Chapter 3—The Knowledge of Good and Evil
“As they refused to have God in their knowledge,” “their senseless
heart was darkened. ”
Though created innocent and holy, our first parents were not placed
beyond the possibility of wrong-doing. God might have created them
without the power to transgress His requirements, but in that case there
could have been no development of character; their service would not
have been voluntary, but forced. Therefore He gave them the power of
choice—the power to yield or to withhold obedience. And before they
could receive in fullness the blessings He desired to impart, their love
and loyalty must be tested.
In the Garden of Eden was the “tree of knowledge of good and
evil.... And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree
of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil, thou shalt not eat.”
Genesis 2:9-17
. It was the will
of God that Adam and Eve should not know evil. The knowledge of
good had been freely given them; but the knowledge of evil,—of sin
and its results, of wearing toil, of anxious care, of disappointment and
grief, of pain and death,—this was in love withheld.
While God was seeking man’s good, Satan was seeking his ruin.
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When Eve, disregarding the Lord’s admonition concerning the forbid-
den tree, ventured to approach it, she came in contact with her foe. Her
interest and curiosity having been awakened, Satan proceeded to deny
God’s word, and to insinuate distrust of His wisdom and goodness.
To the woman’s statement concerning the tree of knowledge, “God
hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die,”
the tempter made answer, “Ye shall not surely die: for God doth know
that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye
shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.”
Genesis 3:3-5
.
Satan desired to make it appear that this knowledge of good min-
gled with evil would be a blessing, and that in forbidding them to take
of the fruit of the tree, God was withholding great good. He urged
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