What was special about these two trees and their bearing on humanity’s relationship with the Creator?

In Genesis 2:16-17, God explained to Adam the consequence associated with the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It was a real tree with real fruit that if eaten would bring death. Adam and Eve, therefore, had a choice to either obey God’s decree of abstaining or reject God and partake.

From the beginning, Adam and Eve had a conjectural knowledge of good and evil associated with this tree, but not an experiential knowledge. They had experienced only good and nothing evil. But once they ate of it, they had experiential knowledge of evil for they had sinned.

We then understand the purpose of this tree to be one that gave them enlightenment as to their place in Creation. They were not mindless automatons programed to worship the Creator. They were beautifully and perfectly created with free will. They had a choice; they were willing participants of God’s love!!! God did not and never will force His love upon someone. Every person gets to be a consensual recipient of His immeasurable love! Our worship, therefore, is a genuine, loving worship. Our relationship with God is a genuine, loving relationship that contains the greatest fulfillment one can ever experience. It is the fulfillment and purpose for which we were created – communion with our loving Creator.

By not partaking of the tree, Adam and Eve demonstrated their love for God, placing Him above all in their lives. By partaking of the tree, they demonstrated their selfishness and idolatry, placing themselves above God.

The consequences of rejecting God and choosing themselves were devastating. The entire creation was cursed (Genesis 3:17, Romans 8:22). Death, disease, destruction, pain and suffering entered and defiled the perfect creation (Romans 5:12, 1 Corinthians 15:21).

Adam and Eve had been warned of the penalty of death. God had said, “ for in the day that you eat from it, dying you shall die ” (Genesis 2:17). The Hebrew for “ dying you shall die ” is mō-wt tā-mūt (מ֥וֹת תָּמֽוּת׃). It means that in the very day they ate of the forbidden fruit, they would begin to physically die and eventually return to the dust of the ground (Genesis 3:19). Even worse, they were spiritually dead – separated from God. However, He did not abandon them. He provided a blood sacrifice and covering for them (Genesis 3:21).

Romans 5:12 and 1 Corinthians 15:21 clearly state that there was no death before sin. Was this only spiritual death, or does this also include physical death?

First, at the end of the creation week, God pronounces all that He had created “ very good ” (Genesis 1:31). This cannot mean there was death, disease, pain, suffering, or carnivorous activity, for otherwise we would serve a moral monster as our Creator. When examining the entire creation account of Genesis 1 & 2 (consult our harmony at /a-harmony-of-genesis-1-2/ ), we see that the last thing God says to all creation is that every living creature is to eat only vegetation (Genesis 1:30). Carnivory was forbidden as death was not permitted in a perfect creation. It is after this decree that God pronounces the entire creation “ very good ” (1:31).

Second, Adam and Eve are told that the penalty for eating of the forbidden tree would be death. That death penalty would begin the very day of their sin as they would be spiritually dead/separated from God (Ephesians 2:1), but they would also begin to physically die (see above). This is repeated to Adam in Genesis 3:19. The Tree of Life’s purpose, therefore, cannot be to keep Adam and Eve from dying pre-sin. They are warned that they will die if they eat the forbidden fruit, but they are never warned they will die if they do not eat of the Tree of Life. Therefore, since the warning of physical death comes only with the forbidden tree, we can conclude that they would have physically lived forever in the perfect creation for however long the Lord willed, as long as they continued in obedience to His decree.

The question of the Tree of Life’s purpose comes about when dealing with death before sin. It is the default position of theistic evolutionists that the death penalty of Genesis 2:17 is spiritual death only. This is required in their theology as death is the mechanism for evolutionary advancement. Therefore, God made Creation with death, pain, suffering, and survival of the fittest for the transmutation of species.

This, of course, has no Scriptural or scientific support. Yet, these evolutionists argue that the Tree of Life is the proof of physical death before sin. If Adam and Eve did not eat of that tree, they would have grown old and physically died, just as God designed. The animals did indeed die as divine evolution advanced life, so they claim.

To me, the notion that God would create an existence in which perfection includes death, disease, pain, and suffering makes God a moral, insidious monster of a creator. How could He look at Creation and declare it “ very good ” (Genesis 1:31) if it contained physical death?

Why would He command that all animal life and people eat only vegetation (Genesis 1:30) if it was not for the forbidding of carnivory in order to prevent death in a perfect world?

Here are some questions regarding this issue and the Tree of Life:

The only way to reconcile all of this is the conclusion that there was no physical death before sin as God created a perfect universe in which no animal and no human would ever die as long as holiness and perfection were maintained. That conclusion then requires that the Tree of Life was not the sustainer of physical life pre-Fall as physical life was not in danger of death and, therefore, needed no sustaining. It must have served some other purpose in the Garden. Also, its function in the Garden could have been different or changed after the Fall. The job of the cherubim pre-Fall was certainly different from their job post-Fall (Genesis 3:24).

By not eating the forbidden fruit and by eating of the Tree of Life, Adam and Eve showed their love for God and would continue to physically live as long as the Lord willed.

By eating the forbidden fruit, they sinned and physically died. They fell from grace and were no longer allowed to declare their love of God by partaking of the Tree of Life. This makes partaking of the Tree of Life a form of worship.

Renowned 19 ^th century commentator Alfred Edersheim wrote, “…there was also the ‘tree of life’ in the garden, probably as a symbol and pledge of a higher life, which we should have inherited if our first parents had continued obedient to God” ( The Bible History: Old Testament , Vol. 1, 1949, p. 20).

