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Few scriptures
are so much misunderstood as the ones that refer to the
fall of Adam and Eve. Unfortunately, misunderstanding of
these passages has caused no end of confusion and
misunderstanding in many other areas of the Bible as
well. Indeed, if we do not have a clear understanding of
what happened in Genesis: 1-3 then we will not also have
a good understanding of what Jesus Christ accomplished
as saviour. Really, why should we need a savior for?
What did Jesus Christ restore? Many of us know that
Jesus Christ redeemed us from what Adam did. But do we
know what exactly happened when Adam did what he did?
Also we know that today after we believe in Jesus Christ
we get holy spirit. But why do we need holy spirit for
and why it was not available before the day of
Pentecost? To answer to these and to many other
questions, a clear understanding of what is said in the
first three chapters of Genesis is more than necessary.
That's why I consider what we are going to see in this
study as especially significant and I ask for your
attention.
1. "In the day that you eat of it you shall surely die"
To
start approaching our topic, let's go to the first book
of the Bible, the Genesis. There, after God made man, He
imposed a restriction on him and He also made known the
penalty, for the case that this restriction was
violated. So let's read:
Genesis
2:16-17
"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, for in
the day that you eat of it you shall surely die".
The
restriction that God imposed on Adam was that he should
not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil1.
The penalty for the case that this restriction was
violated was that: "in the day (pay attention:
that very day) that you eat of it you shall surely die".
Two very significant things have to be noted in that
penalty. The first is that if Adam ate from the tree
death would happen immediately, in that very day.
The second is that this would happen surely. The phrase
"you shall SURELY die" has exactly the purpose to put
emphasis on the fact that death would happen 100%,
surely, in that day.
Now
let's go to chapter 3 of Genesis to see if Adam and Eve
kept what God told them:
Genesis
3:1-6
"Now
the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field
which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman,
"Has God indeed said "you shall not eat of every tree of
the garden?" And the woman said to the serpent, We may
eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the
fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden,
God has said, "You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch
it, lest you die." Then the serpent said to the woman
"You shall 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." So when the woman saw
that the tree was good for food, that it was
pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make
one wise, she took of its fruit and ATE. She also
gave to her husband with her and he ATE."
This
passage describes how the serpent, which is another name
for Satan2,
deceived Eve. We have already seen in issue 1 of this
journal that Satan succeeded in his purposes, because
Eve didn't know the Word of God accurately. It is
the accurate knowledge of the Word of God that
gives terrible headaches to Satan. So finally, Adam and
Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Having done that, according to what God had said, they
should have died at that moment. The problem here is
that Genesis 5:5-6 says:
Genesis
5:5-6
"After
he begot Seth, the days of Adam were eight hundred
years; and he had sons and daughters. So all the days
that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years; and
he died."
Therefore,
according to the Bible, Adam continued to have life in
his body for many many years after he ate from the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil. On the other hand,
God had said that if he ate from that tree he would
surely die in the same day. At first glance, here there
is a problem about what finally happened in the day that
Adam and Eve ate from that tree. Did they die as God
said, or they didn't die? Who will solve us this
"problem"? Man's ideas, theories, religion and
tradition? No! Only one can give us answers, and this is
no other than the Word of God. And if you want this Word
to give you answers, you have to leave it to speak for
itself (self interpretation).
In
our case, since God cannot lie (Numbers
23:19) in the day that Adam and Eve ate from that
tree they really died. Actually, it was Devil that said,
when he deceived Eve, "you shall not surely die". Thus,
if they didn't die that day, as God said, then Satan was
right and God was wrong which is simply impossible.
However, that's exactly what many teach today when they
say "actually when God said that they would surely die
He meant that just the sperm of death would be planted".
The Word of God does not need such kind of defense.
Actually it does not need any defense at all for it is
truth and truth can stand by itself. What the Word needs
is to be rightly divided and then boldly proclaimed.
Returning to our topic: SINCE GOD SAID THAT THEY WOULD
SURELY DIE THAT VERY DAY, THEY INDEED DIED THAT DAY.
However, since they continue to have life in their
bodies even after they ate from the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, it is self-evident that they
must have had another form of life, in addition to the
life of their bodies, that was lost in the day that they
ate and for this reason it was death (absence of a form
of life). So, we have to search the Scriptures to see
how man was created and what were the parts of his
being. Knowledge of what composed the life of the first
man will also enable us to see what was lost in that
day.
