When man fell from his spiritual state because he wanted to take for himself an attribute that belonged only to God—namely, the authority to know and judge what is evil and what is good—a kind of power rivalry arose. Consequently, man built his own religion, which was like saying, “I too can create spirituality.” He also raised up his own kingdom and government, not honoring God’s government but rather rejecting it. These consequences of disobedience first appeared in the transgressing angel, who wanted to rise beyond the rank and rule of the Most High and establish his own government so as not to be subject to the Source—an outcome driven by greed and fascination with power, control, and dominion.
This being decided he was powerful and capable enough to occupy God’s seat and scepter of authority and challenged His rule. Our first parents believed they could obtain the capacity of judgment—to decide what is good and what is evil—without obedience to the Voice of God. Ancient Israel rejected God’s government by asking to be like the other nations, governed by a man and not by God, because they considered themselves wise in their own opinion, just as the fallen angel did, and as Adam and Eve did.
The initial transgression is called “the fall” because man fell from his spiritual state and from a creation that was like God. We were created as heavenly beings in our father Adam and Eve.
However, the Book of the Life of Adam and Eve says that God knew what man would do, and thus, once they left the Garden as a result of their transgression, human beings would be born on the earth. I would prefer that the word intuit be used instead of know, because we were made free beings, and the freedom we have does not make us 100 percent predictable.
Adam and Eve were born in that place we call heaven, and Eden was part of the Kingdom. It was located in a region between heaven and earth. The Book of Adam and Eve says:
“God planted the Garden of Eden in the eastern part of the earth, at the border of the world toward the east, beyond where the sun rises, where there is nothing but water that encompasses the whole world and reaches to the borders of the heavens.”
A border is the exact delimitation of a state’s territory; an intermediate zone between two countries; a strip where one state borders another. Thus, the Garden was placed by God in some area where, if one crossed the “border” of the earth, one would reach some region of the Kingdom, or vice versa.
The Garden of Eden was planted in a place that bordered the earth. In a sense, one could say that Eden descended from heaven to earth. Fallen spirits did not have access to the Garden, but they could roam around its surroundings. The fall occurred when Eve and Adam, leaving the Garden, encountered the transgressing angel, who had possessed a serpent in order to speak to them without terrifying them. The serpent was an animal, and no animal being—including us in this physical body—has access to the Kingdom of light.
The tragedy of disobedience to the divine command did not happen inside the Garden. Moreover, the same book tells us that Adam and Eve crossed the border from Eden to the earth before the expulsion:
“And the Lord said to Adam and Eve: You have transgressed by your own free will…”
Then the Lord says the following: “and you went out of the Garden in which I had placed you.”
A spirit of shadows cannot reside in the Kingdom, because it is light, and Eden was part of it. In a conversation between Adam and Eve it is mentioned that only light existed in Eden:
“Oh Eve! I remember that while we were in the Garden, we did not know either day or night. I think of the Tree of Life, beneath which the water flowed, and which cast more light upon us. I remember, O Eve, the land of the Garden and its brightness. In the Garden there was no darkness while we lived in it.”
Darkness is the absence of God’s light and appears when there is transgression. In addition, the Scriptures say that Yahweh God walked in the Garden to speak with Adam and Eve. The Garden was an extension of God’s domains of light. Furthermore, God reproached Adam for having gone out of Eden. Eden protected them from the spirits of shadows that already inhabited the abyss of the earth. These spirits could not enter Eden, where there is no transgression or darkness. Darkness is the essence and manifestation of transgression, and transgression is rebellion against God’s government. Whoever voluntarily submits to His government and obeys His commands has light.
The essence and manifestation of light is submission to God’s government. Put another way, a person’s light flows from their subjection to God’s rule. Darkness arises from the opposite state. Just as the beginning of the knowledge of God—or His Wisdom—is reverence for His Word, the beginning of the knowledge of evil, or of darkness, is irreverence toward it. When the angel rebelled against God’s government, he lost his light. He became darkness and was cast out of the Kingdom—where darkness does not exist—into the uninhabited earth. The transgressing angel, envious of the greatness and hierarchical position in the Kingdom that had been given to the first created pair, planned to make them fall as he had fallen.
