the Week of Christ the King / Proper 29 / Ordinary 34
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New American Standard Bible
Genesis 2:16
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And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, "You may surely eat of every tree of the garden,
And Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat:
The Lord God commanded him, "You may eat the fruit from any tree in the garden,
Then the Lord God commanded the man, "You may freely eat fruit from every tree of the orchard,
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat:
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "You may freely (unconditionally) eat [the fruit] from every tree of the garden;
And God comaundide to hym and seide, Ete thou of ech tre of paradis;
And Jehovah God layeth a charge on the man, saying, `Of every tree of the garden eating thou dost eat;
And the LORD God commanded him, "You may eat freely from every tree of the garden,
But the Lord told him, "You may eat fruit from any tree in the garden,
Adonai , God, gave the person this order: "You may freely eat from every tree in the garden
And Jehovah God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
And the Lord God gave the man orders, saying, You may freely take of the fruit of every tree of the garden:
And the Lorde God commaunded the man, saying: eating, thou shalt eate of euery tree of the garden:
And Jehovah Elohim commanded Man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou shalt freely eat;
The Lord God gave him this command: "You may eat from any tree in the garden.
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying: 'Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat;
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of euery tree of the garden thou mayest freely eate.
And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
The Lord God told the man, "You are free to eat from any tree of the garden.
And the Lord God commanded the man, "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden;
And Yahweh God laid command on the man, saying, - Of every tree of the garden, thou mayest eat;
And the Lorde God commaunded the man, saying, Thou shalt eate freely of euery tree of the garden,
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat;
He told him, "You may eat the fruit of any tree in the garden,
And he commanded him, saying: Of every tree of paradise thou shalt eat:
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden;
And the Lord God gave a charge to Adam, saying, Of every tree which is in the garden thou mayest freely eat,
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree of the garden,
The LORD God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat:
And Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, "From every tree of the garden you may freely eat,
And Jehovah God commanded the man, saying, Eating you may eat of every tree in the garden;
And the LORDE God commaunded man, sayege: Thou shalt eate of all maner trees in ye garden:
God commanded the Man, "You can eat from any tree in the garden, except from the Tree-of-Knowledge-of-Good-and-Evil. Don't eat from it. The moment you eat from that tree, you're dead."
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat;
But the Lord God warned him, "You may freely eat the fruit of every tree in the garden—
The LORD God commanded the man, saying, "From any tree of the garden you may eat freely;
And Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, "From any tree of the garden you may surely eat;
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
God: 1 Samuel 15:22
thou mayest freely eat: Heb. eating thou shalt eat, Genesis 2:9, Genesis 3:1, Genesis 3:2, 1 Timothy 4:4, 1 Timothy 6:17
Reciprocal: Genesis 1:11 - fruit Genesis 1:29 - to you Genesis 3:3 - But Genesis 3:17 - and hast
Cross-References
And so the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their heavenly lights.
By the seventh day God completed His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done.
Out of the ground the LORD God caused every tree to grow that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Samuel said, "Does the LORD have as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices As in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than a sacrifice, And to pay attention is better than the fat of rams.
For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with gratitude;
Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to set their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy.
Gill's Notes on the Bible
And the Lord God commanded the man,.... Over whom he had power and authority; and he had a right to command him what he pleased, being his Creator, benefactor, and preserver; and this is to be understood not of man only, but of the woman also, whose creation, though related afterwards, yet was before this grant to eat of all the trees of the garden but one, and the prohibition of the fruit of that; for that she was in being, and present at this time, seems manifest from Genesis 3:2
saying, of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: a very generous, large, and liberal allowance this: or "in eating thou mayest eat" y; which was giving full power, and leaving them without any doubt and uncertainty about their food; which they might freely take, and freely eat of, wherever they found it, or were inclined to, even of any, and every tree in the garden, excepting one, next forbidden.
y ××× ×ª××× "comedendo comedas", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus, Drusius, &c.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
- XII. The Command
15. × ×Ö¼× nuÌach ârest, dwell.â ×¢×× âaÌbad âwork, till, serve.â ש××ר shaÌmar âkeep, guard.â
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. âAnd put him into the garden.â The original word is âcaused him to rest,â or dwell in the garden as an abode of peace and recreation. âTo dress it and to keep it.â 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 exhaustion of a once rich soil. The hand of rational man, therefore, has its appropriate sphere in preparing and enriching the soil, and in distributing the seeds and training the shoots in the way most favorable for the full development of the plant, and especially of its seed or fruits. This âdressingâ was needed even in the garden. The âkeepingâ of it may refer to the guarding of it by enclosure from the depredations of the cattle, the wild beasts, or even the smaller animals. It includes also the faithful preservation of it as a trust committed to man by his bounteous Maker. There was now a man to till the soil. The second need of the world of plants was now supplied. Gardening was the first occupation of primeval man.
