2025/10/20

218. The Establishment of Reconciliation

As Christians, we can still read God's plan from what is written in Genesis. That is because the New Testament has been established. 

When creatures of the same species become plural, accidental information is generated among them. This accidental information first appeared when God brought the woman he had created to the man. The man said, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" (Gen 2:23). However, Genesis states that God used the bone of the "man" in the creation of the woman but does not mention the flesh. I believe the man expressed the accidental information because God had taken one of ribs of the "man" and "closed up its place with flesh" (2:21). 

The man, Adam, was not created by God specifically as a male. The "man" -- the one before there were men or women --, when one of his ribs had been taken away, became the man, Adam. So, the man, who inherited the body and memories of the "man", had three memories. The memory of God-given "work" (cf. Gen 2:15), the memory of "knowledge": "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die" (2:16-17), and the memory of the "experience": "Whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for the man there was not found a helper fit for him" (2:19-20). However, as we later learn, as for the memory of "knowledge", the man could not exactly share it with the woman. That is because human accidental information continually arose between them, and their memories were newly overwritten (cf. 3:1-5). 

"In the cool of the day" (Gen 3:8), the Lord God came walking through the garden and called Adam. God had a plan. He planned to prepare Adam for priesthood so that He could celebrate with the people the day which he had blessed and hallowed (cf. 2:3). For this purpose, "The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it" (2:15). But Adam and the woman, whose memory had been overwritten, forgot God's command, "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden" (2:16), and did not take from the "tree of life" and eat. Instead, they took and ate from the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil", of which God had commanded, "You shall not eat" (2:17). 

Adam then ignored the memory of his "experience" that "for the man there was not found a helper fit for him" (Gen 2:20) in those he had named, and named the woman, whom God created from "the man", as he had given names to other creatures. That was because he was misinformed that "she was the mother of all living" (3:20). Thus, Adam's disobedience in perceiving the woman as equal to other living creatures was decisive, and he was driven out of the Garden. However, God did not change His plan to give Adam the priesthood, as it is written, "The LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken" (3:23). 

Eventually, Noah, who had survived the flood, built an altar to the Lord (cf. Gen 8:20), Abraham met Melchizedek, king of Salem, the priest of God Most High (cf. 14:18), and God ordained Aaron and his sons as priests (cf. Ex 29:9). Thus, the long story of the Old Testament, beginning with Genesis, shaped the history of the formation and development of Adam, i.e. men, to make them fit for the priesthood that God planned. These Old Testament histories and the old priesthood end with the birth and life of John the Baptist as Jesus said, "For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John" (Mt 11:13). And Jesus Christ, the Son of God, at the beginning of his ministry, finally found a new Adam to whom he gave the priesthood of the New Covenant. They, later called the Apostles, were the very descendants of Adam who grew to the extent that they achieved reconciliation with God. 

"And he [Jesus] saw two boats by the lake; but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon's, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat" (Lk 5:2-3). 

The fishermen must have somehow listened to what Jesus was saying. "And when he had ceased speaking, he said to Simon, 'Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.' And Simon answered, 'Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.'" (Lk 5:4-5). How long God had been waiting to have such an exchange with the descendants of Adam! 

"And when they had done this, they enclosed a great shoal of fish; and as their nets were breaking, ... But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, 'Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.'" (Lk 5:6-8). With these words of Peter, God has received the true answer of the man to the question He had asked that day in Genesis, "Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?" (Gen 3:11). 

"And so also were James and John, sons of Zeb'edee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; henceforth you will be catching men.' And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him" (Lk 5:10-11). Having heard Jesus' words and followed him, they became the first to take the fruit from the "tree of life" and eat of it. 

Maria K. M.