Darkness is and originates from the absence of God’s light. The fallen angel became darkness because God removed His light—or Spirit—that illuminated him. The Creator did not want our father Adam and Eve to suffer the same fate. He removed their light, but He gave them a physical body so that they could be saved from eternal darkness.
The fall of our first progenitors did not occur because they ate a piece of fruit. It occurred because they disobeyed the command not to do so, and when they did—following what another voice urged them to do in order to violate the order of the Source—they fell under the dominion of the one who tempted them, while at the same time rejecting God’s government.
In ancient laws of war, there was a belief that obedience to another chief—for example, an invader or conqueror—meant submitting to his dominion and renouncing the protection of one’s original leader. Thus, by breaking obedience to God and submitting to the counsel of the serpent, the first human pair entered into an “alliance” with a being opposed to God. In this act of obedience to the fallen angel, they transferred their spiritual freedom and authority, entering into a kind of servitude under the power of the one they obeyed.
This concept also reflects the nature of covenants in ancient times: once an alliance or loyalty was formed, it was difficult to reverse without an act of redemption or rescue. This gives meaning to the need for spiritual “redemption”: if humanity lost its status by obeying the fallen angel, restoration would require a significant act to break that alliance. The promise of redemption through God’s salvation is found in the Book of the Life of Adam and Eve.
The Garden of Eden was a piece of God’s heaven on earth. When God created Adam, the fallen entities were already inhabiting our planet. God had told Adam not to leave the Garden, but they did. That is when the disobedience and rejection of God’s command occurred.
The referenced text says:
“Adam and Eve went out to the door of the cave and headed toward the Garden. And as they approached the western gate, where Satan deceived them, and they realized that the serpent had become the transgressing angel—licking the dust and crawling upon it—with the curse Elohim gave him.”
This western gate is mentioned again as an entrance from the earth into the Garden. According to the text, there were three entrances from the earth to Eden: the western gate, the eastern gate, and the southern gate, and God had planted the Garden in the eastern part of the earth.
Believers imagine the Garden as an orchard on earth with no direct connection to the Kingdom, due to the belief that God made man from clay and put him there like a living little doll to guard and cultivate it.
The Garden was part of the Kingdom, and before the transgression the Kingdom touched or bordered the earth through Eden. Its entrances were sealed because God knew that man, in his rebellious state against God’s government, would want and attempt to enter in order to challenge His power and authority. This was proven by the construction of the Tower of Babel.
If we practice the actions of evil, the inner light of our spirits is extinguished. The more spiritually developed and transformed we become, the more inner light we acquire and manifest:
“The lamp of the body is the eye. If you look at others with a desire to help them, your whole body will be full of light. But if you look at them with envy, then your whole body will be full of darkness. If the only light you have is darkness, how terrible that darkness will be!”
This is not a metaphor. If you practice the works of darkness, you will be darkness. If you practice the works of good, you will be light.
The transgression occurred outside Eden, where the fallen angel dwelt after his rebellion against God. After the disobedience, Adam and Eve wanted to return, but they could not. When we lost the nature like God, the spiritual body of Adam and Eve was altered and became physical. Matter took control, and from then on human societies began to be built under its influence—under that inclination toward materiality. We now live in the animal realm and are part of it, but that was not God’s plan for us. This was the consequence of the poor decision our first ancestors made in their full state of freedom.
A psalm says regarding the fall and the loss of our state like God:
“I said, ‘You are gods;
you are all sons of the Most High.
But you will die like mere mortals,
and fall like any other ruler.’”
We were gods because we were sons of the Most High, but because of the fall we now die like mere mortals.
The account of Adam and Eve says that after the transgression—already outside the Garden, in a land strange to them—and as God saw them diminished, having lost their spiritual capacity and power, He spoke to them. God said to Adam:
“When you were under My control, I had given you all creatures; but after you transgressed My command, they are all in a better place than you.”