Genesis 2:16-17
And the Lord God commanded the man, saying. - This is a pregnant sentence. It involves the first principles of our intellectual and moral philosophy.
I. The command here given in words brings into activity the intellectual nature of man. First, the power of understanding language is called forth. The command here addressed to him by his Maker is totally different from the blessings addressed to the animals in the preceding chapter. It was not necessary that these blessings should be understood in order to be carried into effect, inasmuch as He who pronounced them gave the instincts and powers requisite to their accomplishment. But this command addressed to man in words must be understood in order to be obeyed. The capacity for understanding language, then, was originally lodged in the constitution of man, and only required to be called out by the articulate voice of God. Still there is something wonderful here, something beyond the present grasp and promptitude of human apprehension. If we except the blessing, which may not have been heard, or may not have been uttered before this command, these words were absolutely the first that were heard by man.
The significance of the sentences they formed must have been at the same time conveyed to man by immediate divine teaching. How the lesson was taught in an instant of time we cannot explain, though we have a distant resemblance of it in an infant learning to understand its mother-tongue. This process, indeed, goes over a space of two years; but still there is an instant in which the first conception of a sign is formed, the first word is apprehended, the first sentence is understood. In that instant the knowledge of language is virtually attained. With man, created at once in his full though undeveloped powers, and still unaffected by any moral taint, this instant came with the first words spoken to his ear and to his soul by his Makerâs impressive voice, and the first lesson of language was at once thoroughly taught and learned. Man is now master of the theory of speech; the conception of a sign has been conveyed into his mind. This is the passive lesson of elocution: the practice, the active lesson, will speedily follow.
Not only the secondary part, however, but at the same time the primary and fundamental part of manâs intellectual nature is here developed. The understanding of the sign necessarily implies the knowledge of the thing signified. The objective is represented here by the âtrees of the garden.â The subjective comes before his mind in the pronoun âthou.â The physical constitution of man appears in the process of âeating.â The moral part of his nature comes out in the significance of the words âmayestâ and âshalt not.â The distinction of merit in actions and things is expressed in the epithets âgood and evil.â The notion of reward is conveyed in the terms âlifeâ and âdeath.â And, lastly, the presence and authority of âthe Lord Godâ is implied in the very nature of a command. Here is at least the opening of a wide field of observation for the nascent powers of the mind. He, indeed, must bear the image of God in perceptive powers, who shall scan with heedful eye the loftiest as well as the lowest in these varied scenes of reality. But as with the sign, so with the thing signified, a glance of intelligence instantaneously begins the converse of the susceptible mind with the world of reality around, and the enlargement of the sphere of human knowledge is merely a matter of time without end. How rapidly the process of apprehension would go on in the opening dawn of manâs intellectual activity, how many flashes of intelligence would be compressed into a few moments of his first consciousness, we cannot tell. But we can readily believe that he would soon be able to form a just yet an infantile conception of the varied themes which are presented to his mind in this brief command.
Thus, the susceptible part of manâs intellect is evoked. The conceptive part will speedily follow, and display itself in the many inventions that will be sought out and applied to the objects which are placed at his disposal.
II. First. Next, the moral part of manâs nature is here called into play. Mark Godâs mode of teaching. He issues a command. This is required in order to bring forth into consciousness the hitherto latent sensibility to moral obligation which was laid in the original constitution of manâs being. A command implies a superior, whose right it is to command, and an inferior, whose duty it is to obey. The only ultimate and absolute ground of supremacy is creating, and of inferiority, being created. The Creator is the only proper and entire owner; and, within legitimate bounds, the owner has the right to do what he will with his own. The laying on of this command, therefore, brings man to the recognition of his dependence for being and for the character of that being on his Maker. From the knowledge of the fundamental relation of the creature to the Creator springs an immediate sense of the obligation he is under to render implicit obedience to the Author of his being. This is, therefore, manâs first lesson in morals. It calls up in his breast the sense of duty, of right, of responsibility. These feelings could not have been elicited unless the moral susceptibility had been laid in the soul, and only waited for the first command to awaken it into consciousness. This lesson, however, is only the incidental effect of the command, and not the primary ground of its imposition.
