Sin requires knowing the difference between good and evil. Original sin therefore fails to be tenable, for Adam and Eve knew not the difference between good and evil until after eating of the fruit.

ignorance is no excuse from the law


it is what it is, even if not calling it 'good and evil'

God gave instruction that they disobeyed, whether they understood the concept of Good and Evil or not...

understanding instructions or choosing to rebel were not things Adam nor Eve were ignorant of,,,as evidenced by the coincidence of how they didnt choose to partake of the tree UNTIL the serpent claimed it would make them 'equal' to God,,,

Exactly. also Adam/Eve wasn't kicked out of the Garden for being "evil". They were kicked out for being "disobedient". So no, there is no need to know good from evil to sin. Weather they know it's evil or not, it is the act of being disobedient that is sin.

I think the only true "sin" is doing something that goes against your own morals and conscience. The only way to really be "wrong" is to "sin" against yourself in that way.

The rest is all just man's way to control the populace using God as the means by which to do it.

Ignorance of the difference between good and evil cannot discern between. To exhonerate your God from setting them up to fail, based upon their being told to do something is foolish given the fact that they could not possibly know the difference between doing right(good) and doing wrong(evil) until after it had been done.

Kleisto,

That is untenable. Everyone does what they think/believe is best at that time, all things considered. It is only later that we figure out that we've been mistaken.

the difference between good and evil is not the same as the difference between obedience and disobedience

it is not EVIL go stay up past eight, yet if I tell my children not to do it and they stay up till ten, they will have the consequence for being disobedient

That may be true, but our conscience is always speaking too. It's a matter of whether we listen to it or not that determines the course we take.

Being held accountable for being obedient/disobedient requires knowing the difference between right and wrong. Unless you can clearly draw and maintain a distinction between right/wrong and good/evil, one cannot know that it is wrong to be disobedient unless one knows the difference between right(good) and wrong(evil).

It is to hold one accountable for being ignorant of that which they could not possibly know. It is for a creator to knowingly create an ignorant creation and then to punish the creation for acting upon it's ignorance.

I agree.
It doesn't make sense.

Why would 'god' deny his creations access
to the 'fruit from the tree of knowledge'
and punish all 'his' creations from that day
forward, knowing full well this curse will
affect ALL of humanity FOREVER.....

Seems 'god' should have let them eat from that tree all day long!

Maybe we could look at our 'sins' less as a bad thing and more of a good thing. As experience. If ya think about it, each 'sin' we committed has probably turned out to be a grand life lesson.
Most of us learn from our past mistakes, hopefully.
If we can come out of a 'sin' stronger, better people that have truly learned through our experience, then maybe our 'sin' was actually a gift.

I agree, to me there really isn't any right or wrong in that sense, just experiences. They all shape who we are and what our lives become, good and bad things alike.

What would be the point of being here if everything we had to do had to automatically go back to one thing or another? How can you truly learn anything if your choices are that limited? You can't. Part of why we are here is to live, learn and experience. It really can't happen if we don't have the free will to make of our lives what we wish, without anything influencing that will from the outside.

Also, about God it really doesn't make any sense that a supposed perfect God would make people with the capability to do what we are allowed to do, and then punish us for acting as such. To me if God wanted us to be just obedient slaves to Him, He'd have made us as such. But he didn't. If he created us perfectly, he couldn't have made us imperfectly at the same time. That just doesn't work.

What it boils down to is, either we are as we were meant to be now, or God isn't perfect. Can't have it both ways. I for one tend to believe we are perfect just as we are. God doesn't make mistakes.

You are correct....sin is anything that goes against God and his nature, which is holy, just and pure.

We're not punished for what Adam and Eve did. Yes, granted we aren't in the paradise, but that isn't a punishment in the exact sense. Human race got kicked out of the paradise and God has given us a second chance through Jesus Christ to return to the paradise. To show that we are obedient to our father.

