OUR FATHER WHO GAVE US FREEDOM (2)

Continuing with Genesis chapter 2 verse 9, let us  summarize that there were many trees in the garden that were suitable for the man whom God had formed and then there were two trees singled out from the rest that were in the centre of the garden.

It is important to consider that trees are often used in scriptures as metaphors for modes of civilization.

Ezekiel chapter 31 most clearly illustrates this but in other examples as well.

Ezekiel chapter 31 verses 3 - 4 says this;

Consider Assyria, once a cedar in Lebanon, with beautiful branches overshadowing the forest; it towered on high, its top above the thick foliage.

The waters nourished it, deep springs made it grow tall;

Ezekiel chapter 31 verse 18 says this;

“‘Which of the trees of Eden can be compared with you in splendor and majesty? Yet you, too, will be brought down with the trees of Eden to the earth below; you will lie among the uncircumcised, with those killed by the sword.

“‘This is Pharaoh and all his hordes, declares the Sovereign Lord.’”

This verse explicitly mentions the trees of Eden in comparing the civilization of the various kingdoms and empires on earth.

In Mathew chapter 13 verse 13 - 32, the Lord Jesus described the civilization of the kingdom of God as a mustard seed that grew in the garden and became a great tree. The verse reads this way;

He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.”

With this pattern in mind, we can look at the trees in the garden of Eden as representing the modes of civilization that were available to the human race at the onset of our endeavor that were good options for the continuance for our race but at the center of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil which brought complexity to the array of choices we had.

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