by Witness 007 2 Replies latest watchtower bible
The Watchtower lies to us teaching offically that the tree of Knowledge was just a symbol.....however I was shocked to read in the Watchtowers study bible this footnote for Gen 3:16.
"The tree was...something to be longed for with the eyes TO IMPART KNOWLEDGE {INTELLIGENCE, PRUDENCE}"
The hebrew text supports the view that the tree had magical knowledge powers. This blows apart the offical Witness teaching and puts some mystic views into the eden story!!!
At this the serpent said to the woman: “YOU positively will not die. For God knows that in the very day of YOUR eating from it YOUR eyes are bound to be opened and YOU are bound to be like God, KNOWING good and bad.”
Consequently the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was something to be longed for to the eyes, yes, the tree was desirable to impart wisdom (intelligence; prudence).
Now, if you believe the serpent, that's your problem.
Witness 007.....Actually, "impart knowledge" is an overtranslation in its own right. The Hebrew has a simple infinitive hiphil verb lhskyl with causative force, which is somewhat ambiguous; often this occurs to mean "observe" (as it is in Deuteronomy 29:8, 32:9, etc.) or "understand" and "learn", but all these senses require an object (i.e. there is something that one observes/understands/learns), and there is no object in Genesis 3:6. So the sense is simply "to make wise" or "to cause to be wise". The NWT alternative rendering instead reifies knowledge as a thing that is imparted by the fruit to the person, which is perhaps one way of making one wise, but certainly not the only way permitted by the text.
