The Fall

Theologians say there was a Fall. Humankind, they say, was made a little lower than the angels, but through disobedience fell from our lofty estate and brought the whole world down with us. We fell, they say again, into the wretched condition of original sin. Alienated from our Creator, we ushered death and damnation into a formally pristine universe. It is a dark view of the world and humans. I don’t see it – neither in scripture nor in nature.

There are two stories of creation in the opening chapters of Genesis - different ways of understanding the same condition. The first is poetry describing a universe in harmony - light and dark flowing in a yin-yang dance of opposites, bringing forth life. The Lord pronounced the whole cosmos as good, including humans, the most recent of God’s creatures, added to the earthly menagerie as an ellipsis at the end of a long week.

The second story is not meant to negate the first, but to supplement it. It tells a story of a Garden in Eden, Adam and Eve, magical trees, a wily talking serpent, and sword-wielding cherubim. It reads like a folk tale. Here humans are created first. That is the problem. In their self-importance they eat greedily of the Tree of Knowledge, hide from God, become aware of good and evil, suffering and death, and are walled off from paradise.

As I read the stories, the world did not fall from its primeval harmony when Homo sapiens began to exercise moral choice. Eden did not wilt or decay. The galaxies still spin in their celestial orbits, unaffected by what happens on this pale blue dot. To suggest our actions have cosmic consequences is to repeat the primordial sin of anthropocentrism.

We did not fall; we jumped. Our ancient ancestors did not fall from a paradisal state of sinless innocence and endless life. They jumped down from the trees and onto the savannas to get a different view. We stood erect. We became self-aware and morally conscious. We exchanged hunting and gathering for animal husbandry and agriculture. We built villages and cities, factories and the internet.

Along the way we forgot the songs of Eden and died to the dance. Creation still sings its sacred hymn, but we no longer recognize the tune. But as I face the ocean and watch the waves thundering onto the shore, I hear echoes of Eden. I get a glimpse of what lies over the horizon. We have not fallen. We have simply turned our backs.