Second. The special mandate here given is not arbitrary in its form, as is sometimes hastily supposed, but absolutely essential to the legal adjustment of things in this new stage of creation. Antecedent to the behest of the Creator, the only indefeasible right to all the creatures lay in himself. These creatures may be related to one another. In the great system of things, through the wonderful wisdom of the grand Designer, the use of some may be needful to the well-being, the development, and perpetuation of others. Nevertheless, no one has a shadow of right in the original nature of things to the use of any other. And when a moral agent comes upon the stage of being, in order to mark out the sphere of his legitimate action, an explicit declaration of the rights over other creatures granted and reserved must be made. The very issue of the command proclaims manâs original right of property to be, not inherent, but derived.
As might be expected in these circumstances, the command has two clauses, - a permissive and a prohibitive. âOf every tree of the garden thou mayst freely eat.â This displays in conspicuous terms the benignity of the Creator. âBut of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat.â This signalizes the absolute right of the Creator over all the trees, and over man himself. One tree only is withheld, which, whatever were its qualities, was at all events not necessary to the well-being of man. All the others that were likely for sight and good for food, including the tree of life, are made over to him by free grant. In this original provision for the vested rights of man in creation, we cannot but acknowledge with gratitude and humility the generous and considerate bounty of the Creator. This is not more conspicuous in the bestowment of all the other trees than in the withholding of the one, the participation of which was fraught with evil to mankind.
Third. The prohibitory part of this enactment is not a matter of indifference, as is sometimes imagined, but indispensable to the nature of a command, and, in particular, of a permissive act or declaration of granted rights. Every command has a negative part, expressed or implied, without which it would be no command at all. The command, âGo work today in my vineyard,â implies thou shalt not do anything else; otherwise the son who works not obeys as well as the son who works. The present address of God to Adam, without the exceptive clause, would be a mere license, and not a command. But with the exceptive clause it is a command, and tantamount in meaning to the following positive injunction: Thou mayest eat of these trees only. An edict of license with a restrictive clause is the mildest form of command that could have been imposed for the trial of human obedience. Some may have thought that it would have been better for man if there had been no tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
But second thoughts will correct this rash and wrong conclusion. First. This tree may have had other purposes to serve in the economy of things of which we are not aware; and, if so, it could not have been absent without detriment to the general good. Second. But without any supposition at all, the tree was fraught with no evil whatever to man in itself. It was in the first instance the instrument of great good, of the most precious kind, to him. It served the purpose of calling up into view out of the depths of his nature the notion of moral obligation, with all the kindred notions of the inherent authority of the Creator and the innate subordination of himself, the creature, of the aboriginal right of the Creator alone in all the creatures, and the utter absence of any right in himself to any other creature whatsoever. The command concerning this tree thus set his moral convictions agoing, and awakened in him the new and pleasing consciousness that he was a moral being, and not a mere clod of the valley or brute of the field.
This is the first thing this tree did for man; and we shall find it would have done a still better thing for him if he had only made a proper use of it. Third. The absence of this tree would not at all have secured Adam from the possibility or the consequence of disobedience. Any grant to him whatsoever must have been made âwith the reserve,â implicit or explicit, of the rights of all others. âThe thing reservedâ must in equity have been made known to him. In the present course of things it must have come in his way, and his trial would have been inevitable, and therefore his fall possible. Now, the forbidden tree is merely the thing reserved. Besides, even if man had been introduced into a sphere of existence where no reserved tree or other thing could ever have come within the range of his observation, and so no outward act of disobedience could have been perpetrated, still, as a being of moral susceptibility, he must come to the acknowledgment, express or implied, of the rights of the heavenly crown, before a mutual good understanding could have been established between him and his Maker. Thus, we perceive that even in the impossible Utopia of metaphysical abstraction there is a virtual forbidden tree which forms the test of a manâs moral relation to his Creator. Now, if the reserve be necessary, and therefore the test of obedience inevitable, to a moral being, it only remains to inquire whether the test employed be suitable and seasonable.
Fourth. What is here made the matter of reserve, and so the test of obedience, is so far from being trivial or out of place, as has been imagined, that it is the proper and the only object immediately available for these purposes. The immediate need of man is food. The kind of food primarily designed for him is the fruit of trees. Grain, the secondary kind of vegetable diet, is the product of the farm rather than of the garden, and therefore does not now come into use. As the law must be laid down before man proceeds to an act of appropriation, the matter of reserve and consequent test of obedience is the fruit of a tree. Only by this can man at present learn the lessons of morality. To devise any other means, not arising from the actual state of things in which man was placed, would have been arbitrary and unreasonable. The immediate sphere of obedience lies in the circumstances in which he actually stands. These afforded no occasion for any other command than what is given. Adam had no father, or mother, or neighbor, male or female, and therefore the second table of the law could not apply. But he had a relation to his Maker, and legislation on this could not be postponed. The command assumes the kindest, most intelligible, and convenient form for the infantile mind of primeval man.