2. "For dust you are"
To
start our research regarding the first man let's go to
Genesis 2:7. There it says:
Genesis
2:7
"And
the Lord God formed man of the dust of the
ground........"
Which
part of man did God form of the dust of the ground? His
body. That's why the elements of the human body can be
found in the ground. So one part of the first human
being was the body. But let's continue:
Genesis
2:7
"And
the Lord God formed man of the dust of the
ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of
life and man became a living soul (soul = nephesh in
Hebrew)"
(KJV)
We
saw that God formed man's body of the dust of the
ground. However, this body didn't have life. It was just
formed, without life. Then, the Word of God tells us
that God "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life
and man became a living soul". Therefore, what is soul?
Soul is what gives life to the body. The fact that
people do not understand, the simple truths of the Word
of God described at that point has caused no end of
confusion. Here, the Word of God tells us, that soul is
what gives life to the body. Without soul the body is
dead. Where is the soul, the life of the body, the life
of the flesh? The Word of God again is very accurate:
Leviticus
17:11, 13-14
"For
the life (nephesh in Hebrew) of the flesh is
in the blood.....Whatever man of the children of
Israel, or of the strangers who dwell among you, who
hunts and catches any animal or bird that may be eaten,
he shall pour out its blood, and cover it with dust;
For it (i.e. the blood) is the life (nephesh)
of all flesh; the blood of it is for the life (nephesh)
of it: therefore I said to the children of Israel "You
shall not eat the blood of any flesh: for the life
(nephesh) of all flesh is its blood"
(NKJV-KJV)
We
saw in Genesis 2:7
that soul (nephesh) is what gives life to the body. Here
in Leviticus we see that "the life of the flesh is in
the blood". In the above passage the word life is a
translation of the Hebrew word "nephesh" that is
translated as soul in Genesis 2:7 as well as in 471 out
of the 753 other places where it occurs. Therefore, what
is nephesh or soul? According to Genesis 2:7 soul is
what gives life to the body. Where is the nephesh, the
life of the body, the soul? According to Leviticus
17:11-14 it is in the blood: "For the life (nephesh,
soul) of the flesh is in the blood". How this soul life
passes from generation to generation? Through the blood.
That's why Acts 17:26 says:
Acts
17:26
"And
He has made from ONE BLOOD every nation of men to dwell
on all the face of the earth".
The
"one blood" of this passage is the blood of Adam which
passes from generation to generation and actually is the
blood that all of us have.
Actually,
soul is not something that only man has. Animals have
also soul which again is in the blood. Although this is
immediately understood from the above passage of
Leviticus, where we are told that the life of all flesh
is in the blood let's go to
Genesis 1:20-21, 29-30 to see it there as well:
Genesis
1:20-21
"And
God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the
moving creature (nephesh, soul; see also KJV-margin)
that has life (nephesh, soul) and fowl that may
fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And
God created great whales, and every living creature (nephesh,
soul) that moveth, which the waters brought forth
abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl
after his kind: and God saw that it was good"
(KJV)
Genesis
1:29-30
"And
God said "Behold I have given you every herb bearing
seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every
tree whose fruit yield seed; to you it shall be for
food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird
of the air, and to every thing that creeps upon the
earth , wherein there is a living soul (KJV
margin - nephesh in Hebrew) I have given every
green herb for meat:" and it was so."
(NKJV-KJV)
Therefore,
not only man but also the animals have "nephesh" i.e.
"soul". This is not strange at all, if we understand
that soul is what gives life to the body. When you die
there is no more life, no more soul. The same happens
with the animals. Soul is for them the same that is for
man i.e. what gives life to the body. Although, there is
no problem about what is defined as soul in the Bible,
the problem is created when we go to the Bible with the
preconceived idea that soul is immortal. If soul was
immortal, then really the souls of the various animals
would also be immortal, since they have "nephesh" as man
has "nephesh". Soul is not something immortal. It just
gives life to the body. When you stop having life in
your body, you have no more soul.
By
now, we have seen that the Bible teaches that God formed
the body of man of the dust of the ground, and that He
gave to that body life i.e. soul. The same is also true
for the animals. They also have body and soul. Every man
in the world, believer or unbeliever, has body and soul.
It can therefore be concluded that since Adam died 930
years old, when he ate from the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil he obviously didn't loose neither his body
nor his soul. Thus, since something had to die for Adam
that day, he must originally have had at least one more
part, which was lost, died, when he ate. So, let's
continue searching the Scriptures to see what they say
about that.
