Tree of Good and Evil

I agree, there would have been no free will without the tree. God didn't have to plant it there.

This is all a matter view. Our view, but more importantly God's view.

Before the Fall, God viewed mankind positively. We were 'good'. We had to do nothing to gain this positive view. There was no sin and no possibility of sin. Then God decided, whatever His reasons were(His glory is a good enough reason for me), that he didn't want mindless obedience. So He planted the tree.

God's view of us at this point is still positive. It doesn't matter that He knew what choice that Adam would make. Obviously, God still held the power to NOT plant that tree or to not allow the tree to produce fruit and man would have remained sinless. That wasn't what He wanted. For some reason He wanted willingness to obey, more than He wanted obedience.

At this point our view of God is still positive. To change this Adam would have to make a negative choice. Adam made his choice in full understanding of God's command. (this doesn't exactly let Eve off the hook, mind you)

The fruit gets swallowed and lo and behold, everyone's veiw changes!

God no longer views us as 'good'. We no longer have a negative choice to make, but a positive one. But it is a choice we can't fullfill on our own. We have to choose to do something as opposed to chosing not to do. This is a much more difficult thing.

God no longer viewing us as 'good', now decides to provide us a way to become 'good' again. He promises us a sacrifice that will wash away the bad. But there is a catch. God, never changing, still doesn't want mindless obedience. We must choose to believe that He will do what He says he will do. We have to make the much harder positive choice of acceptance of all that He offers.

I realize that this is where I differ from the Calvinists, who believe either the making the positive choice is impossible for us or that the choice itself constitutes a 'work'. We'll just have to differ. Remember, I warned you!

Congrats on reaching 4000 posts, Pinoy!

 

The problem is actually more complicated than that, since He created Adam to be the sort of person who would make that choice under those circumstances and then put him into those circumstances.

 

With a board full of professional theologues I would not dare to hint at the possibility that we do not fully know for sure! Scripture does not say specifically and I would rather not read anything into the bible. We can be assured however that God put it there to accomplishes His purposes. We do know that this tree was used by Satan to lead humanity into sin. But thanks be to God for His indescribable gift He gave to us in Jesus Christ who conquered sin through his vicarious and substituionary atonement on the cross!