According to the description of the Creation of the world in the Old Testament, in the Book of Genesis, man was the final creation of God. This does not mean that God does not continue to create. Quite the contrary, in the New Testament Christ says:
My Father works until now, and I work. (Gospel of John, chapter 5)
This means that God continues to create. When we say that God's final creation was man, we are referring to the process of Creation, which lasted six days and is described in the first two chapters of Genesis.
God created man differently from animals.
Why is man the main creation of God? Simply because a person does not belong to either the material world or the spiritual world. He is a child of two worlds: he has a spiritual principle (soul) and a material body. Man, therefore, is the connecting link between the spiritual and material worlds. To better understand this, let's look at what Scripture says about how God created man.
God created all animals and birds with just one word. But when creating man, he chose a completely different method - action.
And the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul. (Book of Genesis, chapter 2)
We see that God created man differently - He made special efforts, He gave man a soul and body, and made him a king on earth, so that he would have power over all earthly creatures.
Creation of Man: God breathed a soul into man.
The soul of a person, as his spiritual component, is of great importance, so much so that even Christ tells us:
For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?
Or what ransom will a man give for his soul? (Gospel of Mark, chapter
The Bible often tells us about the soul and spirit. A person's spirit is his soul. It should not be confused with the Holy Spirit, or the Spirit of God. First God created man's body, and then he breathed into man a "living soul." This is how God created man. The soul and body of man are conceived and created simultaneously. It is this fact that underlies the fact that the Church opposes abortion. It is believed that the soul of a child exists from the moment of conception - from the moment the first cell of his body appears.
God created the human body.
And the body also has great value, since the soul is inseparable from the body. The body is the temple of the soul that lives in it.
Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who dwells in you, which you have from God, and you are not your own? (Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 6)
The body is sanctified by the spirit of God who lives in it. A person receives the body and blood of Christ during Holy Communion. After death the body will return to the earth, but at the second coming of Christ the person will be resurrected. Resurrected and reunited with the soul.
How did the temptation happen?
People with an inquisitive mindset often have questions about why God placed a tree in the garden, the fruits of which could not be touched? After all, if this tree did not exist, there would be no reason for temptation. Another common question is the expression of interest in how the Serpent got into the Garden of Eden, because he practically personifies the image of the original evil. And the most important question, which causes difficulty even among theologians, is how, not knowing sin in principle, not knowing a single ungodly thought or emotion, did Eve succumb to persuasion?
The serpent, according to what is written in the Bible, was more cunning than all other creatures created by the Creator. That is, God also created him, like other birds and animals. It is quite possible that it was the Serpent who was the first to taste the forbidden fruits; this version is supported by many researchers of biblical texts. They justify their theory with the same arguments that the Serpent gives in his conversation with Eve. However, there are no direct phrases talking about this in the book.
There is no explanation in the text as to why the Creator placed the forbidden tree in the garden. Theologians believe that this chapter symbolizes the fact that temptation is always near a person, it is encountered constantly on the path of life. And, if a person succumbs to temptation, then, at first glance, nothing terrible happens to him, he does not get sick, he does not die. But after temptation inevitably comes the fall, due to which a person loses something extremely important.
The description of the temptation itself is quite short. It comes down to a dialogue between the Serpent and Eve. Initially, the woman refuses the offer to taste the fruit, explaining that God forbade it, and if the rule is broken, death will come. The serpent objects, claiming that Eve will not die, but will learn the unknown, will be able to distinguish between good and evil, and will gain an understanding of the nature of the world. The result of this conversation is the eating of the fruit.
How long did it take for the world to emerge? Feature of the description of creation
God created all things in six days. Many theologians see this as the primary reason why Christians should not work, do housework, or otherwise work on the seventh day of the week.
Interestingly, according to the biblical text, the stars, including the Sun, were created only on the fourth day of creation. It is the description of the fourth day that is the main argument of opponents of the biblical history of the origin of the world in disputes with supporters of this version.
