Would Adam have been admitted to eat from the tree of knowledge if he had kept the probation in the garden? Jim Jordan has argued from hints in Genesis 1-3 that the answer is Yes. Perhaps there’s also some further hint in Matthew 4:1-11. Jesus goes into the wilderness, and is keeping a fast; unlike the first Adam, He resists the temptation to eat forbidden food, and He triumphs over Satan. At the end of the passage, however, he eats; having faithfully kept the fast, He is allowed to feast. This perhaps can be read back as the hypothetical history of the first Adam: Had he resisted Satan and kept the fast, He would have been admitted to a feast. Not decisive, of course, but perhaps relevant.
Notes on Anosmia
One morning several years ago, as my wife, Wendy, and I were having breakfast together, I had…
Empire of Unreality
Shiva Naipaul (1945–1985) was the author of three novels and two books of mordant dispatches from places…
The Dreadful Christ of Pär Lagerkvist
It’s dangerous to meet a god,” says the disgraced Pythia in Pär Lagerkvist’s The Sibyl. Her observation…