We have been plying varied aspects, desultorily at times, regarding the Fall. Last time we drew some parallels between Genesis 3 and Matthew 4, pointing out the historic and repeated method of Satan: Hath God Said?
We return to Genesis 3.2-4.
ב וַתֹּאמֶר הָאִשָּׁה, אֶל-הַנָּחָשׁ: מִפְּרִי עֵץ-הַגָּן, נֹאכֵל.
2 And the woman said unto the serpent: 'Of the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat;
ג וּמִפְּרִי הָעֵץ, אֲשֶׁר בְּתוֹךְ-הַגָּן--אָמַר אֱלֹהִים לֹא תֹאכְלוּ מִמֶּנּוּ, וְלֹא תִגְּעוּ בּוֹ: פֶּן-תְּמֻתוּן.
3 but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said: Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.'
ד וַיֹּאמֶר הַנָּחָשׁ, אֶל-הָאִשָּׁה: לֹא-מוֹת, תְּמֻתוּן.
4 And the serpent said unto the woman: 'Ye shall not surely die;
We observed from Genesis 3.1 the surreptitious and deceitful approach, Hath God Said? Last time, we saw that Satan was a master exegete of words and syntax. Now, the grammar of deceit is cast to the side. You surely shall not die .
This is a flat contradiction of God’s threat of death should they eat of the forbidden tree. It is an assault on His integrity and the trustworthiness—again—of His Word.
Had Adam and Eve stood back and pondered this, perhaps iterating it 10 to 20 times, excogitating it, Coram Deo, perhaps they might have thought again. They didn’t.
Satan’s lie says, in essence, “You can violate or break God’s Word, get away with it, and suffer no consequences. You can be treasonous, rebellious and disrespectful. You can trust me, Satan. Look how lowly and humbly I come to you. God loves you `unconditionally!’ `He so loves you—he loves you so much—it’s gonna be OK.’”
Do we not hear the same today? “God loves you unconditionally!” This fiction is one of the great misunderstandings of our day. You will not die intones the serpent. This is in the church, not the world.
We must impute this guilt to misinformed, unthinking, misleading, and untaught leaders—men who don’t read. Hear the subtlety. This is in the church, not the world.
Genesis 3.5, the liar continues:
ה כִּי, יֹדֵעַ אֱלֹהִים, כִּי בְּיוֹם אֲכָלְכֶם מִמֶּנּוּ, וְנִפְקְחוּ עֵינֵיכֶם; וִהְיִיתֶם, כֵּאלֹהִים, יֹדְעֵי, טוֹב וָרָע.
5 for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil.
This appears to be the upshot of this serpentine salesman, e.g. “great value at low costs.” Here's the sense of it.
"Look at the knowledge you will gain. You’ll be like God. You will know what good and evil is like. In your current condition, you are lacking. You need something more. He hasn’t been upfront with you. You’ll become an uber-mensche, a super-man, with a super mind and super feelings. You don’t quite have it and he’s made limited you. If you eat it, you’ll get quite a lift. Tired of that old worship? Tired of all that old stuff? You’ll have a taste of the new. This will take you higher. What a great value here for such a low investment. Go for it! Just take the fruit and you’ll be free! "
This is always the same storyline, like the Pharisees and Sadducees, either adding or subtracting from the Word of God. The party names change through history, but this coordinates them all.
Satan’s word is an invitation to autonomy and is a grasp for self-rule. It is a quest to run things by oneself. It is evident throughout the book of Exodus. It comes to repeated expression in the Book of Judges, to wit, that every man did that which was right in his own eyes. It will re-appear throughout the major and minor prophets. It will appear in Jesus’ time. It was strong in the days of the apostles, even down to later decades, e.g. Revelation (1-3). It will appear in all the centuries to follow.
This is a collision and it is war. It is a collision between God’s will and man’s will. There is now a battle for sovereignty, a battle for authority, and the beginnings of the historic Battle for the Bible. The war often ends up in seminaries and in denominations as well. Who shall prevail?
This precisely what the man of lawlessness and sin will pursue even in our own times, that antichrist, that man of sin, who sets himself above God’s Word and raises his twisted interpretations to a level of infallibility.
The short of it for today is that all this is very bad news (but then, there is the Gospel).
Here ends part Eleven.
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