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Electra
Registered Member

Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611

Posted 7/7/2002 3:59 AM (GMT -6)

Once we have eaten of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, is it possible to return to the original ignorance Adam and Eve knew in paradise? If so, how. If not what are the implications of the fact that we are stuck with this knowledge?

I’m interested both in how Bonhoeffer would answer these questions, and in how any of you personally would answer these questions.

Thanks,
Electra

~·• kyrie eleison ·~•~· christe eleison ·~•~· kyrie eleison •·~

Electra
Registered Member

Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611

Posted 7/12/2002 12:24 PM (GMT -6)

I’m not good with systems, but every once in a while I pull off a scheme or two. I’m going to call this one “Electric Ethics.” Let me know what you think.

                | GOOD             | CURSED           | PERFECT
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Realm           | Garden           | Banished from    | Kingdom of God
                |(God is Creator)  | the Garden       |(God is King of
                |                  |                  | Creation)
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Presence of     |“the serpent was  |“he will strike   |“you will strike
Evil            | more crafty than | your heel.”      | his head.”
                | any other wild   | Gen. 3:15        | Gen. 3:15
                | animal that the  |                  |
                | LORD God had     |                  |
                | made.” Gen. 3:1  |                  |
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Knowledge       | ignorant of good | knowing good and | knowing good and
                | and evil         | evil with self   | evil with Christ
                |                  | as criteria*     | crucified as
                |                  |                  | criteria*
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Intention       | innocent         | judged and       | forgiven and
                |                  | judging          | forgiving (the
                |                  |                  |“keys to the
                |                  |                  | kingdom” Matt.
                |                  |                  | 16:19; John 20:23;
                |                  |                  | Luke 6:37)
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Action          | vulnerable       | victimized and   | loved and
                |                  | victimizing      | loving
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

In the tentative and incomplete scheme above, I chose to identify the criterion for knowledge of good and evil as a person rather than a priciple. If the criteria is a principle, I believe the problem and its solution are misconstrued as a matter of forensics (i.e. something that can be solved by rules, hence we are still under the law). However, if the criterion is a person, then the problem and its solution are construed relationally.

This scheme presumes that we are stuck with the knowledge of good and evil, and our original ignorance is irretrivable. However, this scheme also presumes a “felix culpa” understanding of salvation history—the Garden was good, but we have been given the keys to the Kingdom, and we are called to be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect.

~·• kyrie eleison ·~•~· christe eleison ·~•~· kyrie eleison •·~

Edited by - Electra on 07/13/2002 4:31:41 PM

Edited by - Electra on 07/15/2002 5:33:39 PM

Iconoclast
Registered Member

Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1227

Posted 7/12/2002 4:55 PM (GMT -6)

Electra

Once we have eaten of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, is it possible to return to the original ignorance Adam and Eve knew in paradise? If so, how.

Iconoclast

Great question.

I think that Bonhoeffer would answer that it is possible to the extent that we are living from Christ as our center.

I don’t think this is a binary thing that once accomplished is accomplished for all time. I think it is a process that we grow in. We continue to yield ourselves to the Spirit. We continue to “grow” in Christ, which also means that Christ continues to “grow” in us. However, I don’t think that this is a continuous process. I don’t think that we start our Christian life at 1% yielded to Christ as our center and with hard work add a percent per month or something like that. I think of it more that when we finally accept Jesus into our life, for a moment we are completely yielded to Christ as our center. The next moment we jump back into the center and judge the guy next to us for not yielding like we just did. Then we realize that maybe we aren’t quite cut out to live as perfectly as we are supposed to as a Christian and throw ourselves before God seeking mercy which means we yield ourselves to Christ again.

I tend to think of it as some moments we are living from Christ as our center and some moments we storm back into the center. The Christian walk is a matter of learning how to spend more and more of our time allowing Christ to be our center rather than ourselves. It is a "quantum" phenomenon.

When we are yielded to Christ as our center we are then living in the state of original ignorance that Adam and Eve knew in paradise.

Electra

When our criteria for knowing good and evil is the cross, it doesn’t matter what a sinner’s story is (i.e. how excusable or blameworthy their actions are in light of their history), it only matters that Jesus died for them, therefore we are free to love them unconditionally and to the utmost of our God-given and Spirit-inspired gifts and abilities.

