Knowledge of Good and Evil – Genesis 2:15-17

A friend of mine retired from dentistry some years ago and he and his wife traveled a lot.  But they came to the place where they realized they weren’t happy.  They were not doing anything purposeful with their lives.  So they asked the Lord to show them their ministry and He did.  We are made to do purposeful work.  We don’t thrive without it.

15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 17 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 surely die.” (Genesis 2:15–17, ESV)

Adam’s responsibility includes working and keeping the garden.  The garden won’t remain ordered and productive without his effort.  The Cambridge Bible says:

…the garden requires to be dressed and kept; it is not a place of spontaneous perfection. Man in the garden is to work, to take trouble, to practice forethought, to exercise solicitude and sympathy for the objects of his toil. “Paradise” is not a place for indolence and self-indulgence…he is (1) to improve his surroundings, (2) to provide for the necessities of life, (3) to protect from waste or loss that which is committed to his care.

Adam’s other responsibility is to keep covenant with God, to be obedient to God and trust in His love.  God gives Adam a specific prohibition (after giving him absolute freedom to eat from every other tree) against eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, promising death if he does eat of it.  Is there something wrong with the tree, something in and of itself that is immoral about eating the tree?  No, it is simply an arbitrary command from God to test Adam’s covenant loyalty.

What makes the tree one of knowledge of good and evil is what the serpent will later tell Eve, the lie that to eat of it makes one like God (Genesis 3:5).

Eating from the tree forbidden to him will be Adam’s bid to be like God, to be the one who can determine what is good and evil.  That is still our temptation, to feel we know better than God what is wrong or right.

It should be noted that Adam is given this prohibition before Eve is created.  How does she learn of this command?  From Adam only, or does God repeat it for her?  We are not told.