According to Christian belief, God created people just like Himself, perfect without blemish (Adam and Eve) and God saw that it was very good. God was pleased with His creation.

Some people want to blame God for Eve's bad choice.

I think its fascinating that people would buy anything that says that knowledge is a bad thing to have :P

Gnostic texts claim that not only did God NOT create Adam and Eve (one of his creations did), but that Eve was encouraged to eat from the tree of knowledge by the powers of good--and that, once she had, she realized that knowledge was good, and shared it with Adam. Interesting, no?

One more thing...if God made humans "in his own image," why would he want them to romp around, as naive as an infant? Frankly, I think thats a bunch of hooey. "I want them to be pretty! Pretty, and dumb!" I think not.

Jamime: only one tree was denied them per some Christian belief. The tree of knowledge of good and evil. All the other trees of knowledge were fair game.

If God is male, is there a female deity? There cannot be a male without a female.

AD- In Jewish belief, G-d is neither male nor female, G-d is unknowible and possesses no human characteristics, any reference to gender or to "the hand of G-d" are metaphorical and intended only to help limited Human perception comprehend the divine.

I'm also under the belief that the masculine gender assignment of G-d has as much to do with a lack of gender neutral third person pronoun in English and Hebrew. This belief may be inaccurate, but when I was studying Torah last, we believed that G-d lacked exact gender.

Cobra: How does one interpret the plural "our" image in Gen 1:26

I wouldn't blame God directly for Eve's disobeying; I blame Adam. Afterall, Adam lied to her. She only ate the apple after it was proven to her that Adam had lied to her. How was she supposed to know that half of what he said was true?

I blame God for:
a) never telling Eve she wasn't supposed to eat the apple
b) creating Adam flawed enough to lie her
c) blaming her for disobeying when she had no good reason to believe that she was

I'm disagreeing with the statement that Adam and Eve were perfect.

Jim: I've seen translations where that passage doesn't use "our" but I think that is an attempt to refer to G-d and avoid assigning gender.

To Everyone: If you're interested in a "Bible as metaphor" concept instead of a "Bible as literal truth" concept, there's a not uncommon Conservative Jewish interpretation of this passage that says the consumption of the fruit of good and evil is a metaphor for humans gaining intelligence. Before that we were lower primates that wondered around following our instincts: Fight, Flight, Feed, and Procreate. We didn't suffer, not really, from emotional pains, we were animals. Once we gained intelligence, we gained the capacity for a more profound sort of sufferring, but we also gained a capacity for a higher form of pleasure. This doesn't necessarily balance out all the time, but this permits JYTE to exist.

Anyone interested in this concept should check out the books of Harold S. Kushner here.

Something that should be considered is that if the bible is "the word of God," it is still written by man. And translated from a translation of a translation of a translation written by man. So, it makes sense that something could have been accidentally changed or mistranslated somewhere along the way. And there certainly official different "translations" for different sects of Christianity. So, quibbling over a word in one translation seems like a waste of time :P

OUR BIBLE & THE ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS

by SIR FREDERIC KENYON

formerly Director of the British Museum

Copyright Sir F Kenyon 1895. First published Eyre & Spottiswoode 1895.

fourth edition 1939.

Sir Frederic Kenyon said "the Christian can take the whole Bible in his hand and say without fear or hesitation that he holds in it the true Word of God, handed down without essential loss from generation to generation throughout the centuries."

Griffin, I think your most recent comment is one of the best things I've ever read of yours. Congrats.

Jim,

Kenyon was factually in error when he wrote that. There have been books written about the topic in this century, two later than that one.