3. "So God created man in his own image, in the image of
God He created him"
To
continue our enquiry let's go to Genesis 1:26-27. There
it says:
Genesis
1:26-27
"Then
God said "let us make man in our image, according to our
likeness.... So God created man in His own
image, in the image of God He created him; male and
female He created them"
According
to this passage, God created man "in His own image".
Here is a very critical point, a key point, if we want
to understand not only what happened in the day that
Adam and Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil, but also other passages of the Bible, where
what is said here has reflections upon. Reading the
above passage, the question that has to be asked is what
is the image of God? What does He look like? John 4:24
tells us:
John
4:24
"God
is Spirit"
God
is not flesh but Spirit. That is His image.
Therefore, when the Word of God tells us that God
created man according to His image, it means that in
addition to body and soul man also had that which is the
image of God i.e. spirit. In order to understand better
the usage of the phrase "in his image" in the above
critical passage, let's see another place where this
phrase occurs.
Genesis
5:1-3
"This
is the book of the generations of Adam. In the
day that God created man, In the likeness of God made
He him; Male and female created He them ; and
blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day
when they were created. And Adam lived an hundred and
thirty years, and begat a son in his own
likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth"
(KJV)
This
passage says that Adam begat a son "in his own likeness,
after his image". What does it mean? It means that as
Adam was, so his son was i.e. as Adam had hands so Seth
had hands. As Adam had feet so Seth had feet etc. As
Adam was body and soul so Seth was body and soul.
Similarly, when the Word says that God created man "in
his image", "in the likeness of God", what it means is
that as God is, so Adam was. God is not flesh. He does
not have feet, hands, head. He is spirit. So as God is
spirit so Adam had spirit. One could ask, why did God
make Adam apart from body and soul, spirit as well? The
simple reason is that without spirit Adam could not
communicate with God Who is spirit. God being spirit,
cannot communicate with the body and soul. They are
different things. You see, you cannot receive the
messages of the radio station unless you have a radio
receiver. You may have a washing machine. But the fact
that you have a washing machine does not make possible
for you to receive the messages of the radio station.
You necessarily need a radio receiver. Similarly, God is
spirit and to communicate with Him you must have spirit.
Body and soul are enough for things of the five senses.
But when it comes to the things of God, what you need is
spirit. This truth is also explained in I Corinthians
2:14:
I
Corinthians 2:14
"But
the natural (psuchikos in the Greek) man does not
receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are
foolishness to him: nor can he know them, because
they are spiritually discerned."
In
this passage, the word translated "natural" is the Greek
adjective "psuchikos", which comes from the noun "psuchi"
which means soul. So, psuchikos means "a soul man" i.e.
a man with body and soul only3.
According to that passage a man who is only body and
soul "does not receive the things of the Spirit of God".
As it was said above to receive "the things of the
spirit of God", to communicate with God you need the
appropriate receiver i.e. spirit. That's why the passage
says: "nor can he (the man of body and soul) know them
because they are spiritually discerned". The man of body
and soul is impossible to know the things of God for the
simple reason that such things have to do with the
spirit, "they are spiritually discerned", and since he
lacks spirit he cannot know them. Summarizing all the
above, Adam had body, formed from the dust of the
ground, soul that gives life to the body and spirit to
communicate with God. He was body, soul and spirit.
Having established that, there is no question about what
happened in the day that Adam and Eve ate from the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil. God had told them
that in the day that they would eat, they would surely
die. Bearing in mind that death means the absence of a
form of life, we can now see what died that day. Adam
was body, soul and spirit and his body died many years
after the day that he ate. Now since what permits to a
body to live is soul, Adam had body and soul even after
he ate from that tree. On the other hand, since God is
always right in what He says, something had to die that
day. Since Adam was body, soul and spirit before he ate
and since, as we saw, he continued to have body and soul
after he ate what was lost for him that day, was the
spirit that God gave him. He continued to have body and
soul but he didn't have spirit. The spirit departed from
him and this was death for him since spirit, a form of
life that he had before he ate, was no more there.
You
see, how clearly the Bible settles the things when you
leave it to interpret itself. It was actually this loss
of the spirit that was restored in the day of Pentecost
where holy spirit was made available, so that today
after believing in Jesus Christ you are again body soul
and spirit. However, this as well as other very
interesting points on this topic will be examined in a
next issue.
Tassos
Kioulachoglou | 
