Original sin

[hupo]

We are born of the flesh . . . DEAD in tresspasses and sins. Christ came that we might have life - that we might born of the Spirit of God and be heirs with Christ of God and His wondrous kingdom.

First I apologize if I respond out of context, as your post may have been specific to another post.

We are born of the flesh, you say. Lets see what scripture says about it

Gen 1:26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness..."

Gen 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

Gen 1:28 And God blessed them.....

They way it is written here, in singular and plural, mixed.... it sounds like "Man" here is not Adam but the human race as a whole.

This would fit in with "male and female he created them".

Now God created Man in His own image....His own image.... would that be Man in the flesh or the spirit of Man (in God's image, let's not forget that!).

So In Genesis 1, it is not a personal creation of Adam (and then of Eve), it is the creation of Man as a race. It is the creation of the context into which the first Adam was born.

In chapter 2 it gets more personal or down to details.

Gen 2:7 then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

This sounds much more like a creation of a singular being, Adam. Here Adam was not born in the image of God!!.

Here Adam was created from dust. A dead being until God breathed in him the breath of life.

He was created male only....no female in this creation.

Eve was created from Adam later

Gen 2:21 So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.

Gen 2:22 And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.

Gen 2:23 Then the man said, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man."

So between the two creations one was in the image of God, the human race including males and females.

The other was "just" Adam created from dust, and not even alive till God put the breath of life into him.

Adam was created a body... a dead body in fact. Then God put breath into him. Was that the spirit?

So now we have the human race as a context of beings in God's likeness/image and in that context, Adam was born, dead and then brought to life. And from Adam, Eve was created.

Gen 2:16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "You may surely eat of every tree of the garden,

Gen 2:17 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."

Adam is getting his first orders of the day from God. Eve hasn't yet been created and in Hebrew, the "you" in the above verses is singular/male which makes it quite clear who God is talking too, in case we had any doubts.

God tells Adam specifically NOT to eat from the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" and the punishment for not obeying is death.

Two questions bounce right up:

What does "death" mean here? is it physical death? Spiritual death?

Throughout the Bible there is an emphesys for man to learn to distinguish between right and wrong, good and evil. Why would God start Adam off by NOT allowing him to understand the difference between good and bad?!

The little I know of God, He knows pretty well what He is doing . He doesn't make mistakes.

If there is something I don't understand then that is exactly what it is.... me not understanding.

I want to know what God means with the above procedure of creation but whether I know or not, won't make an ounce of difference to the truth.

Whether I know or not can only make a difference to my sanity

Can someone here help me stay sane ?

Blessings