Is it a sin to seek knowledge?

[Greatest I am]

Is it a sin to seek knowledge?

Is it a sin to want to open one’s eyes instead of being blind?

Is it a sin to do as scriptures urge us to do?

Matthew 5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

Gen 3:2 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil:

Adam and Eve were doing exactly what we are all told by scriptures to do, yet God seemed quite upset.

Why is seeking knowledge and ignoring a vile command to remain in ignorant bliss wrong or a sin?

Are you sinning when you seek knowledge and becoming more like God?

Regards
DL

 

[Sabour]

Adam and Eve were doing exactly what we are all told by scriptures to do, yet God seemed quite upset.

Hello, am not a Christian

Can you show how does the bible support the statement you made ? Didn't Adam and Eve follow the advice of Satan according to the bible ?

 

[Desert Snake]

Hello, am not a Christian

Can you show how does the bible support the statement you made ? Didn't Adam and Eve follow the advice of Satan according to the bible ?

It wasn't Satan. The narrative simply describes a creature.

 

[Sabour]

It wasn't Satan. The narrative simply describes a creature.

What did the creature do? Can you provide me with the verse?

 

[George-ananda]

Knowledge is good. I don't look at ancient stories to find their flaws with modern logic.

 

[Augustus]

Is it a sin to seek knowledge?

Is it a sin to want to open one’s eyes instead of being blind?

Is it a sin to do as scriptures urge us to do?

Matthew 5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

Gen 3:2 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil:

Adam and Eve were doing exactly what we are all told by scriptures to do, yet God seemed quite upset.

Why is seeking knowledge and ignoring a vile command to remain in ignorant bliss wrong or a sin?

Are you sinning when you seek knowledge and becoming more like God?

Regards
DL

It means that humans gained awareness of the difference between good and evil, instead of living in innocence.

“For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

They were warned that this would bring them only harm.

The myth functions to explain why there is a good/evil dichotomy within humanity and why humans must struggle with their own morality. You can also relate it to themes such as knowledge can bring problems and hardships rather than enlightenment; the ideas that innocence cannot be regained once lost, that we cannot 'un-know' something, etc.

Many of these old myths are not meant to be taken too literally, they are stories with a meaning, stories that give guidance and explain some point of wisdom. Instead of trying to identify 2 passages which contradict each other, look at the meaning of each one individually, it is possible they might both be true if you treat them as lessons rather than unequivocal facts to applied in all situations without thought or nuance.

 

[jeager106]

Gaining knowledge does not become god like.
We have brains, we seek knowledge, it's innate in all humans.

 

[Popcorn]

Is it a sin to seek knowledge?

Is it a sin to want to open one’s eyes instead of being blind?

Is it a sin to do as scriptures urge us to do?

Matthew 5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

Gen 3:2 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil:

Adam and Eve were doing exactly what we are all told by scriptures to do, yet God seemed quite upset.

Why is seeking knowledge and ignoring a vile command to remain in ignorant bliss wrong or a sin?

Are you sinning when you seek knowledge and becoming more like God?

Regards
DL

Do you know what is sin?

 

[Vishvavajra]

Knowledge isn't a sin in the Eden myth, which isn't really about sin in an case. That's just how later Christian readers have chosen to interpret it, since that's how they tend to want to view everything.

The Eden myth isn't about how people did wrong. It's not really about crime and punishment. It's about the consequences that naturally result from sapience, which include forms of suffering that non-sapient creatures don't experience. You can't have the kind of knowledge that people have and not have it balanced with new problems, is the idea.

Lots of Christians have failed to understand that, of course. If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

 

[Windwalker]

Is it a sin to seek knowledge?

No. But what exactly was the commandment in Genesis? Not to seek knowledge of any kind, or was it specific knowledge, the "knowledge of good and evil"?

Is it a sin to want to open one’s eyes instead of being blind?

One could argue that the metaphor was that to open your eyes to death and suffering is a loss of innocence. Do recall that this was what the serpent tricked Eve into believing was the reason not to eat of the fruit? It was not God who said, "If you eat of it your eyes will be open and you will see like me". I tend to think if the metaphor of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil goes along with the other fruit of the other trees, which would mean that those were also trees of knowledge. Right? So it wouldn't have been about not being blind, that knowledge itself was hidden, but the knowledge that they are separate from God, knowing good and evil in themselves. Isn't this the metaphor?

Is it a sin to do as scriptures urge us to do?

Matthew 5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

This later injunction it to seek to reunite with the divine. It's an injunction to reverse what was foisted upon humanity by choosing to know ourselves apart from the divine. It's technically not a contraction.

Gen 3:2 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil:

Adam and Eve were doing exactly what we are all told by scriptures to do, yet God seemed quite upset.

God didn't tell them to choose separation. For right or for wrong, man choose to open his eyes to his nakedness, to fear, to understand death, to understand his mortality, his aloneness. Isn't what scripture says to do is to re-unite with God?

Why is seeking knowledge and ignoring a vile command to remain in ignorant bliss wrong or a sin?

Was that the command, or your misunderstanding of the passage?

Are you sinning when you seek knowledge and becoming more like God?

What do you imagine being more like God is? To understand science? Or does that mean something beyond that?

 

[Desert Snake]

Knowledge isn't a sin in the Eden myth, which isn't really about sin in an case. That's just how later Christian readers have chosen to interpret it, since that's how they tend to want to view everything.

The Eden myth isn't about how people did wrong. It's not really about crime and punishment. It's about the consequences that naturally result from sapience, which include forms of suffering that non-sapient creatures don't experience. You can't have the kind of knowledge that people have and not have it balanced with new problems, is the idea.