Iconoclast

I would like to suggest that in the exact moment that we are doing this we no longer know good and evil for ourselves and we ARE in the state of original ignorance. We make no evaluation of whether our alcoholic friend who is in total denial and is crashing and burning deserves what they are getting. We only seek to find a way, any way, to help them. Nor do we confuse helping them with enabling them – as though we can gain some worth at their expense.

I would also like to suggest that the very next moment when our alcoholic friend refuses our genuine self-less help and we feel that they are being stubborn and ungracious (as though it is even about us) that in that exact moment we have stormed back into the center and are completely in the Fall.

As we mature we learn to take that thought captive, banish it and crucify it and thus put Christ back at the center.

I think that the story of Adam and Eve is not just a completely true story about what happened in the beginning. I think that the story of Adam and Eve is ALSO a completely true story about what is happening with each and every one of us at every moment. I think this is a key part of what it means that: “he will strike your heel and you will strike his head.” The serpent in the story represents the “power of religious godlessness.” And in that sense the serpent is the knowledge of good and evil that we have stolen for ourselves.

thanks,
Iconoclast

"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Edited by - Iconoclast on 07/12/2002 9:56:57 PM

Edited by - Iconoclast on 07/12/2002 10:01:09 PM

Iconoclast
Registered Member

Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1227

Posted 7/13/2002 8:25 AM (GMT -6)

Electra

In the tentative and incomplete scheme above, I chose to identify the criterion for knowledge of good and evil as a person rather than a priciple. If the criteria is a principle, I believe the problem and its solution are misconstrued as a matter of forensics (i.e. something that can be solved by rules, hence we are still under the law). However, if the criterion is a person, then the problem and its solution are construed relationally.

Iconoclast

I really like the conclusion you draw that the problem and its solution should be construed relationally. I am confused about how you get to this conclusion. I guess I just don’t understand what you mean by “if the criterion (for our knowledge of good an evil) is a person (Christ and Him crucified).”

Electra

This scheme presumes that we are stuck with the knowledge of good and evil, and our original ignorance is irretrivable. However, this scheme also presumes a “felix culpa” understanding of salvation history—the Garden was good, but we have been given the keys to the Kingdom, and we are called to be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect.

Iconoclast

I like your progression of Innocent -> Judged and Judging -> Forgiven and Forgiving.

And I also really like your progression of Vulnerable -> Victimized and Victimizing -> Victorious Love (Victoriously: Loved and Loving?)

In this sense I agree that we can never go back to the garden nor that it is even desirable. We can never NOT know what it was like to be Judged and to Judge. We can never NOT know what it was like to be Victimized and to Victimize. And thus we can never NOT know what it means to be Forgiven and Forgiving and we can never NOT know what it means to be Victoriously: Loved and Loving.

Thus we know God and each other in a new way which is really just like the old way (the garden) except that it has even more meaning to us. It is almost like we are now veterans of a horrible war who know how precious each person and each day in the garden really is. We have been sensitized by being radically traumatized to just how important and meaningful it is to love and to be loved. So that our joy may be complete.

Romans 8:18-21

I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

thanks,
Iconoclast

"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Electra
Registered Member

Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611

Posted 7/13/2002 11:37 AM (GMT -6)

Thanks for your thoughts, Iconoclast! I changed my “scheme” to reflect your suggestion for improvement: “victorious love” is now “victoriously loved and loving.” Romans 8:18–21 has some very interesting implications. I would like to spend some time reflecting on the whole chapter in light of this discussion...but I haven’t had a chance to yet... Blessings, Electra

~·• kyrie eleison ·~•~· christe eleison ·~•~· kyrie eleison •·~

Edited by - Electra on 07/13/2002 4:38:03 PM

Electra
Registered Member

Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611

Posted 7/13/2002 11:49 AM (GMT -6)

Hmmm. But now that Romans 8 passage has got me thinking. Maybe “victoriously” loved and loving is not the best way to put it. Although in Christ “the serpent” has already been defeated, I think that until this victory is fully manifested, living in the reality that we are “loved and loving” often entails suffering rather than triumph. Unlike the suffering we experience as victims and victimizers, suffering out of love is not in vain. It builds up rather than “puffing up” (1 Cor. 13) with emptiness or tearing down to nothingness.

Electra

~·• kyrie eleison ·~•~· christe eleison ·~•~· kyrie eleison •·~

Edited by - Electra on 07/13/2002 4:52:49 PM

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