The Purpose of the Tree of Life

Questions: Did Adam and Eve need the Tree of Life to keep them living in the Garden of Eden? What was the purpose of the Tree of Life?

Reply: There is a school of thought that the purpose of the Tree of Life was to arrest the outworking of mortality whilst Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden. The theory is that Adam and Eve were created mortal, dying creatures, and needed to regularly partake of the Tree of Life in order to stay alive. The penalty for sin, is thus seen as deprivation from the Tree of Life, to allow natural processes to run their course, eventually leading to death and dissolution back to the dust from whence man came. The command was: “of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, thou shalt not eat of it...” (Genesis 2:16-17). From this, it is assumed that the Tree of Life was to be freely eaten of, along with the other trees.

There are, however a number of valid objections to this theory:

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Author: Christopher Maddocks

Keywords: Tree of Life, Eden tree

Bible reference(s): Genesis 2:9, Gen. 2:16-17, Genesis 3:22, Revelation 2:7, Revelation 22:14

Source: “Questions and Answers,” The Waymark, v. 9, n. 6, pp. 28-33.

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