And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” - Genesis 3:2-5

Much has been made of this encounter with Eve. It would seem that she adds to the command by self imposed "neither shall you touch it". These words and this command do not present themselves in the Scriptures. Three options present themselves God did say it, Eve is lying or Eve is mistaken. None of these can be shown from Scripture. The early literature provides no insight into the timing of this event and it cannot be shown that all God's instructions are recorded.

Instead the focus should be on the discourse over death. The serpent's strategy is simple. The negation of God's word is easily done when definitions are changed. In two swift steps the serpent contradicts God's truthful statement and then provides a truthful statement to falsely prove the point. We must be cautious of what we accept as true. We must be cautious to not allow truths to be useful for falseness.

And finally we should develop a healthy fear of knowledge. The fear of the Lord is the source of knowledge (Prov 1:7). We must recognize that not all truth is born out of the fear of the Lord. And we must learn to guard ourselves in this fear.

*The Bible Blogging Commentary is a slow and simple treading of the Scriptures. No quotes from other theologians and no explicit Greek/Hebrew lessons.*