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Now when God was about to fashion man oat of the visible and invisible
creation in His own image and likeness to reign as king and ruler over
all the earth and all that it contains, He first made for him, so to
speak, a kingdom in which he should live a life of happiness and
prosperity. And this is the divine paradise, planted in Eden by the
hands of God, a very storehouse of joy and gladness of heart (for
"Eden" means luxuriousness). Its site is higher in the East than
all the earth: it is temperate and the air that surrounds it is the
rarest and purest: evergreen plants are its pride, sweet fragrances
abound, it is flooded with light, and in sensuous freshness and beauty
it transcends imagination: in truth the place is divine, a meet home
for him who was created in God's image: no creature lacking reason
made its dwelling there but man alone, the work of God's own hands.
In its midst God planted the tree of life and the tree of knowledge.
The tree of knowledge was for trial, and proof, and exercise of
man's obedience and disobedience: and hence it was named the tree of
the knowledge of good and evil, or else it was because to those who
partook of it was given power to know their own nature. Now this is a
good thing for those who are mature, but an evil thing for the immature
and those whose appetites are too strong, being like solid food to
tender babes still in need of milk. For our Creator, God, did not
intend us to be burdened with care and troubled about many things, nor
to take thought about, or make provision for, our own life. But this
at length was Adam's fate: for he tasted and knew that he was naked
and made a girdle round about him: for he took fig-leaves and girded
himself about. But before they took of the fruit, They were both
naked. Adam and Eve, and were not ashamed. For God meant that we
should be thus free from passion, and this is indeed the mark of a mind
absolutely void of passion. Yea, He meant us further to be free from
care and to have but one work to perform, to sing as do the angels,
without ceasing or intermission, the praises of the Creator, and to
delight in contemplation of Him and to cast all our care on Him.
This is what the Prophet David proclaimed to us when He said, Cast
thy burden on the Lord, and He will sustain thee. And, again, in
the Gospels, Christ taught His disciples saying, Take no thought
for your life what ye shall eat, nor for your body what ye shall put
on. And further, Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His
righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you. And to
Martha He said, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled
about many things: but one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen
that good part, which shall not be taken away from her, meaning,
clearly, sitting at His feet and listening to His words.
The tree of life, on the other hand, was a tree having the energy
that is the cause of life, or to be eaten only by those who deserve to
live and are not subject to death. Some, indeed, have pictured
Paradise as a realm of sense, and others as a realm of mind. But it
seems to me, that, just as man is a creature, in whom we find both
sense and mind blended together, in like manner also man's most holy
temple combines the properties of sense and mind, and has this twofold
expression: for, as we said, the life in the body is spent in the
most divine and lovely region, while the life in the soul is passed in
a place far more sublime and of more surpassing beauty, where God
makes His home, and where He wraps man about as with a glorious
garment, and robes him in His grace, and delights and sustains him
like an angel with the sweetest of all fruits, the contemplation of
Himself. Verily it has been filly named the tree of life. For since
the life is not cut short by death, the sweetness of the divine
participation is imparted to those who share it. And this is, in
truth, what God meant by every tree, saying, Of every tree in
Paradise thou mayest freely eat. For the 'every' is just Himself
in Whom and through Whom the universe is maintained. But the tree of
the knowledge of good and evil was for the distinguishing between the
many divisions of contemplation, and this is just the knowledge of
one's own nature, which, indeed, is a good thing for those who are
mature and advanced in divine contemplation (being of itself a
proclamation of the magnificence of God), and have no fear of
falling, because they have through time come to have the habit of such
contemplation, but it is an evil tiring to those still young and with
stronger appetites, who by reason of their insecure bold on the better
part, and because as yet they are not firmly established in the seat of
the one and only good, are apt to be torn and dragged away from this to
the care of their own body.
Thus, to my thinking, the divine Paradise is twofold, and the
God-inspired Fathers handed down a true message, whether they taught
this doctrine or that. Indeed, it is possible to understand by every
tree the knowledge of the divine power derived from created things. In
the words of the divine Apostle, For the invisible things of Him
from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by
the things that are made. But of all these thoughts and speculations
the sublimest is that dealing with ourselves, that is, with our own
composition. As the divine David says, The knowledge of Thee from
me, that is from my constitution, was made a wonder. But for the
reasons we have already mentioned, such knowledge was dangerous for
Adam who had been so lately created.
The tree of life too may be understood as that more divine thought that
has its origin in the world of sense, and the ascent through that to
the originating and constructive cause of all. And this was the name
He gave to every tree, implying fulness and indivisibility, and
conveying only participation in what is good. But by the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, we are to understand that sensible and
pleasurable food which, sweet though it seems, in reality brings him
who partakes of it into communion with evil. For God says, Of every
tree in Paradise thou mayest freely eat. It is, me-thinks, as if
God said, Through all My creations thou art to ascend to Me thy
creator, and of all the fruits titan mayest pluck one, that is,
Myself who ant the true life: let every thing bear for thee the fruit
of life, and let participation in Me be the support of your own
being. For in this way than wilt be immortal. But of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, thou shall not eat of it: for in the day
that thou eatest thereof thou shall surely die s. For sensible food is
by nature for the replenishing of that which gradually wastes away and
it passes into the drought and perisheth: and he cannot remain
incorruptible who partakes of sensible food.
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