The Garden of Eden, plan B

by stillin 8 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • stillin
    stillin

    This is the part I don't get. The universe is a huge place. Plenty of room to let Satan and Adam and Eve have their shot at "being like God" without contaminating "the heavens." All of the angels who want to join in could have done so. Eat from that tree all day, every day if they want to. But why just "dent the bread pan?" Why allow childbearing to take place at all, affecting the lives of so many who haven't got a clue about the "challenge" made in the Garden?

    oh, sure, it gives each of us an "opportunity" to take a stand for the rightful ness of God's rule. Free will, etc. Bur mostly the family of man is just an unwilling participant in an ugly experiment.

  • exWTslave
    exWTslave

    Good thought!

    Those who created the story of Satan might not have foreseen that later Jesus would use the same wording as Satan used in the fictitious story of temptation, as given in Genesis. (Mathew 5:48) Satan is not real. If he were real, he would have known the shape of earth as being round, and would not have taken Jesus “to a very high mountain” as to show him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. (Mathew 4:8) Here Satan reflects the eroneous knowledge of the ancient people that earth is flat, hence is the creation of the unscientific minds of ancient times!

  • cultBgone
    cultBgone

    Each of your comments points to the limited knowledge of the writers, actually. Interesting thread!

  • blondie
    blondie

    Reminds me of the concept of God destroying everyone, human and angel, and starting over after wiping his own memory, which some say would have been a better solution. Or wiping the memories of all and destroying no one.

    As a child, I found it hard that 2 perfect people could instantly choose to "sin." The Mormons (LDS) believe that God gave them 2 laws, one they had to break to keep the other; that they were never meant to live on earth for very long, it was just a testing ground.

    I could never understand how the angel (later Satan per the WTS) left his assignment without God knowing. How God allowed him to "test" Adam and Eve were at the most 30 years old by WTS speculation. They were basically babes in experience. And the bible says that God does not test people with evil things. Why did God not warn them? Jesus certainly had much more information about his enemies.

    (James 1:13) . . .When under trial, let no one say: “I am being tried by God.” For with evil things God cannot be tried nor does he himself try anyone.

  • *lost*
    *lost*

    are you forgetting about the threesome in the garden and the abominable acts ?

    start at the beginning, to get to the end.

    They will tell you satan and his demons don't exist.

    but why are so many people, been so involved with the cult and the occult ?

    since the beginning ?

    Many many things have been hidden from us.

  • kaik
    kaik

    According to Jewish midrash, the exile from Eden was caused by sexual immoratlity between Adam, Eve, and Serpent. Satan Serpent was jealous on Adam and watched them having sexual relationship. Serpent seduced Eve, and Eve became pregnant with Cain. Abel was a product of Adam and Eve, and the enemity between two seeds was between offsprings of Serpent and Adam. Some scholars suggest that Serpent also defiled Adam. After the sex act, both were ashamed what have they done and blamed each ohter. Because both were no more pure and were defiled, the were kicked by G-d from the Eden.

    Jewish explanation of the story from Genesis makes much more sense than Christians. It is more revealing and detailed. There was not just disobidience of the God's command not to eat forbidden fruit, but sexual perversion that destroyed them both as they desired strange [non-human] flesh.

  • stillin
    stillin

    Kaik, interesting spin on the Garden story. I've never heard that one. But it doesn't change anything, does it? I mean, why should it be the reason for so many people who have never even heard the story to suffer?

    They wanted to be like God and decide for themselves what was right and what was wrong. But billions of lives have passed of people who had no choices.

  • Ocean1111
    Ocean1111

    It may be that part about being "in God's image". If there is a God, it never has been and never will be about man, but about God. It's the "image" that is at issue. Anyone brought into ill repute in this way, would understand why the slanderer must be, in principle, destroyed. People do it everyday for alot less. Now think of it from the standpoint of God, just for argument sake. He is not the one performing the experiments.

    So it was extinction of humanity 100%, and taking the bad "image" rap - or an extended hell raising, hell bent for Satan's leather, recovery. There is no other options. It appears Satan's leather must be branded. Not God's. It's in the basic plot of the story in just 3 chapters or so. In the meantime human beings carry the brand in the meantime - voluntarily - not the "image of God" any longer. And again, that is the real issue, that "image" override.

    Like the song says:

    "I won't take no prisoners, won't spare no lives
    Nobody's putting up a fight
    I got my bell, I'm gonna take you to hell
    I'm gonna get you, Satan get you"

    True some do put up a fight, but not many. Truthfully it seems most humans are fine with their inevitable lot, just like the song says, people know it deep inside, there is more truth to it all than meets the eye. I guess her eyes were not opened after all.

  • kaik
    kaik

    Stillin, these stories are in circulation for past 2000 years. The orignal midrash recorded them as far as back as 200 BC. They were retold and rewritten in the late antiquity and also got into Babylonian Talmud: "the serpent came upon Eve he injected a lust into her". During medieval times, monks in the monasteries mentioned that Satan seduced Eve, and introduced sin into her, which was carried into the rest of the humanity. Renaissance was especially productive in creating sexual themes, and it was rather well known in 1500's Europe that Cain was Satan's child. Talmud and midrash explain that the enemity between two seeds of Eve was a stuggle between Cain and Abel, not spiritual battle that is mentioned in NT.

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