Tree of the knowledge of good and evil

"I, I, I need the insight.

I need the understanding." And what we forget is when we ate of the Tree of Knowledge, what we did is we sacrificed one way of knowing God for a different way of knowing God.

Mm.

So God essentially had to birth us or send us out of the Garden so we could rediscover what it is to be children of God, rediscover what it is to find our way back home through this broken journey that involves sin and pain and everything that we know from that story.

... going to change everything.

Mm.

Mm.For us, unfortunately, when it comes to how God speaks, we're still trying to know and understand it through the tree of knowledge-

Hmm

We don't find there are no Jewish sources that say.

the etadah tovarah, the tree of knowledge of good and evil, which was the tree that God said to Adam and Eve, don't eat of this tree.

There are no Jewish sources that say that it's an apple.

There are a whole bunch of them that appear, speculations in chazal and etrog, fig, grape, wheat.

It's a journey.

Week after week after week, lying on the couch, talking about his mother, about his father, about his siblings, about his grandfather, his great-grandfather, all the way back to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, and the ape from the Tree of Knowledge.

And there's much to talk about, right? All the phobias and fears, real, imaginary traumas, You get the idea.

And he's meanwhile paying plenty.

Great are thy virtues, doubtless, best of fruits, though kept from man, and worthy to be admired, whose taste, too long forborne, at first assay gave elocution to the mute, and taught the tongue not made for speech to speak thy praise.

Thy praise he also who forbids thy use conceals not from us, naming thee the tree of knowledge, knowledge both of good and evil.

Forbids us then to taste, but his forbidding commends thee more, while it infers the good by thee communicated, and our want.

For good unknown sure is not had, or had and yet unknown is as not had at all.

Yet oft his heart, divine of something ill, misgave him.

He the faltering measure felt, and forth to meet her went, the way she took that morn when first they parted.

By the tree of knowledge he must pass.

There he her met, scarce from the tree returning, in her hand a bough of fairest fruit that downy smiled, new gathered, and ambrosial smell diffused.

He believed it all then, but as he grew older and learnt more and more, he became wise enough to understand that the splendor of the Garden of Paradise must be very different to all this.

Oh, why did Eve pluck the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge? Why did Adam eat the forbidden fruit?" thought the King's Son.

If I had been there, it would never have happened, and there would have been no sin in the world.

The Garden of Paradise occupied all his thoughts till he reached his seventeenth year.

Are we now in the garden of paradise? Asked the prince.

No indeed replied the East Wind, but we shall be there very soon.

