6 Reasons Why Adam and Eve’s Eating of the Forbidden Fruit Was a Terrible Transgression Against God
BY LE ANN TREES | Did God overreact to Adam and Eve’s sin in the garden of Eden? Why was Adam and Eve’s eating of the forbidden fruit such a terrible transgression against God?
The theologian Herman Bavinck writes: “Why did God create the world? the answer is: Because he so willed.”[1] God didn’t have to tell us why he made the universe, but he wanted us to have specific knowledge about him (special revelation) that we could never acquire from observing and studying the physical world (general revelation).
The Bible begins and ends in a beautiful garden with a life-giving tree located in each one. There is a good reason for this: God created the world for his glory—so that his creation would live unto him, giving him praise in all things. Genesis describes how everything God created was good (Gen. 1). God created humans as his royal image bearers to rule over creation, tend his garden, and care for his creatures—honoring their creator in all. Adam and Eve were righteous and upright, with the full ability to obey God and keep all his commands. After breathing life into the first human,
The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 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.” (Gen. 2:16– 17)
Adam and Eve were responsible to serve God and care for all the creation under their dominion. To prove their faithfulness to their Creator, God gave Adam a test: Adam must obey God’s command to not eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in order to eat from the other mentioned tree in the garden—the tree of life (Gen. 2:9)—and live forever in God’s presence.
The Covenant between God and Adam
The relationship that existed between God and Adam had a condition placed upon it, which was…