Genesis 2:17

_BUT OF THE TREE OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL, THOU SHALT NOT EAT OF IT: FOR IN THE DAY THAT THOU EATEST THEREOF THOU SHALT SURELY DIE._ The tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat. The inspired historian (Genesis 2:15) resumes the thread of his narrative, which was broken by the insertion (Genesis 2:8-14) of the topographical description of Eden. Kurtz and others indeed think that this tree possessed the inherent property of imparting a knowledge of the physical evil that was in the place of his abode, and that thereby it stood in direct opposition to the tree of life; so that, by pointing to the two trees in the midst of the garden, the Creator virtually addressed the first pair in the same terms that were afterward used to the Israelites, "See, I have set befo

16,17 Let us never set up our own will against the holy will of God. There was not only liberty allowed to man, in taking the fruits of paradise, but everlasting life made sure to him upon his obedience. There was a trial appointed of his obedience. By transgression he would forfeit his Maker's favour, and deserve his displeasure, with all its awful effects; so that he would become liable to pain, disease, and death. Worse than that, he would lose the holy image of God, and all the comfort of his favour; and feel the torment of sinful passions, and the terror of his Maker's vengeance, which must endure for ever with his never dying soul. The forbidding to eat of the fruit of a particular tree was wisely suited to the state of our first parents. In their state of innocence, and separated from any others, what opportunity or what temptation had they to break any of the ten commandments? T...

Verse Genesis 2:17. _OF THE TREE OF THE KNOWLEDGE - THOU SHALT NOT EAT_] This is the _first positive precept_ God gave to man; and it was given as a test of obedience, and a proof of his being in a _dependent_, _probationary_ state. It was necessary that, while constituted lord of this lower world, he should know that he was only God's _vicegerent_, and must be accountable to him for the use of his mental and corporeal powers, and for the use he made of the different creatures put under his care. The man from whose mind the strong impression of this dependence and responsibility is erased, necessarily loses sight of his origin and end, and is capable of any species of wickedness. As God is sovereign, he has a right to give to his creatures what commands he thinks proper. An intelligent creature, without a _law_ to regulate his conduct, is an absurdity; this wou...

- XII. The Command 15. נוּח _nûach_ “rest, dwell.” עבד _‛__ābad_ “work, till, serve.” שׁמר _shāmar_ “keep, guard.” We have here the education of man summed up in a single sentence. Let us endeavor to unfold the great lessons that are here taught. Genesis 2:15 THE LORD GOD TOOK THE MAN. - The same omnipotent hand that made him still held him. “And put him into the garden.” The original word is “caused him to rest,” or dwell in the garden as an abode of peace and recreation. “To dress it and to keep it.” The plants of nature, left to their own course, may degenerate and become wild through the poverty of the soil on which they alight, or the gradual

EXPOSITION GENESIS 2:8 In accordance with a well-known characteristic of Hebrew composition, the writer, having carried his subject forward to a convenient place of rest, now reverts to a point of time in the six days antecedent to man's appearance on the earth. In anticipation of his arrival, it was needful that a suitable abode should be prepared for his reception. Accordingly, having already mentioned the creation of plants, trees, and flowers, the narrative proceeds to describe the construction of Adam's early home. AND THE LORD GOD (Jehovah Elohim) PLANTED—_i.e._ specially prepared—A GARDEN (_gan_,_ _a place protected by a fence, from _ganan_,_ _to cover; hence a garden: cf. Deutero

BUT OF THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL,.... Of the name of this tree, and the reasons of it, Genesis 2:9 THOU SHALT NOT EAT OF IT; not that this tree had any efficacy in it to increase knowledge, and improve in science and understanding, as Satan suggested God knew; and therefore forbid the eating of it out of envy to man, which the divine Being is capable of; or that there was anything hurtful in it to the bodies of men, if they had eaten of it; or that it was unlawful and evil of itself, if it had not been expressly prohibited: but it was, previous to this injunction, a quite indifferent thing whether man ate of it or not; and therefore was pitched upon as a trial of man's obedience to God, under whose government he was, and whom it was fit he should obey in all things; and since he had a grant of all the trees of the garden but this, it was the greater a

Genesis 2:1. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made. These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens, And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground. And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a...

II. THE GENERATIONS OF THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH Man in Innocency before the Fall Genesis 2:4-45 _ 1. The earth his abode (Genesis 2:4)_ 2. The creation of man (Genesis 2:7) 3. The garden of Eden (Genesis 2:8) 4. Man in the garden. His commission (Genesis 2:15) a. To keep the garden b. The commandment 5. No helpmeet for Adam found (Genesis 2:18) 6. The formation of the woman (Genesis 2:21) 7. The un

J'S STORY OF CREATION AND PARADISE LOST. This story does not belong to P, for it is free from its characteristics in style, vocabulary, and point of view. It is distinguished from P's creation story by differences in form and in matter. The regular and precise arrangement, the oft-repeated formulæ, the prosaic style are here absent. We have, instead, a bright and vivid style, a story rather than a chronicle. The frank anthropomorphism would have been repugnant to the priestly writer, and a marked difference is to be observed between the two accounts. P starts from a watery chaos, this narrative from a dry waste. P represents the development of life as moving in a climax up to the creation of man and woman, while here man seems to be created first, then plants and animals, and woman last of all. The use of Yahweh, the anthropomorphism, and several characteristic expressions combine to sho...

TREE. Note the three trees: "Knowledge" (Genesis 2:9), man's Ruin; "the Cross" (Acts 10:39; Acts 5:30; 1 Peter 2:24), man's Redemption; "the Tree of Life" (Genesis 2:9; Revelation 2:7; Revelation 22:2), man's Regeneration. GOOD AND EVIL. See on "knowledge", Genesis 2:9. Obedience proving what was "good" ...