We all know the story told in the first chapters of Genesis, where God, after finishing Creation, tells Adam and Eve that they can eat from any tree except for the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Then comes the scene with the serpent, Eve eats from the forbidden fruit and gives some to Adam, they realize they are naked and feel ashamed, God questions them and punishes them by expelling them from Paradise, lest they also eat from the Tree of Life and become immortal.

Eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil gave humanity the ability to make ethical or moral decisions and thus the power to act rightly or wrongly. After eating the apple, humanity’s relationship with God changed entirely. In Paradise, humanity was indifferent to moral issues; there was no possibility of choosing between good and evil. Outside of Paradise, humanity became a being that could choose, that could decide. And that decision was influenced by the Yetzer Hara, the impulse toward evil, and the Yetzer Hatov, the impulse toward goodness. God helps us choose the latter through the Mitzvot. Fulfilling them is the path He would like us to take.

To say that you know all the good and all the bad of something means that you know it completely. Eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil also changed us in an intellectual sense. From that moment on, humanity has the need to know, to understand everything about everything. We want to comprehend Divine Creation and also create on our own. The apple made us want to imitate God.

The apple also awakened our sexuality. It was part of the divine plan. If Adam and Eve had stayed in Paradise, they would eventually have eaten from the Tree of Life and become immortal. By being expelled and being mortal, the only way to perpetuate the species was through procreation.

Scholars ask: Did God really want Adam and Eve to stay in Paradise? What did God want from humanity: complete obedience or potential defiance? A moral automaton or a free spirit? Ultimately, by being expelled from Paradise, humanity was condemned to nothing more and nothing less than to become a human being. And all for an apple.

By Marcos Gojman
Bibliography: “The Torah, a Modern Commentary,” edited by W. Gunther Plaut.