Do you see that wall of rocks and the cavern beneath it over which the grapevines hang like a green curtain through that cavern we must pass wrap your cloak round you For Awhile the sun scorches you here a few steps farther It Will Be Icy Cold the Bird Flying Past the Entrance To The Cavern Feels As If One Wing Were In The Region Of Summer And The Other In The Depths Of Winter So This Then Is The Way To The Garden Of Paradise asked The Prince As They Entered The Cavern IT Was Indeed Cold But THE COLD SOON PASSED FOR THE EAST WIND SPREAD HIS WINGS AND THEY GLEAMED LIKE THE BRIGHTEST FIRE AS THEY PASSED ON THROUGH THIS WONDERFUL CAVE THE PRINCE COULD SEE GREAT BLOCKS OF STONE FROM WHICH WATER TRICKLED HANGING OVER THEIR HEADS IN FANTASTIC SHAPES SOMETIMES IT WAS SO NARROW THAT THEY HAD TO CREEP ON THEIR HANDS AND KNEES WHILE AT OTHER TIMES IT WAS LOFTY AND WIDE LIKE THE FREE AIR IT HAD THE APPEARANCE OF A CHAPEL FOR THE DEAD WITH PETRIFIED ORGANS AND SILENT PIPES WE SEEM TO BE PASSING THROUGH THE VALLEY OF DEATH TO THE GARDEN OF PARADISE SAID THE PRINCE BUT THE EAST WIND ANSWERED NOT A WORD ONLY POINTED FORWARDS TO A LOVELY BLUE LIGHT WHICH GLEAMED IN THE DISTANCE THE BLOCKS OF STONE ASSUMED A MISTY APPEARANCE TILL AT LAST THEY LOOKED LIKE WHITE CLOUDS IN MOONLIGHT THE AIR WAS FRESH AND BALMY LIKE A BREEZE FROM THE MOUNTAINS PERFumed WITH FLOWERS FROM A VALLEY OF ROSES A RIVER CLEAR AS THE AIR ITSELF SPARKLED AT THEIR FEET WHILE IN ITS CLEAR DEPTHS COULD BE SEEN GOLD AND SILVER FISH SPORTING IN THE BRIGHT WATER AND PURPLE EELS EMITTING SPARKS OF FIRE AT EVERY MOMENT WHILE THE BROAD LEAVES OF THE WATER LILIES THAT FLOATED ON ITS SURFACE FLICKERED WITH ALL THE COLORS OF THE RAINBOW THE FLOWER IN ITS COLOR OF FLAME SEEMED TO RECEIVE ITS NOURISHMENT FROM THE WATER AS A LAMP IS SUSTAINED BY OIL A MARBLE BRIDGE OF SUCH EXQUISITE WORKMANSHIP THAT IT APPEARED AS IF FORMED OF LACE AND PEARLS LED TO THE ISLAND OF HAPPINESS IN WHICH BLOSSOMED THE GARDEN OF PARADISE THE EAST WIND TOOK THE PRINCE IN HIS ARMS AND CARRIED HIM OVER WHILE THE FLOWERS AND THE LEAVES SANG THE SWEET SONGS OF HIS CHILDHOOD IN TONES SO FULL AND SOFT THAT NO HUMAN VOICE COULD VENTURE TO IMITATE WITHIN THE GARDEN GREW LARGE TREES FULL OF SAP BUT WHETHER THEY WERE PALM TREES OR GIGANTIC WATER PLANTS THE PRINCE KNEW NOT THE CLIMBING PLANTS HUNG IN GARLANDS OF GREEN AND GOLD LIKE THE ILLUMINATIONS ON THE MARGINS OF OLD MISSALS OR TWINED AMONG THE INITIAL LETTERS BIRDS FLOWERS AND FESTOONS APPEARED INTERMINGLED IN SCENING CONFUSION CLOSEBY ON THE GRASS SIT A GROUP OF PEACOCKs WITH RADIANT TAILS OUTSPREAD TO THE SUN THE PRINCE TOUCHED THEM AND FOUND TO HIS SURPRISE THAT THEY WERE NOT REALLY BIRDS BUT THE LEAVES OF THE BURDOCK TREE WHICH SHONE WITH THE COLORS OF A PEACOCK'S TAIL THE LION AND THE TIGER GENTLE AND Tame WERE SPRINGING ABOUT LIKE PLAYFUL CATS AMONG THE GREEN BUSHES WHOSE PERFUME WAS LIKE THE FRAGRANT BLOSSOM OF THE OLIVE THE PLUMAGE OF THE WOOD PIGEON GLISTened Like Pearls As It Struck The Lion's Mane With Its Wings While The Antelope Usually So Shy Stood Near Nodding Its Head As If It Wished To Join In The Frolic The Fairy Of Paradise Next Made Her Appearance HER RAYMENTS shone Like The Sun AND her serene continents beamed with happiness like that of a mother rejoicing over her child SHE WAS YOUNG AND BEAUTIFUL AND A TRAIN OF LOVELY MAIDENS FOLLOWED HER EACH wearing A Bright Star In Her Hair The East Wind Gave Her The Palm Leaf On Which Was Written The History Of The Phoenix AND her eyes sparkled with joy she THEN took THE PRINCE by thE hand AND led hiM INTO hEr palace tHE walls oF wHiCh werE richly colored likE a tulip leaf whEn iT is turnto ThE sUn THe roof had thE appearance of an inverted flower ANd thE colors greW deeper AnD brighter to thE gazer The prince walked to a window and saw what appeared to be the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil with Adam and Eve standing by, and the serpent near them.

"I thought they were banished from paradise," he said.

Why is it that women have the condition of nida and men do not? Several explanations are given for this.

One is that this is a punishment for the first woman's participation and initiation of the sin of the tree of knowledge.

That since Chava, Eve, was the one who began with the sin and ate from the fruit and fed it to her husband, Adam, and this resulted in death and impurity coming to the world, that her punishment was that her Descendants from all generations, the female descendants, should have this dam nida, this menstrual blood.

The Rabbeinu Bechaya gives another interesting explanation.