have assumed that God had told Adam or Eve before they were banished from Eden about the existence of a tree of life, but if you were to read the first three chapters of Genesis, you would quickly realize that God only mentions the tree of life when Adam and his wife were being evicted from their garden home. (Genesis 3:22)
@St George of England:
After a suitable time to prove his/their [loyalty] by not eating the tree of good/bad, they would be rewarded by being allowed to eat of the tree of life. They would thus be granted immortality which is of course different from just living forever.
I don't know anything about any "JW answer" to this question, but the Bible answer is that Adam would have been in the same position as will those of us that survive the great tribulation to become the nucleus of the new world: Those that live through the whole of the 1,000-year Judgment Day, are granted the right to live forever after the new scrolls are opened and will have passed the final test of obedience to the things written in those scrolls so that their names come to be "written in the book of life" will gain for themselves the right to live forever. This right is not the same as immortality, since human nature doesn't permit us to be immortal.
The human body has the amazing ability to renew itself, the cells in the body are either replaced or repaired, and were it not for the wearing out of a genetic material known as "telomeres," self-renewal would go on forever. Death follows as aging is a process that occur when our cells stop dividing, but science has discovered and enzyme called "telomerase," by means of which human cells can continue dividing indefinitely!
But whether telomerase is all of that which scientists think it to be or not, they still would be unable to keep the life-force in humans operating at full efficiency, for if they could, then worn tissues would continually be replaced or repaired. Adam's skin would never have wrinkled with age, his heart would not have become diseased and his internal organs break down as he got older, maybe becoming deaf or blind. Had Adam been obedient, he would not have died, for God would have sustained his life-force forever!
So with God taking care to ensure that our life-force doesn't diminish in power, then even though mortal, we would still live forever. Adam's obedience was tested, and so will the obedience of those that survive Judgment Day.
@Finally-Free:
If Adam and Eve had any brains at all they would have planned the whole thing a lot better. Before eating from the tree of knowledge, they should have picked several bushels of fruit from the tree of life, eaten some, and hidden the rest just outside the garden. Then, once expelled from the garden, they would still have fruit from the tree of life stashed.
You assume for whatever reason that Adam and Eve weren't innocent, that they had no guile in them, no desire to scheme any plan against their God and Creator. All was well in Eden until it wasn't, and once they were expelled from their garden home, there was no time for them to do anything but leave.
As I indicated above, Jehovah had told Adam about the tree of the knowledge of good and bad, but had said nothing at all to him about the tree of life until after they were being evicted, but Jehovah does tell them as to the existence of a "tree of life" so that they would know that they would have given the right to eat from it had they proved to be obedient, just as those that survive Judgment Day will need to pass the final test of obedience to the things written in those scrolls in order to gain the right to eat from the figurative tree of life, that is to say, in order to get their names "written in the book of life."
@pirata:
What I don't get is why they didn't eat from the tree of life first, and then the tree of knowledge second.
Adam and Eve weren't informed by Jehovah as to the existence of the tree of life until after they were being evicted from Eden. From your vantage point, reading the Bible, you are aware of their being a tree of life that God has planted there in Eden. (Genesis 2:9) And whatever it is that would make you think that Adam and Eve possessed the mindset of a criminal that would have been smart enough to scheme and plan in advance of their sin in order to successfully frustrate God from His being able to execute the sentence of death against them, this inclination to sin was simply not in either of them. It was only after they had sinned that their consciences began to make them realize that they were naked and to experience guilt for the very first time as it (their consciences) began to accuse them of sin, so that they then came to know that what they had done was bad.
@djeggnog