Priests and theologians, in principle, do not see any discrepancies between the story from the book of Genesis and scientific theories of the emergence of life. They explain very simply that the stars appeared on the fourth day. The book of Genesis is not a documentary chronicle, but a spiritual work. Of course, the Earth and everything that is on it is given first place in the description, since it is on it that man lives. That is, from a spiritual position, the Earth is much more important than the Sun and other celestial bodies, and that is why in the description their creation is told secondarily.
Indeed, the fourth day, on which God creates the luminaries, divides the history of creation into two parts. Until this day, inanimate matter was created. The planet itself. But after the fourth day, God began to directly create life. If we perceive the book of Genesis as an ordinary literary work, then placing the stage of creating auxiliary elements, in this case the celestial bodies, in the middle of the story is a simple artistic device.
Humanity's Choice
Photo: Temples.ru
So, a person faces evil. In the form of cruelty, violence, injustice. He suffers from them, he is in pain, his soul screams, asks for help. But evil does not exist, God did not create it. Where does it come from in the world? Evil is the absence of good. It simply fills a vacuum where there is no love. This is where evil appears. That is, it stems from the fact that people themselves do not want to fill the world with love. The less they love each other, the more darkness the world becomes.
The more people suffer from manifestations of unlove, the more must understand that the darkness is enough, it’s time to go to the Light. And gradually they come to God as the only unshakable source of love. This trickle is small for now. But this only means one thing - that there is still a lot of love in the world. There is still the opportunity to endure, receiving grains of it as a cure for suffering.
A person who is free to choose, having suffered from cruelty, strives for good. And the Lord waits for everyone who makes this choice. He waits and greets him as in the parable of the prodigal son, the father greeted him - as the most dear guest. And he encourages those who already enjoy His gifts to meet the prodigals as he did. And he even knocks on people’s hearts.
Here I am standing at the door and knocking; If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me (Rev. 3:20).
Masons' compasses
Another compass is a mathematical instrument of the Masons - the builders of the Great Temple. And the Temple is the throne of God in a person’s head. The more majestic and better constructed it is, the closer a person is to holiness during life, closer to his Higher Self. For me, this is also synonymous with the degree of mental sanity.
Possession or bipolar disorder is a product of self-ignorance, ignorance of tools and their proper use.
The loss of balance from a temptation that has not been overcome reveals to us the specifics of the problems of being in a state cut off from the Kingdom of Heaven and the inability to maintain this balance. One must return back through the throes of birth (true thoughts) and through the complex acquisition of material for analysis (bread through thorns and thistles) in search of answers to eternal questions.
The grains for bread grow from the earth, and the earth Adam means cultivating oneself, one’s personal dignity —the main and most difficult work of a person in life. We also remember that the bread still needs to be baked and additional work on ourselves is encrypted here. The raw product will not suit us.
This is how we get the archetypal symbols of grain, agriculture, bread and the family structure of people.
- The direct meaning leads us to the fact that we must get married and cultivate ordinary land to survive. But this alone does not redeem us in any way during our lifetime and we will not go to heaven, but will end up on a new entry into another life and scenery.
- And the metaphysical meaning tells us that we need to cultivate ourselves and strive to establish a connection with the Higher Self. Only in this way will the door open back to Paradise. We have lost His trust and must earn it or we will live forever in this world as in a prison of deficiency of God's Light.
Both meanings are important, but understanding the latter is elusive. And we just live and cannot understand what we are missing, what we must do in order to make up for some irreplaceable loss in the earthly world.
The entire content of the Bible is a code about how to restore communication with the Heavenly Father, atone for sin and circumvent errors. Only the direct meaning of the interpretation of scripture is dangerous with fatal errors. For we are prescribed torment and suffering, and even hostility within ourselves and a terrible desire to be above our sense of proportion (wife). And also other restrictions that are not the topic to touch on now.
Where was the Garden of Eden located?
The creation of man according to the Bible ends with his settlement in the Garden of Eden. Of course, many people who become acquainted with this story become curious about where this place was located.