Elohim spoke again:
“Look, O Adam, how Satan has exalted himself! He has deprived you of the exalted state like Mine, and he has not kept his word to you, only to become your enemy afterward.”
When God removed their spiritual brightness—the brightness that gave them light—they lost, and we lost in them, the exalted state He had given us as His children. His image and likeness were given to us at the beginning of creation in order to make us like Him in spirit. But that elevated equality was possible and could be maintained only through subordination to His power, because we were created beings.
It is interesting to note here the use of the word “creatures.” Although we usually use it to refer to human beings and animals, it also has a broader application. God had given His children Adam and Eve governance over every created creature—for example, angels, including fallen angels, and heavenly beings of every kind that the Most High may have created.
When God says that after the transgression “they are all in a better place than you,” He is not speaking exclusively of the animal creation. Before the creation of Adam and Eve, God had not given anyone the hierarchical position of command—subordinate only to God—within His Kingdom. In addition, God had given them the divine condition of being His image. That meant it was as though one were seeing God Himself—a supreme attribute because of which angels and all creation rendered honor and worship.
The Book of Enoch says of other beings created by God:
“Then they led me to a place whose inhabitants are like blazing fire, but when they wish, they appear as humans.”
These beings or creatures are not angels.
The fallen entity had taken the exaltation God had given Adam because he had overcome him. And from being under the gentle dominion of God, Adam had passed into the cruel and destructive lordship of the transgressing angel.
Regarding the serpent speaking to Eve, the same book says that the fallen angel possessed the animal. It also explains under what power the first human pair fell after the offense—an explanation not found in traditional Scripture.
“However, when Adam came out and saw his horrible figure, he was afraid of him and said, ‘Who are you?’ Then Satan answered and said to him: ‘I am the one who hid within the serpent and spoke with Eve and seduced her to eat from the tree and to obey me. I am the one who sent her with deceptive speeches so that she would go to where you were and you would eat also, and you would turn away from the command of Elohim.’”
It also says that animals were endowed with speech. As a side note—very interesting in relation to this account—every animal except the giraffe has vocal cords. That fact, at the very least, could encourage a skeptic to consider that there might be something true in the account that animals spoke before the transgression.
The account of Adam and Eve says that animals were of a creation inferior to the spiritual nature of the first human pair. When the alteration of Adam and Eve’s spiritual body to an earthly one occurred, God told them that because of the transgression they had become like the animals. In this sense, scientists who categorize man as part of the animal kingdom are correct. To leave the animal realm to which we belong after the fall, we must be transformed into spiritual beings.
The following are some passages explaining that the spiritual man had become an animal being. In the first two, Adam speaks with the angels:
“O blessed spiritual beings who stand before Elohim, look at me. I am unable to see you. But when I was in my former bright nature, I could see you; I sang praises and my heart rose above you. But now that I have transgressed, and the bright nature has departed from me, and I have fallen into this miserable state, I can no longer see you; and you no longer serve me as you used to, for now I have animal flesh.”
And the angel said to Adam and Eve:
“Elohim has sent me to tell you that you must eat, because you no longer have strength to continue. If you do not eat, you will die. Now you have animal flesh, and this flesh cannot survive without food and drink.”
In the next passage, Adam speaks to God:
“Adam then arose in prayer and said: O Elohim, You know that we have transgressed against You, and from the moment we transgressed we were stripped of our bright appearance, and our body became brutish, requiring food and drink as the animal desires.”
Adam and Eve did not want to eat or drink water because they wanted to return to Eden, where they did not need these things because they were spiritual and not material. Their body was different then, and God explained it to them:
“Then Elohim said to Adam: While you were in obedience to Me and were like a bright angel, you did not know this water. But now that you have transgressed My command, you cannot do anything without water. You need it to wash your body and make it grow; now it is like that of beasts, and it is for lack of water.”
Then the Word of Elohim came to Adam and said:
“O Adam, why do you have this fear and remain in this fast? And why did you not fear before the transgression? But now that you live in this strange land, your animal body cannot survive without earthly foods; you need them to strengthen yourself and restore your energy.”