Lots of Christians have failed to understand that, of course. If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Knowledge was the sin, in the Garden. The fruit was of the tree of knowledge.
ok, ok, it was disobeying, that was the sin....some semantics,

 

[Thief]

Is it a sin to seek knowledge?

Is it a sin to want to open one’s eyes instead of being blind?

Is it a sin to do as scriptures urge us to do?

Matthew 5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

Gen 3:2 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil:

Adam and Eve were doing exactly what we are all told by scriptures to do, yet God seemed quite upset.

Why is seeking knowledge and ignoring a vile command to remain in ignorant bliss wrong or a sin?

Are you sinning when you seek knowledge and becoming more like God?

Regards
DL

You are equating sin with death.

Death is not the consequence in the acquisition of knowledge.
Death would have been there anyway.

Death does not separate you from paradise.
It opens the door.

But to walk in heaven among the angelic without knowing good from evil?......I think not.

Acquisition was essential.

If you want to regard the garden event as a test....that's fine.

We passed the test.
We ARE that creature seeking knowledge, even as death is pending.

 

[Kolibri]

Gen 3:2 And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil:

This meant that mankind has to now decide for all by themselves what is good and bad, even though they are not equipped to do so without help.

That was the whole point of letting man rule himself for a time - to gather tangible evidence that we can't do it successfully.

I well know, O Jehovah, that man's way does not belong to him.
It does not belong to man who is walking even to direct his step.
- Jeremiah 10:23

 

[psychoslice]

I think back years ago they were frightened to let people seek knowledge, it was because they didn't want them to leave their belief system, and they still are doing it today.

 

[Vishvavajra]

Knowledge was the sin, in the Garden. The fruit was of the tree of knowledge.
ok, ok, it was disobeying, that was the sin....some semantics,

The modern Christian concept of sin was pretty alien to ancient Hebrews. The Eden myth wasn't written as a morality tale. Like its close analog in the Greek tradition (Prometheus, Pandora, etc.), it's about how the gods limit mankind by balancing a benefit with a detriment, lest humans usurp the position of the gods.

Yahweh in the Eden myth isn't the good guy. He lies to the humans about what the fruit will do, and when they disobey him we discover (from his own mouth) that his real concern is that the humans will become as powerful as he is. So of course they must be stopped. Zeus does the same thing in the Greek myth, for the same reason. In both cases the events of the story are primarily a narrative means of getting people to where they are now, to express how we feel life is hard and unpleasant, even though we can imagine it otherwise (which suggested to people a memory of a time when it was). But note that in both myths it's never an option for people to be both sapient and free of suffering; rising above the animal state is assumed to be a good thing, but it comes with its own new set of troubles.

The funny thing is, no ancient person would have read the Eden myth and wished that the man and woman had declined to eat the fruit. They felt no need to explain why it was a good thing. Nobody wants to go back to being benighted animals. But of course modern people are just misanthropic enough to suggest that attaining sapience is the worst crime we ever committed and that we would have been better off without it. Modern people are weird.

 

[Thief]

The modern Christian concept of sin was pretty alien to ancient Hebrews. The Eden myth wasn't written as a morality tale. Like its close analog in the Greek tradition (Prometheus, Pandora, etc.), it's about how the gods limit mankind by balancing a benefit with a detriment, lest humans usurp the position of the gods.

Yahweh in the Eden myth isn't the good guy. He lies to the humans about what the fruit will do, and when they disobey him we discover (from his own mouth) that his real concern is that the humans will become as powerful as he is. So of course they must be stopped. Zeus does the same thing in the Greek myth, for the same reason. In both cases the events of the story are primarily a narrative means of getting people to where they are now, to express how we feel life is hard and unpleasant, even though we can imagine it otherwise (which suggested to people a memory of a time when it was). But note that in both myths it's never an option for people to be both sapient and free of suffering; rising above the animal state is assumed to be a good thing, but it comes with its own new set of troubles.

The funny thing is, no ancient person would have read the Eden myth and wished that the man and woman had declined to eat the fruit. They felt no need to explain why it was a good thing. Nobody wants to go back to being benighted animals. But of course modern people are just misanthropic enough to suggest that attaining sapience is the worst crime we ever committed and that we would have been better off without it. Modern people are weird.

Nobody lied in the garden event.
I got a thread around here somewhere on that very notion.

 

[Rival]

Looks like someone needs to sit down and read proverbs.

"Take my instruction instead of silver,
And knowledge rather than choice gold,
For wisdom is better than jewels,
And all that you may desire cannot compare with her."

-Proverbs 8:10-11

 

[Greatest I am]

Hello, am not a Christian

Can you show how does the bible support the statement you made ? Didn't Adam and Eve follow the advice of Satan according to the bible ?

To your first question.
Work with what I quoted.
That should be all you need to reply.

To your second.
Eve was deceived and Adam just plain disobeyed is what the scriptures tell us.

Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned--

That is the dogma I keep hearing but no one ever answers as to why God put Satan in the garden in the first place. Some say to test but that is dumb because Eve had no way to overcome God's power to deceive that would have flowed through Satan.

Regards
DL

 

[Greatest I am]

It wasn't Satan. The narrative simply describes a creature.

A plain old serpent is described in the narrative. Later it speaks through supernatural satanic control thanks to God giving Satan the power to deceive us all.

Quite the gift for her rebellion in heaven.

Something seems wrong with that.

Thoughts?

Regards
DL

 

[Greatest I am]

Knowledge is good. I don't look at ancient stories to find their flaws with modern logic.

I understand that that can be a pain but to let this story stand when it has caused and continues to cause so much damage and injustice to women, --- would make those of us who are not misogynous just as immoral as Christians.

For that evil part of Christianity to grow, all good people need do is nothing.

Not discrediting this myth is worse than doing nothing.

Regards
DL