{"id":81,"date":"2006-10-05T18:11:06","date_gmt":"2006-10-05T18:11:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/summametaphysica.com\/ge\/30020-tree-of-lifetree-of-knowledge\/30023-shorthand-symbolism-of-eden-parable\/"},"modified":"2018-04-23T20:19:17","modified_gmt":"2018-04-23T20:19:17","slug":"30023-shorthand-symbolism-of-eden-parable","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.summametaphysica.com\/ge\/30020-tree-of-lifetree-of-knowledge\/30023-shorthand-symbolism-of-eden-parable\/","title":{"rendered":"300.23 Shorthand: Symbolism of Eden Parable (pps.86-87)"},"content":{"rendered":"

hard cover page 86<\/p>\n

The Garden of Eden saga, properly interpreted, symbolizes the overriding cosmic inverse,314 <\/sup>whose workings may not be impeded.315<\/sup><\/p>\n

The Midrash portrays Abraham as expostulating with God: “If you want a world, you will not have justice; if it is justice you want, there will be no world. You are taking hold of the rope<\/p>\n

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314 <\/sup>See Cohen, The Tremendum, <\/em>pp. 27-28. “It is of the nature of the human that we live on two sides always: one illuminated, the other remaining in darkness. . . . These bivalences of the human exist. . . these contrarieties inhere in the human . . . bifurcated creature in a bifurcated universe, man doubled in a universe that is doubled, fractured man, prisoner of contradic- tion in a universe no less cut in two.”<\/p>\n

315 <\/sup>Midrash Bereshit Rabbah 14 addresses the question of why there is a seemingly extraneous consonant y (yod)<\/em> in the Hebrew Vayyizer<\/em> in the phrase “Then the Lord God formed the man” (Genesis 2:7). The consensus is that the connotation is for two formations, with variations of that theme offered: (1) Adam\/Eve, (2) the celestial\/the earthly, (3) good\/eviI, and (4) this world\/the next world. We would parallel (3) and offer (5)Tree of Life\/Tree of Knowl- edge; i.e., two possible world paths were open to man.
\nCf. Midrash Rabbah, Genesis 21:5-6. ” ‘Behold, the man has become as one of us.’ . . . Said R. Akiba to him. . . How then do you interpret Mimmennu<\/em>? It means that the Holy One, blessed be He, set two ways before him, life and death, and he chose the other path.” (Commentary: “that which God did not wish him to choose,” viz., death. Th.: R. Akiba treats mimmennu <\/em>as third- person singular [“of himself”], not first-person plural [“of us”], translating: “Behold, the man has become as one who knows good and evil of himself, of his own free will, and thereby has himself chosen the path of death.”)<\/p>\n

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hard cover page 87<\/p>\n

by both ends-you desire both a world and justice-but if you do not concede a little, the world cannot stand.”316<\/sup><\/p>\n

Thus, when man chose to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, he chose to accept the entire set of dynamics of the Tree of Knowledge, and he turned his back on the entire set of dynamics of the Tree of Life. It was actually man who determined his own “expulsion” from the Garden of Eden’s bliss. It was man seeking the destiny of Tree of Knowledge with all that the choice implies.317<\/sup><\/p>\n

To proceed one step further, it may be proposed that at Eden man gave his imprimatur<\/em> to creation itself. For, creation is inexorably interwined with the dynamic of the Tree of Knowledge. In choosing the Tree of Knowledge, man retroactively ignited a crucial link in creation.<\/p>\n

The Garden of Eden tale, which is fittingly placed at the commencement of the biblical narrative, is a philosophically exquisite theodicy\/philosophy wrapped in an image-laden, but ultimately sophisticated, parable.<\/p>\n

The Eden theodicy must be placed at “front and center” of the Torah, for theodicy is central to any monotheistic theology. The major thrust of our Unified Formulation stares us in the face, cloaked in a parable.<\/p>\n

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316 <\/sup>Midrash Rabbah, Genesis 49, no. 20.<\/p>\n

317 <\/sup>See Augustine, Confessions and Enchidion.<\/em> “For God would never have created any, I do not say angel, but even man, whose future wickedness He foreknew, unless He had equally known to what uses in behalf of the good He could turn him, thus embellishing the course of the ages, as it were an exquisite poem set off with antitheses. For what are called antitheses are among the most elegant of the ornaments of speech. They might be called in Latin ‘oppositions,’ or, to speak more accurately, ‘contrapositions.’ ” As cited in Hick, Evil and the God of Love<\/em>, p. 24.<\/p>\n

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hard cover page 86 The Garden of Eden saga, properly interpreted, symbolizes the overriding cosmic inverse,314 whose workings may not be impeded.315 The Midrash portrays Abraham as expostulating with God: “If you want a world, you will not have justice; if it is justice you want, there will be no world. 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