Fifth. We are now prepared to understand why this tree is called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The prohibition of this tree brings man to the knowledge of good and evil. The products of creative power were all very good Genesis 1:31. Even this tree itself is good, and productive of unspeakable good in the first instance to man. The discernment of merit comes up in his mind by this tree. Obedience to the command of God not to partake of this tree is a moral good. Disobedience to God by partaking of it is a moral evil. When we have formed an idea of a quality, we have at the same time an idea of its contrary. By the command concerning this tree man became possessed of the conceptions of good and evil, and so, theoretically, acquainted with their nature. This was that first lesson in morals of which we have spoken. It is quite evident that this knowledge could not be any physical effect of the tree, seeing its fruit was forbidden. It is obvious also that evil is as yet known in this fair world only as the negative of good. Hence, the tree is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, because by the command concerning it man comes to this knowledge.
Sixth. âIn the day of thy eating thereof, die surely shalt thou.â The divine command is accompanied with its awful sanction - death. The man could not at this time have any practical knowledge of the physical dissolution called death. We must, therefore, suppose either that God made him preternaturally acquainted with it, or that he conveyed to him the knowledge of it simply as the negation of life. The latter hypothesis is to be preferred, for several reasons. First, it is the more economical mode of instruction. Such knowledge may be imparted to man without anticipating experience. He was already conscious of life as a pure blessing. He was therefore capable of forming an idea of its loss. And death in the physical sense of the cessation of animal life and the disorganization of the body, he would come to understand in due time by experience. Secondly, death in reference to man is regarded in Scripture much more as the privation of life in the sense of a state of favor with God and consequent happiness than as the mere cessation of animal life Genesis 28:13; Exodus 3:6; Matthew 22:32. Thirdly, the presence and privilege of the tree of life would enable man to see how easily he could be deprived of life, especially when he began to drink in its life-sustaining juices and feel the flow of vitality rushing through his veins and refreshing his whole physical nature. Take away this tree, and with all the other resources of nature he cannot but eventually droop and die. Fourthly, the man would thus regard his exclusion from the tree of life as the earnest of the sentence which would come to its fullness, when the animal frame would at length sink down under the wear and tear of life like the beasts that perish. Then would ensue to the dead but perpetually existing soul of man the total privation of all the sweets of life, and the experience of all the ills of penal death.
III. Man has here evidently become acquainted with his Maker. On the hearing and understanding of this sentence, at least, if not before, he has arrived at the knowledge of God, as existing, thinking, speaking, permitting, commanding, and thereby exercising all the prerogatives of that absolute authority over people and things which creation alone can give. If we were to draw all this out into distinct propositions, we should find that man was here furnished with a whole system of theology, ethics, and metaphysics, in a brief sentence. It may be said, indeed, that we need not suppose all this conveyed in the sentence before us. But, at all events, all this is implied in the few words here recorded to have been addressed to Adam, and there was not much time between his creation and his location in the garden for conveying any preliminary information. We may suppose the substance of the narrative contained in Genesis 1:2-3, to have been communicated to him in due time. But it could not be all conveyed yet, as we are only in the sixth day, and the record in question reaches to the end of the seventh. It was not, therefore, composed until after that day had elapsed.
It is to be noticed here that God reserves to himself the administration of the divine law. This was absolutely necessary at the present stage of affairs, as man was but an individual subject, and not yet spread out into a multitude of people. Civil government was not formally constituted till after the deluge.
We can hardly overestimate the benefit, in the rapid development of his mind, which Adam thus derived from the presence and converse of his Maker. If no voice had struck his car, no articulate sentence had reached his intellect, no authoritative command had penetrated his conscience, no perception of the Eternal Spirit had been presented to his apprehension, he might have been long in the mute, rude, and imperfectly developed state which has sometimes been ascribed to primeval man. But if contact with a highly-accomplished master and a highly-polished state of society makes all the difference between the savage and the civilized, what instantaneous expansion and elevation of the primitive mind, while yet in its virgin purity and unimpaired power, must have resulted from free converse with the all-perfect mind of the Creator himself! To the clear eye of native genius a starting idea is a whole science. By the insinuation of a few fundamental and germinant notions into his mind, Adam shot up at once into the full height and compass of a master spirit prepared to scan creation and adore the Creator.