19 ^th century Irish and Scottish commentators Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown expressed that the Tree of Life was, “so called from its symbolic character as a sign and seal of immortal life. Its prominent position where it must have been an object of daily observation and interest, was admirably fitted to keep man habitually in mind of God and futurity” ( A Commentary, Critical and Explanatory, on the Old and New Testaments , Vol. 1, 1878, p. 18).

17 ^th century English theologian Matthew Poole believed the Tree of Life was so called “…symbolically, and sacramentally, because it was a sign and seal of that life which man had received from God, and of his continual enjoyment of it upon condition of his obedience” ( Annotations on the Holy Bible , 1683-5,   https://biblehub.com/commentaries/poole/genesis/2.htm ).

This would maintain the thought that before the Fall, Adam and Eve did not eat of the Tree of Life so that they would live forever, but rather they ate of the Tree in worship because they would live forever. This is similar to the Lord’s Supper – we do not partake of it so that we will live forever, but rather we partake in worship of the One who has saved us to live forever with Him.

20 ^th century American commentator H.C. Leupold wrote, “The church has always understood in reference to these trees that, in the nature of the case, eating of the fruit of one tree cannot impart life, just as little as partaking of the fruit of another cannot impart a sense of moral distinctions… Since the New Testament, by the analogy of the sacraments, presents so adequate a parallel and so satisfactory an explanation, criticism has gone sadly astray by drawing upon the analogy of magic from heathen sources” ( Exposition of Genesis , Vol. 1, 1942, pp. 120-1).

Leupold makes the point that to believe that the fruit of the Tree of Life was the source of immortality before the Fall or to believe that the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was the source of understanding morality is the same as believing ancient mysticisms of pagan religions. This does not, however, negate the historical truth that these were physical trees with physical fruit, both of which had spiritual consequences and physical realities when eaten. Consequently, though it is symbolic, partaking of the Lord’s Supper has serious consequences if one partakes in an unworthy manner (1 Corinthians 11:29).

Other scholars have made the claim of a deluded theology in believing the Tree of Life imparted immortality. They argue that such a reality would invalidate the divine penalty for sin. Did Adam and Eve have to really be kept from the Tree of Life because its fruit would nullify the penalty for sin – death? They argue that this is bordering on ancient mysticisms of special concoctions for immortality.

Poole argued for the reason of God’s banishment of and forbiddance of Adam and Eve to eat of the tree being that they would not “…thereby profane that sacrament of eternal life, and fondly persuade himself that he shall live for ever” ( Annotations , 1683-5, https://biblehub.com/commentaries/poole/genesis/3.htm ).

18 ^th century English theologian John Gill echoed this sentiment, “…live for ever; not that it was possible, by eating of the fruit of the tree of life, his natural life could be continued for ever, contrary to the sentence of death pronounced upon him; or so as to elude that sentence, and by it eternal life be procured and obtained; but he was hindered from eating of it, lest he should flatter himself, that by so doing he should live for ever” ( Exposition of the Old Testament , 1748-63, https://www.sacred-texts.com/bib/cmt/gill/gen003.htm ).

Early 19 ^th century English commentator Joseph Benson continued this thought, writing, “Care must be taken, and man must be banished hence, lest he take of the tree of life, as he took of the tree of knowledge, and thereby profane that sacrament of eternal life, and persuade himself that he shall live for ever” ( Holy Bible, containing the Old and New Testaments …with Notes, Critical, Explanatory, and Practical, 2 ^nd ed., 1811-8, https://biblehub.com/commentaries/benson/genesis/3.htm ).

Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown concurred, “This tree being a pledge of that immortal life with which obedience should be rewarded, man lost, on his fall, all claim to this tree; and therefore, that he might not eat of it or delude himself with the idea that eating of it would restore what he had forfeited, the Lord sent him forth from the garden” ( Commentary, Vol. 1, 1878, p. 20).

Despite these arguments from several scholars over several centuries, I am not convinced of the argument that the effects of the Tree of Life post-Fall were merely perceptional and not physical. At this time, I believe the Hebrew supports the traditional translation and understanding that if they would have eaten of the Tree of Life after the Fall, they may have indeed avoided physical death because of its divine nature.

In all of these thoughts and arguments, it remains the clear, distinct teaching of Scripture that the only reason anyone or anything dies is because of the detrimental consequence of sin. Russel Grigg composed an article in 2009 for Creation Ministries International after the passing of his wife, to whom he was married 47 years. He wrote:

“I can now say that, for someone who had not intimately witnessed death before, nothing prepared me for the realization that the person who a few moments previously had been a living, loving, sharing, interacting wife, mother and grandmother, was now a lifeless corpse. From this point of view, death is a terrible, terrible thing… This tells me three things about the holiness and love of God.

We who know Christ as Saviour and Lord shall all meet again when we see Jesus face to face.”
( https://creation.com/is-death-a-good-thing-or-a-bad-thing )

In His grace (receiving that which we have not earned), the Lord allowed Adam and Eve to praise Him for their lives by partaking of the Tree of Life. When they fell from grace, the Lord in His mercy (not receiving that which we deserve) allowed the death process to begin so that they would not live forever in a fallen world. They were instead clothed with life and atoned for by innocent blood (Genesis 3:21) so that they might again partake of the Tree of Life in eternity (Revelation 2:7).

May we likewise be covered in life and atoned for by the innocent blood of the Lamb (1 Peter 1:18-19, Galatians 3:27), worshiping Him through the partaking of the Lord’s Supper in a worthy manner (1 Corinthians 11:23-29) until the day we, too, are able to partake of the Tree of Life.