(8g) Adam and Eve - my interpretation

The story of Adam and Eve

Many people know the story of Adam and Eve: Adam was created by God but soon he felt lonely and thus God decided to create out of Adam's rib a woman, Eve.

God told both that they can use everything except the apples of that one tree in the middle of the garden in which they were living.

Then the devil in the form of a snake appeared and convinced Eve to convince Adam to take an apple from that tree of "the knowledge between good and bad".

We know the story: first Adam hesitated as he remember what God told him but the power of women to convince men can be too much and thus he agreed to take an apple and both Adam and Eve took a bite. Instantly they noticed they were naked and covert themselves as they had eaten from the tree of knowledge. For this, God threw them out of paradise and into the wilderness.

Modern version of the story of "Adam and Eve" whereby the apple is replaced by a pint of beer - wall painting of a bar

People disrespect requests

Many people think God exaggerated. Indeed, such a harsh punishment for eating an apple. Still, how many people don't experience at least ones in their life a similar situation whereby they have children or visitors and tell them they are welcome but should not enter a specific room or take a specific object. As often, this triggers curiosity and the result is that people break their promise and try to find out what is special about that specific room or object. They may discover it is nothing special and some will even tell the other why they made so much fuss about nothing while the unknown story may be about a memory of a lost person. Or a child may draw pictures in a very rare and expensive book. And thus trust is broken, sometimes even irreparable whereby friendships stop and they split.

Thieves are rarely naked

Both also knew they were wrong and the result is that they hide their nudity. Indeed, watch videos on the internet that show thieves in shops. Never can they be naked and many wear many layers of clothes in which they hide the things they steal. Just as Adam and Eve did after their stole. Indeed, innocence was lost.

Destruction of the natural world as we're greedy

Finally, I think it can also be considered as a parable of what is happening in our world. Although scientists warn we should maintain forests such as in Africa, Brazil, Indonesia but also protect nature in Europe and America as they produce oxygen and clean water, bring peace in crowded cities but also to maintain the weather balance, still humans do what they know they should not do, often illegal for which ingenious constructions are setup so it seems legal.

The result is a change in the climate such as less rain in regions such as the Amazon but it affects the weather even in other parts of our world such as storms and flooding. And thus, as we do what we shouldn't, yields may decrease when abnormal weather destroys them and thus people may be "thrown out of paradise", or at least people may have to import more from other regions. Indeed, also Adam and Eve were thrown out of paradise but without being killed, after their removal from paradise they had to find food elsewhere and for this they and descendants, i.e. humans, continued to destroy as we see today so paradise continues to become smaller.

Before, humans didn't listen to God but listened to the one who told we should take everything and humans became convinced that God gave us everything to destroy.

Today, humans don't listen to scientists but listen to those who promise short term gain although we know this may lead to disaster while we attack those who still live in harmony with nature that they don't want to progress so they either disappear or also become convinced that destruction is needed to become wealthy. Central Africa is an example where nature is sacrificed for wealth by a few aggressive people while normal people suffer. Past and today, little changed.

But, humans, certainly in the West, start to change and oppose even more destruction of our planet and many accept the protection of our world may cost when that means a better future for next generations. Indeed, a growing number of people pay to save tropical forests although the financial crisis made this more difficult. Another manner to help to stop the destruction of more forests is to ban the import of tropical forest wood; indeed, we have other materials that can be used in the building industries such as plastics or the wood of our own trees when they are cut and thus we don't need to buy foreign wood as that contributes to more destruction.

Unfortunately, in other places such as the Amazon and elsewhere, indigenous people who live in harmony with nature, try to defend what exist but suffer as a consequence and are forced to either change and accept our modern way of living that includes destruction to become wealthy or be killed; thus continued disappearing of what many call "primitive cultures". The disappearance of forest also scares scientists because they know there are still to be discovered plants that may help in the battle against illnesses; indigenous people can help scientists as they know some of the plants powers and help scientists to "discover" those plants and their healing powers.

End notes, whether Adam and Eve ever existed is not important while we know our ancestors lived first in harmony with nature and therefore we know little how they lived while at a certain point in human history, people started to "civilise" that resulted in things such as the destruction of forests to build cities that resulted in competition and rivalry between these cities as certain rulers wanted more power and started to conquer other places. This has consequences up to our time. Thus, the story can teach us how we should respect our environment although of course, we need to build homes and thus there will always be some destruction of land.

Later the story continues with Cain and Able, sons of Adam and Eve. Identical as for Adam and Eve who had to leave Paradise after their (minor) sin, also Cain was sent wandering (i.e. leave his birthplace to try to find his own place in the world) as punishment for having murdered his brother. Then he started to build cities that resulted in destruction of the environment but likely also in wars to be able to settle in other people's land as Cain didn't mind to murder his own brother simply because he was jealous and thus this may have been a time whereby dynasties emerged that wanted more power at whatever cost, even at the cost of his brother's live. They (are family members) became powerful as they had more knowledge (such as being able to build better weapons) and convinced people to side them in their power struggles by educating them so those who gained knowledge also had power over locals while they promised loyalty to those who educated them. However, some wanted more powers for themselves and started to fight against others, including own family members. This also resulted in destruction of land and as a result climate change that ended with the story of Noah and the destruction of civilisations of which I published before twice.