The Two Trees - My Genesis Ponderings

by cedars 190 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  transhuman68

  The Book of Genesis is a real grab-bag of stories, some adapted from cultures nearby to the Israelites, but the story of the Garden of Eden seems to be a myth-of-origin story, like “How the leopard got its spots.” Eating from one tree but not the other, then being expelled from Paradise explained why life was so difficult; and why people got sick and died. Probably it gave those ancient people some comfort, and added some meaning to life and death.

  (This post was written while listening to Nickelback's The Long Road album, which shows how much I care.)
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  N.drew

  Perhaps it is allegory of the Human Race. And the "us" that is mentioned is the Superior Race who occupy Heaven. Heaven knows everything that happens on Earth. People do not. "You will positively die" means extinction. They know, but they want it not to happen. Why? Because it took a long time to "birth" humans and because The God loves us. The Bible is for non-extermination. You can say it has caused extermination, but you don't know that, you are making it up.

  The Trees. The question should be answered "why did they not touch the Tree of Life?". Because it's the same tree. That is the only way I know how to answer it.

  Why are they different? Because viewing the tree for life gives life. But viewing the tree for profit gives death. At the beginning there was not much to profit except to know. To know is something that belongs to Heaven. To know is not off limits but it is to be learned over time and by obedience and not by stealing.
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  botchtowersociety

  Once you shake off a fundamentalist reading of the text, then its meaning becomes far more profound. All of us are born, which means each and every one of us has been cast out of a sheltered Garden and disconnected from a Tree of Life. All of us eat from the Tree of Knowledge and can never return to the pure innocence of when we were children. All of us come to realize our nakedness. The Garden story is about part of the voyage of the human soul in this life. It is also about our voyage as a human people.

  
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  ProdigalSon

  They are both the same tree....

  ....and it looks like this:

  The best book I have found that explains this tree, at the suggestion of a particularly enlightened member of this forum, is this one:

  Gnosis of the Cosmic Christ: A Gnostic Christian Kabbalah

  http://www.amazon.com/Gnosis-Cosmic-Christ-Christian-Kabbalah/dp/0738705918
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  N.drew

  Your being obscure son, which is the dark side of Wibble. Is it one tree or not?
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  ProdigalSon

  Your being obscure son, which is the dark side of Wibble. Is it one tree or not?

  I don't see where I was being ambiguous, but yes, one tree.

  This will help explain it:

  http://www.halexandria.org/dward001.htm
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  N.drew

  Yah! Does that make two or three of us?
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  designs

  'Original sin' is not a Jewish belief. The Tree of Life is an ideal from a physical symbol. The Tree of Life drawing is used in Jewish service and ceremony. On the two rolls of the Torah Scroll has this symbol and the saying 'The Torah is the Tree of Life to those who cleave to it'. At the end of the reading the blessing is said ' Who has given us the Law of Truth, and has planted everlasting life in our midst'.

  On the Jewish marriage agreement, known as the Ketubah, the symbolic Tree of Life is used as the motif.
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  Band on the Run

  I used to think that ancient people were not very sophisticated. After reading a lot of sacred scripture, I now believe they may have been more sophisticated but just lack some technological know how. Religion is something that humans don't need technology to wonder why things are so. I do believe Genesis has the least believable stories of any Bible book. If they are taken symbolically, they are very sophisticated. I now wonder if they were always meant not to be interpreted literally.

  Creation stories share common motifs around the world. I prefer The Epic of Gilgamesh to Noah's story anyday. The writing is so much better and deeper. It is very sad that society came to believe in the absolute truth of these accounts. It robbed us of much richness. Even at church discussions, no one believes these stories as mundane truth.
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  tec

  sophisticated but just lack some technological know how.

  Agreed. Deep truths told in a manner that the people could understand.

  It doesn't mean that there is no truth to them. But you don't speak about the universe and physics in mathematical equations to someone who does not have an education and background in those equations. You speak in a language that people can understand, or you might as well not speak at all.

  Peace,

  Tammy