Board index ‹ Specific Bible verses, texts, and passages ‹ Genesis

[Grosser]

So Did Adam and Eve mess up God's plan by disobeying or was them disobeying part of his plan? Did he change his plan?

If because of the Fall, things haven't gone according to God's plan, why doesn't he just start over? Doesn't he want to execute his original plan? Did he change his mind? The fact that he hasn't hit the reset button suggests he wants it this way.

[jimwalton]

I think the best answer to your question is that you are thinking in the wrong vein. "Messing up God's plan" or "conforming to God's plan" is a distorted approach to what happened in the context of an omniscient God. The attitude you express behind your question is that God somehow flubbed by (1) failing to foresee, or (2) failing to start over, or (3) failing to execute His original plan, or (4) changing His mind, or (5) He wanted them to sin. All of these choices betray a wrong way of looking at what happened.

Adam and Eve stand as archetypes of humanity (please don't read allegory or metaphor), representing all of humanity. The choice given to all humanity was whether to recognize God as the center of order and the source of wisdom or for humans to claim that for themselves. The man and woman show that it is the tendency of humans to claim God's prerogatives for themselves rather than to recognize God in that place. The point is that humans are insufficient in themselves to achieve spiritual life; we need a Savior. God has always known about this inadequacy and vulnerability in humanity. Hence, there was a plan before the creation of the world for Jesus to redeem humanity. To reduce or distort this narrative into some sort of trap about "God's plan" or God's misjudgment or error is barking up the wrong tree.

[Common Cup]

Suppose you were in a void and you said ‘Let there be…’

You took responsibility when you said ‘Let us make man in our image’

Right there you make living beings with hopes and fears who did not ask to be created yet have the ability to ponder the things of eternity and death.

You are responsible.

No one else.

Everyone else, every single living being is as a lamb to the slaughter. Who can talk back?

Who can argue against the Lord of Spirits?

If somebody cannot see and understand it is because they have been blinded.

If someone can see and understand it is because their eyes have been opened.

Who can talk back?

Lambs to the slaughter.

[jimwalton]

There are so many misunderstandings here I hardly know where to begin.

Genesis 1 is an account of God ordering the cosmos and the world to function in a certain way; it's not about the material manufacture of the cosmos and the Earth. So there was no "void" into which God spoke. We'll start there. The EARTH was "without form and void," meaning it had not yet been ordered or been assigned a function. "Formless" was a term of disorder in the ancient world—essentially a chaotic state, not a "void." So you're off on the wrong foot.

Second, "God's image" is explained in Gn. 1.26-28 as "rule and subdue." Humankind was to be stewards over the Earth as God would: with responsibility and care. It is no implication that God was taking responsibility for the decisions humans made. So that's error #2.

> you make living beings with hopes and fears who did not ask to be created

This is an absurdity. How can you ask something that doesn't exist if it wants to be created? That's error #3.

> the ability to ponder the things of eternity and death.

The ability to ponder the things of eternity and death is a blessing, not a problem. That's error #4.

> Everyone else, every single living being is as a lamb to the slaughter. Who can talk back?

What does this even mean? Every living being is as a lamb to the slaughter? What sense does this make? God made all things good is what the text says. Where do you get lambs to the slaughter? This is a misconstrued and distortion for sure, error #5.