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Chapter 3—The Knowledge of Good and Evil
Though created innocent and holy, our first parents were not
placed beyond the possibility of wrongdoing. God might have cre-
ated 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 fully 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 you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil, you shall 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 sin and its
results was in love withheld.
While God was seeking good for the newly created pair, Satan
was seeking their ruin. When Eve, disregarding the Lord’s admo-
nition concerning the forbidden tree, ventured to approach it, she
came into contact with her foe. Her interest and curiosity having
been awakened, Satan proceeded to deny God’s word and insinuate
distrust of His wisdom and goodness. To the woman’s statement
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concerning the tree of knowledge, “God has said, You shall not eat
it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die,” the tempter answered, “You
will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your
eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and
evil.”
Genesis 3:3-5
.
Satan tried to make it appear that this knowledge of good mingled
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
that it was because of its wonderful properties for imparting wisdom
and power that God had forbidden them to taste it, that He was thus
seeking to prevent them from reaching a more noble development
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