In the narrative itself, of course, geographical coordinates are not specified. But the description of the area is given very clearly and very detailed, full of details. Researchers of biblical texts claim that they are talking about an area in the Middle East region, located between the great rivers Euphrates and Tigris.
But archaeologists to date have not discovered anything that could be the remains of the Garden of Eden.
Creation of Man
“And the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul” (Gen. 2:7) - how simply it is said! But if you think about it and imagine: from the dust! God took the earth, or more precisely, clay (it is said about man that he is made of clay - Is. 64:8; Job 10:9), and began to build or create man. He created a head with eyes, ears, nose, mouth - these are simpler organs compared to the brain. What kind of Intelligence and Knowledge did you have to have to create 300 billion brain cells from clay?! (So scientists claim that the brain consists of so many cells, but were they able to count them correctly? - you can believe that yes, but you can doubt it) - this is impossible to understand with the human mind...
Take the circulatory system in a person, in which the human soul - what kind of Mystery is this?! And the stomach of a person that processes food...! The heart of man, the eyes that see, the ears that hear - God created everything from dust, from clay. Then he breathed in the BREATH OF LIFE, and everything in the man came to life; All organs came to life and began to function. The man began to breathe, the heart began to work, pumping blood. With all the great and wonderful Creation, what part did man himself take? - none! The fact that man appeared is the merit of the incomprehensibly Great God - He created man!
But it was not only the physical body that God built. God's goal is to build not only an outward, but also an inwardly spiritual man. In order to achieve this goal, it was necessary to give a person complete freedom, to give him the ability to reason, think, learn to understand and distinguish.
What was the true cause of the Fall? Why does the Serpent act as the tempter?
What is very curious is that neither the Creator nor the Serpent lied to the first people. God said that after eating the fruit, death would come. But he did not promise it in the form of instant punishment for breaking the rules. Death is one of the consequences of expulsion from Eden. The serpent also did not lie even once when describing the consequences of eating the fruit.
Thus, in this plot, both the Serpent and God act as a kind of “poles” between which a choice must be made. Neither one nor the other forces people to do anything. Violation of the divine prohibition and, as a consequence, the loss of Eden is the voluntary choice of Eve and Adam, a manifestation of their free will. And it is precisely this quality of human nature, combined with curiosity, that is the true cause of the Fall.
Why is Eve tempted by the Serpent, and not by any other earthly creature? The answer to this question lies in the peculiarities of Jewish culture. For the Jews, the snake was a symbol of paganism; it personified everything that opposed monotheism and served as a source of evil. It is quite logical that on the pages of the Bible, original evil was symbolized by the Serpent.
Why did people leave Eden?
The myths about the creation of man that exist in every culture often tell about some violations by people of the rules established by the gods. In this sense, the biblical story is not unique; it also talks about neglecting the rules established by the Creator for staying in the Garden of Eden.
While in Eden, the first people knew no sin. Often this postulate refers to the absence of physical intimacy. However, we are talking not only about sex, but also about sin in general as a concept. That is, they were unaware of anger, greed, malice, envy and other vicious properties of human nature. The first people did not know need, hunger, cold, disease and death.
The Creator allowed them to eat fruit from any tree in the garden, with the exception of one. It was called the tree of knowledge or good and evil. It was this prohibition that was violated. And the direct consequence of neglecting the rule established by the Creator was the Fall, due to which people were expelled from the Garden of Eden.
Why did people violate the Creator's prohibition?
The biblical creation of man and all things raises many questions. But the description of the reasons for the fall of the first people evokes them even more. Even those who have never picked up the Bible know that the tempter Serpent, who seduced Eve with sweet words and persuaded her to taste the forbidden fruit, is to blame for people’s violation of the Creator’s rules.
This biblical story gave the world much more “catchphrases,” proverbs, and sayings than any other part of the book. That is why almost everyone is familiar with this chapter of the story, at least in general terms or by hearsay.
