Blog Post 2: August 13th

The second creation account emphasizes knowledge and the tree of knowledge in order to effectively juxtapose good and evil. Knowledge is so heavily communicated throughout this account because the account as a whole describes a human’s constant state of free will with both good and evil decisions. The catalysts in making these decisions and the underlying factor of all free will is knowledge. The second creation account is depicting this struggle of balance and how knowledge drives all free will. According to Legaspi, the eating of “the tree of the knowledge of good and bad” is the entrance of evil into the human free will. While free will existed before the consumption from the tree, this was the first evil act of free will and thus symbolizes the nature of a human’s being and free will: both good and evil. The act was eating and not some other activity because eating is a self-promoting action that benefits no one but yourself. It makes the act of taking the forbidden fruit to another level because it was for self-pleasure. Touching or looking at the special object aren’t on the same level of selfishness. A tree from which to eat was used because nature is a gift from God and by stealing from a tree is still from a gift from God.