Transcript
Asking the Interpreter: who, between God and the Serpent, was the liar concerning the eating of the forbidden tree?
“I tell you that everything God said was true and faithful, while the Serpent lied. God said that on the day the man ate from the forbidden tree, he would surely die. The Serpent told the woman that mankind would not surely die, even after eating from it. Because Adam and Eve did not literally die within that earthly twenty-four-hour day, some people argue that the Serpent seemed closer to the truth concerning their death. So let me explain what ‘the day’ meant in connection with the Garden, or Paradise.
“The day: A day inside the Garden was greatly different from a day outside it upon the earth. Within the Garden, there was only the cool of the day. There was no night, sunrise, sunset, sunlight, moonlight, or rainfall over Paradise. The Garden stood directly beneath the atmosphere of the higher heavens, beyond the firmament and the waters above. As it is in heaven, where God is the Sun, Life, and Light powering all things, so it was within Eden, also called the Mountain of God.
“Adam and Eve first experienced earthly sunrise, night, and darkness after they were cast out of the Garden into ordinary earthly conditions.
“A full day inside the Garden was like a thousand years outside it. An earthly day lasts twenty-four hours, containing evening and morning, daytime and night. Adam’s entire time within Eden before his expulsion amounted to approximately one Garden hour—about one Jubilee, or forty to fifty earthly years. If Adam had lived for one thousand earthly years or more, God’s statement would have failed, because a Garden day corresponded to a thousand earthly years.
“Therefore, by the Garden’s measure, Adam died on the same day he ate from the forbidden tree. He died outside the Garden at nine hundred and thirty earthly years, still short of one complete Garden day.
“Why was death not immediate? Adam, Eve, and the Garden were too full of life for sudden death. The Tree of Life was also there. Had they eaten from it afterward, they would have lived forever, making death impossible. To preserve His faithful word, God cut Adam and Eve off from the Tree of Life and expelled them from the Garden. They were not to die inside that heavenly Paradise, but outside it, where they returned as dust to dust.”