And Elohim withdrew His Word from Adam.
Man’s original creation before the fall was spiritual. Through transgression, he became animal or physical. This is also explained in the New Testament.
1 Corinthians 2:14 says:
“But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
This “natural man” referenced in Corinthians is the unredeemed man—the one who has not yet been reconciled to his Creator and Father. Therefore, he does not know and cannot understand spiritual things because he is entirely earthly.
The natural man, the physical man, cannot dwell in the Kingdom. That is why God will give us a spiritual body like the one our first parents had before disobedience, and by doing so we will recover the image and likeness of God that we had lost. There will be a new heaven and a new earth to house spiritual creation, and everything will be filled with the knowledge and light of God.
The following passage indicates that there is an end to the cycle of time that originated with the transgression. It is the period of physical death in humanity and thus the manifestation of time. Past, present, and future exist—or manifested—as a consequence of the entrance of death into us. The text tells us that there is a time determined by God for the fulfillment of the promise given to Adam: to return to Eden with his descendants. It also tells us that we will live “standing on the earth” until God’s time is fulfilled. This is very interesting to reflect on. The only reason we stand on the earth is because gravity keeps us here. The expression implies that when the time is fulfilled, we will not live standing on the earth—and that could only occur if we are no longer physical beings:
“Elohim said to Adam: I have ordained over this earth days and years, and you and your descendants shall live standing upon it until the days and years are fulfilled—until the Words that created you, and that brought you out of the Garden after your transgression, are spoken. Yes, until the Word is kept again, after five and a half days are passed and fulfilled.”
The consummation of this period will occur when man—the descendants of Eve—has learned to keep and obey the Word of God and has been transformed into a spiritual being. When humanity has learned the most important lesson of its earthly existence—spiritual obedience to God—it will have crushed the serpent’s head and will have evil under its feet.
It must be understood that because we still inhabit a material body that dies, renewal and transformation are spiritual for the moment. Nevertheless, that renewal and transformation affects the physical body with strength and healing.
When the Lord exiled Adam and Eve from the Garden of the Kingdom, He sent them to live in a cave that was below the Garden of God:
“Then Adam and Eve entered the cave, and they were praying in their own language, which is unknown to us, but which they knew well. And while they prayed, Adam lifted his eyes and saw the stone and the roof of the cave above them, covering them and preventing them from seeing the sky and the creatures of Elohim; and he began to weep, and striking his chest strongly, he fell to the ground as though dead.”
This is interesting because this era of Adam and Eve coincides with the Stone Age in terms of dwelling and clothing. The Scriptures say that God made garments of skins for them to cover themselves:
“And the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.”
Consider that when the events described in these texts were written, nothing was known about the characteristics of man in the historical Stone Age. It is in this era that science places the earliest human beings. One can deduce from the dwelling and clothing that the time when the first human pair left Eden corresponds to the Lower Paleolithic.
The fallen angel rebelled against God’s authority because he sought to obtain God’s divinity for himself and envied the position of glory in which Adam and Eve had been placed. Through deception and lies, the angel snatched from our first parents the glory and power they had received from God. Adam and Eve did not know evil, but evil already existed. God said:
“But the wicked Satan did not keep his faith and had no good intentions toward Me; and although I had created him, he considered Me useless and sought the Divinity for himself. For this reason I cast him out of heaven, for he could no longer remain in his first dwelling.”
That is why, to protect them, God warned them not to disobey His command, because disobedience would unleash a deadly effect in their lives and in the lives of their descendants. We are created beings with freedom, but our only protection against evil is our voluntary submission to God’s government. The goal, the vision, and the mission of evil is to destroy us completely.
Sadly, Adam and Eve learned the value of obedience to the Voice of God only after they had lost their spiritual body of glory and their incredible position of power in God’s creation—a position greater than that of the angels.
This long cycle of years and days in which God confined humanity after the fall will end when, on earth, His Word is obeyed as it is in heaven. That means much depends on us, because we are free beings who can choose our destinies.