Henry,

If there is such a thing as divine inspiration in writing an original document than there could certainly be divine inspiration in the assembly and editing material from multiple sources. However, in interpreting such works, I think it is necessary to take into account that it was indeed compiled and edited and even may contain errors made by the original editor. Also, the text we have is obviously not the original and may have been corrupted. This is true of Genesis or of the Gospels

Ronald alluded to Genesis 3:20 (“The man called his wife Eve, because she became the mother of all the living.”) The NAB says in a footnote: “This verse seems to be out of place; it would fit better after Genesis 3:24. The Hebrew name hawwa (‘Eve’) is related to the Hebrew word hay (‘living’).” What I am saying is that one might make a case about how meaningful it is that Genesis 3:20 comes exactly where it does, and one might possibly be right. But it is also possible that somewhere along the line, either in the original editing or the manuscript transmission, the verse got misplaced.

I sometimes wonder if way too much isn’t read into things like the story of Adam and Eve (and particularly into Genesis 3:15, the so-called protoevengelium). To the extent that the story is figurative — and I take it to be very figurative — it doesn’t make a great deal of sense to say what might have happened had Adam and Eve not sinned. (Of course, I made a conjecture about that myself.) In reality, Adam and Eve didn’t sin, because Adam and Eve are not historical characters. They are fictional characters in a figurative account of the origin of the human race.

The Church maintains that the human race originated with two individuals, but it does not maintain (to the best of my knowledge) that we know who these individuals were or what they did. It does not maintain that they lived in an idyllic garden and that a serpent tempted them to eat forbidden fruit, for which they were expelled from the garden. It does not even make sense to say the serpent was Satan, since the serpent is also a fictional character.

It seems to me a lot of thinking about Genesis is influenced by centuries and centuries of reflection on the story during which it was considered to be literally true. The Church now says, “The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man. Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by the original fault freely committed by our first parents.” That makes very little concession to modern science, but it does seem to me to indicate that there was not (or at least no one is bound to believe) there were two individuals who were tempted by Satan in the form of a snake and ate forbidden fruit, realized they were naked, and were expelled from Eden.

You mention several things; I will only briefly discuss them one by one — because there is good in what you say, but also confusion as to the Christian interpretation.

First, yes, Genesis (as with much of Scripture) is edited together, collecting material from several sources. But we must remember this is exactly what Catholics have always said about Holy Scriptures. Though we detect more of the synthetic elements of the book than people before did, is there anything odd or wrong to think there is a spiritual guidance going in in the development of Scripture and its selection of sources from many different and diverse groups? To me there is not.

Second, there was a lie, but like all lies, it is based upon truth and its perversion; here it is equivocation upon the word knowledge. The knowledge of evil that humanity has is the knowledge of being engulfed by evil, which is different from the omniscience of God. Indeed, the knowledge of evil in the human sense is actually an euphemism for defiled knowledge, which is ignorance based upon the distortions of consciousness that comes about through sin. We know evil by reifying it and giving it a false objective existence which then becomes the mediation by which the world is known. Then is the question who is it that God is talking to by saying “like us,” and I think some authors have suggested “those in the heavens” in which there has been a knowledge of evil because of the fall (though I am not certain on this, been sometime since I’ve read/studied commentary on this verse). But many authors then think that death is a boon in the fallen modality of consciousness due to the fall, because it puts a limit to evil.

Many sources point out that if there had been no fall, they would have grown, but without the accompanying growth of evil with the growth of consciousness. In the way of the world, Baudrillard points out that good and evil grow together, and this imo, is because of the fall; humanity would have been equipped to handle the world — would have grown in consciousness, but without the defilements (recognized as original sin and concupiscence).

One thing I find interesting is that the serpent is telling the truth when he tempts Eve. The serpent tells Eve that if she and Adam eat the forbidden fruit, they will be like gods, knowing what is good and bad.

But the serpent said to the woman: “You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad.”

When God becomes aware of what has happened, he confirms what the serpent said in words very close to the serpent’s.

Then the LORD God said: “See! The man has become like one of us, knowing what is good and what is bad! Therefore, he must not be allowed to put out his hand to take fruit from the tree of life also, and thus eat of it and live forever.”

Dare one suggest that God had not been entirely honest when he said Adam and Eve would die if they ate the forbidden fruit? Here are three translations of his words, from the NAB, the RSV, and the JPS (Jewish Publication Society):

The LORD God gave man this order: “You are free to eat from any of the trees of the garden except the tree of knowledge of good and bad. From that tree you shall not eat; the moment you eat from it you are surely doomed to die.”

And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”

And the Lord God commanded the man saying, “Of every tree of the garden you are free to eat; but as for the tree of knowledge of good and bad, you must not eat of it; for as soon as you eat of it, you shall die.”

The NAB translation seems to leave open the possibility that Adam and Eve are setting in motion a course of events which will lead to their eventual death through the loss of a chance at immortality. But the other translations basically say that if Adam and Eve eat the fruit, it will kill them on the spot. But in fact they don’t die from eating the fruit, which confirms that the serpent was telling them the truth when he said they would not die.

It seems to me that until their disobedience, God was dealing with Adam and Eve as children. He did not explain why they must not eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, because they were incapable of understanding it. So he told them they would die if they ate the forbidden fruit.

The Fall is about loss of innocence, but it seems to me that in order for there to be human history, the loss was necessary, otherwise the human race would be a race of children — if there would have been a human race at all. The story of Adam and Eve, unlike the other story in Genesis about the creation of humans, doesn’t seem to imply that Adam and Eve, before the fall, were going to have children (or were going to live forever).

If it had not been for their disobedience, Adam and Eve would have remained childlike creatures in Eden, unequipped to deal with the “real world.”

I have to acknowledge here that while I believe the story of Adam and Eve may tell us something about the human condition, I don’t believe it is in any way historical or even a figurative account of historical events, and I don’t believe that all humans descended from two individuals whose actions affected the fate of the entire human race.

I thought Francis’ comments were more than a little odd as well; I originally deleted the first and hard it restored, hoping that some good conversation could be had (but I think Francis’ writing patterns indicate this is not likely).

As for the questions you have brought forth — well, I think there are many levels and layers to the story in Genesis and each need to be considered in its own way. There is I think a “historical core” behind the myth, though it is hard to get at (and not, of course, the same as saying the book is empirical history following Enlightenment ideas of history). But the importance is not the “history” as much as the symbolism, of which I think patristics understood more than most moderns, because this was the way they looked at the world far more than us in the modern world (even those of us who appreciate symbol). Third, I do think there is something Sophiological behind this story — this area, of course, is difficult, and even harder to get people to appreciate (though I think the Sophiological principle is found in all religions, hence the idea of the ‘Mother of all Buddha’s in Buddhism).

I was sick for most of last week, recovering (though still with sniffles even today) and so my “output” and response have been and will be for sometime “slower” than usual and “less” than what I would otherwise like. However, because you like this side questions, you might like (if you can find it) Divine Sophia: the Wisdom Writings of Vladimir Solovyov which I think will start to take on the more esoteric, mystical elements of the Christian faith (and a good introduction to Christian Sophiology, though Solovyov, being a ‘founder’ also needed some correctives, which later Sophiologists did).