And what curse do you speak of? We have no "curse". If you're talking about the pains of labour and all that for a woman, that is because in the Garden there was no pain, but we're no longer in the Garden so therefore you have the pains of labour. It's not "curse", we're talking about two different places here.



If one is not punished for that sin, how is that one suppose to learn from it and or not to do it? The sins one commits in their life, Jesus offers forgiveness for. Writes them off like one never did such a thing.



How would us being disobedient have anything to do with God not being perfect? That was our choice to eat of the tree, our as in the Human race "Adam and Eve". That was them using their free will to disobey God. The only way God could have prevented this was to have taken free will away. And if he took it away from them, he would have to take it from us all. If we had no free will, what would be the point in making us? We would be just hand puppets doing his will. What would be the point in that? God is making a kingdom full of life, love, and laugher. All three of these come from people's choices that they make with their free will, so take away free will and you would have to take these away as well.

ok cowboy

Because God made us with these capabilities, so any "flaws" we have would be the fault of the creator, NOT the created. If a watch goes bad, it's not the watch that is the problem it's he who made the watch. If God made an imperfect creation, how can he blame us? He made us, we're only acting as we were made!

A perfect God will not create imperfectly, it's really that simple.

As for the rest, that's EXACTLY why the Biblical story fails, because one really does not have free will if you are forced by threats to only do things one way. What purpose would it serve for us to have free will to choose things and experiences if our good choices would be limited to a select few?

God doesn't force us, we have a choice. Regardless if their are consequences or not, you will choose to do as you wish to do. Your analogy with the watch fails miserably. That watch has no free, it MUST do as it was created to do or fail, it has no choice. That is all bearing on the creator of the watch. We have FREE WILL. We can do as we wish when we want. There are no threats either, only again consequence to our actions. We are informed of these so we would know. It would not be fair AT ALL, if God would have given us laws to abide by but didn't tell us of the outcomes of either being obedient or disobedient. They aren't "threats" they are just informing us. We are not created imperfect. There is nothing imperfect about us in anyway. People's choices aren't always perfect though, those actions though are created by that person, not by God, and is why we will be judged on them.



Again, we aren't made to act any particular way(s). If we were created to act a certain way, we would all naturally be obedient to God's laws. If God created us this way, again would be taking away free will, we would be nothing more then little hand puppets. A murderer is not made a murderer, they choose to be that way. They create that person, not God.



Sure they would. You seem to not know what free will is. Free will is being able to make any action you wish to make, being ABLE to. That doesn't mean you have the right to do as such. Heck that kind of thinking could become very dangerous. In the USA, you are FREE. We fought for that FREEDOM. That does not mean you have the freedom to steal something that does not belong to you, does not mean you are free to kill someone for something he did to you. With your way of thinking you would use the FREEDOM as your defence. Cause i mean after all if they punished you for killing someone, they would be taking away your freedom. No, man doesn't work that way. You have free will, and God's laws do not take that away, you still have the choice to obey or disobey.

In order to choose good, one must first know what good is.

not necessarily, semantically perhaps

I can pick a tomato and not know what the tomato is, there can be other traits that cause me to choose the tomato

technically, I chose the tomato, even if I Wasnt aware it was a tomato when I chose it

semantically, I wasnt choosing a tomato so much as choosing something red, or something round,,etc,,,,

but we often interchange words like good and evil, with right and wrong,,,and they arent necessarily the same things although they are similar

if I teach my daughter not to harm animals, she may not have any understanding of the concept of it being an 'evil' thing,, but she understands it is 'wrong' because it is something I have taught her not to do,,,,

You've gone in a circle.

Without having a preconception of what constitutes being good/bad, one cannot knowingly choose good.

but not knowing it was good doesnt change that it was good

and even if one doesnt necessarily know the concept of 'good', they can still understand 'obedient' or 'healthy' or 'safe', or any number of other concepts that will fall under that same category


if I am told not to do something, I dont have to understand that it is good or not good, to understand how to either obey or disobey,,,