The Fall (2)

Fall of man (continued)

With his words the devil tried to raise doubt concerning the Lord’s commandment and to cast suspicion upon God as if He did not seek the glory of man. Satan asked: “Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden…? For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:1b&5).

The answer that the woman gave to Satan’s first attack shows that she knew the Lord’s command although she did not quote it exactly as the Lord gave it. When we compare Genesis 3:2&3 to Genesis 2:16&17, we see that she omitted certain words the Lord had spoken which were not without significance. Also, she spoke of the “fruit of the tree” while God spoke of “the tree” which contains a stronger injunction than Eve mentioned. This inaccurate version of the injunction had already weakened Eve’s position. In her encounter with Satan, Eve should have confined herself to the words God had spoken which she knew since she also had perfect knowledge.

Now Satan made a direct attack. He infers that God is a liar. His word is diametrically opposed to the word of the Lord. God had said, “For in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” The serpent said, “Ye shall not surely die.” Upon this word already Eve should have lashed out against him as a liar who speaks on his own. She listened, however, and thus gave herself into his claws. It is remarkable that God, the woman, and the serpent spoke of death as the punishment of sin. Thus, not only Satan but also man was conscious of good and evil and, also, of the punishment that was threatened.

Moreover, we must notice the hellish plan to tear man away from God. This intention is evident in the words of the serpent, “For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.” Your eyes shall be opened, namely, to see now that you are under God, and the freedom with which Satan alluded to separates you from God. This, then, is the significance of the words “as gods, knowing good and evil.” In this case being as God lies in the knowledge of good and evil, not in the doing of it. God knows evil but does not do it. Committing evil cannot be an inducement to eat of the forbidden tree. Yet, Satan represents the knowledge of good and evil as God knows it for Adam and Eve, commands them to do the good, and forbids their doing evil. According to Satan’s delusion, a person eating of that tree shall be as God, knowing for himself what is good and evil. He shall be free from God, be his own lord and master, stand beside God and not under Him. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was indicative of God’s authority over man. As we can clearly see in Satan’s words, to eat of this tree would be to attack God’s authority. Thus, in the words of the devil two matters are included:

a) he presents God as a liar; and

b) he stirs up man against God to tear himself loose from Him.

Their eating of that tree, then, was more than stealing an apple or a pear or some unknown fruit. It was making God a liar and making themselves loose from God, and that is what happened. “And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.” Covetousness led her to eat, while God’s commandment should have prevented her. Covetousness is sin and leads to committing sin (Romans 7).

Thus, Adam was not deceived by the serpent, “but the woman being deceived was in the transgression” (1 Timothy 2:14b). Adam ate, not ignorantly, but consciously when the woman gave it to him, knowing the fruit of the tree given him by Eve, and being near to the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Both Adam and Eve willingly and consciously ate. Both believed the lie and severed themselves from God.

The Fall was in the decree of God

Some Infralapsarians, in order to weaken the offense that man by nature makes in God’s sovereignty and to maintain strongly the responsibility of man for his acts, wanted to include the Fall in God’s foreknowledge but not in His decree. Considering what was said in the chapter on predestination in which we spoke about Infra- and Supralapsarians at length, we will here only remark that this type of reasoning will never satisfy the man who would reply against God. The same rebellion that makes man oppose God’s decree will prompt man out of enmity to God to ask why God did not prevent the Fall if He knew it was coming. We cannot resist this bitter enmity by removing the Fall out of God’s decree. Paul stops the mouth of the gainsayer in an entirely different manner, namely, with the sovereignty of God, saying in Romans 9:20-23, “Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast Thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew His wrath, and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had afore prepared unto glory?”

They are fitted to destruction because God had in eternity decreed it. That decree predestinated election and rejection and included the entire human race in the Fall according to His sovereign good pleasure, as all God’s decrees are sovereign.

About this Perkins writes: “To say that God knew beforehand about the Fall of Adam, but did not ordain it by an eternal decree is entirely wicked, for the least things in nature do not take place without God’s decree and will (Matthew 10:30). By His eternal counsel God has also decreed works that are sinful (Acts 4:28). Therefore, those who say this are casting God’s providence aside, or at least they are ascribing to God an empty providence. Furthermore, the Fall is a means by which predestination is executed and ordained to that same purpose.”

Man fell, then, according to God’s decree, as also the fall of the angels was in His decree. God did not passively allow sin, and although according to all His perfections He hates sin, nevertheless, He willed it in order to glorify Himself in righteousness and mercy. “The LORD hath made all things for Himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil” (Proverbs 16:4). Regardless of the purpose of those who would include the Fall in God’s knowledge, but say He did not decree it, we must insist that God knows all things by virtue of His eternal decree. Thus, God knew that man would fall because He had decreed that man would fall. Since God’s decree is unshakably firm and will certainly be performed, the Fall of man, as well as that of the angels, had to take place. Still, God had given man all the necessary faculties to remain standing. Nor did the decree of God oblige man to commit evil. Not God’s decree, but God’s law is the rule for man’s actions. Besides, Adam did not know about this decree, so it could not influence his actions. Therefore, the decree does not remove man’s responsibility for his deeds although because of the decree the Fall must necessarily take place.

(To be continued)

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