The Bible says, "And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." (Genesis 2:16,17 NIV)
So, before Adam and Eve ate of the tree, they apparently did not have the knowledge of good and evil. But once they ate of it, the Bible says, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil." (Genesis 3:22 NIV)
The word "knowledge" in the Hebrew is 'Yada' and it means to know, to perceive, to perceive and see, find out and discern, to discriminate, distinguish, to know by experience, to recognize, admit, acknowledge, confess, or to consider.
So, in man's original state, he did not have the knowledge of good and evil. Yet those are attributes that you would normally associate with God. So, if Adam had the Holy Spirit in him, then surely he would have the knowledge of good and evil.
Therefore, it would follow that Adam did not have the Holy Spirit in him, though he did live in a state of sinless perfection. Adam lived in a state of innocence, not knowing the difference between good and evil.
The Holy Spirit gives spiritual wisdom. So again, if he had the Holy Spirit, don't you think he would have the knowledge of good and evil?
In fact, Adam may not have even had a conscience, because a conscience is what tells us the difference between wrong and right. And he had no awareness of that, since he didn't have the knowledge of good and evil.
At the new birth, a person is given the Holy Spirit to deal with the need for victory over sin. Adam, before the fall, didn't have any sin to deal with, so therefore he didn't need the indwelling Holy Spirit.
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'Therefore, it would follow that Adam did not have the Holy Spirit in him, though he did live in a state of sinless perfection. Adam lived in a state of innocence, not knowing the difference between good and evil.'
Never really pondered on this, but reasonable.
At CBC we dealt with in classes the idea that the OT Saints could be filled with the Spirit although not indwelled. King Saul for example.
Couldn't agree more! Are there really some that believe otherwise?
Russell Norman Murray said...
At CBC we dealt with in classes the idea that the OT Saints could be filled with the Spirit although not indwelled. King Saul for example.
I agree. It was selective and often temporary then (but not always temporary, as in the case of John the Baptist, and possibly others like Elijah). Of course, I believe the filling is temporary today, as sin quenches and grieves the Holy Spirit. But per 1 John 1:9, one can be filled again, after spending intimate time and personal exposure with the Lord.
Greg said...
Couldn't agree more! Are there really some that believe otherwise?
Hey, Greg! It's been a long time!
Yeah, the idea for this article began when I was having a discussion with a Charismatic relative who claimed that Adam had the Holy Spirit, since God breathed into Adam the breath of life, and therefore breathed into Adam the Holy Spirit, since breath and spirit are the same Greek word, he said. If I remember correctly, he said that, after the Fall, Adam no longer had the Holy Spirit within him.
Adam was created without a sinful nature and in a perfect world yet he sinned. If he had the Holy Spirit in perfect conditions yet still sinned then how can we (with our sinful nature in this terribly fallen world) be expected to keep God's commandments through the Holy Spirit? If Adam couldn't do it in perfect conditions then we have no chance in our fallen condition so I believe that Adam didn't have the Holy Spirit.
It seems to me that God created a perfect man and put him in perfect conditions to show that, without the Spirit, man would sin. Then He sent Jesus, the Second Adam, without a sinful nature but this time full of the Spirit, to live a perfect life through the Spirit and become our Saviour. Now, believers are empowered by the Holy Spirit to overcome sin.
God bless,
Mick
Thanks, Mick, for your comment, and I would agree.
The Bible says,
Genesis 2:17 KJV
But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
IN THE DAY. Yet Adam did not die physically and if he didn't have the Holy Spirit then he didn't die spiritually, so what died IN THAT DAY?
Job says,
Job 33:4 KJV
The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.
Therefore, isn't 'the breath of the almighty," the Spirit of God that God breathed into Adam?
Death is separation. A physical death is the separation of the soul from the body. Spiritual death, which is of greater significance, is the separation of the soul from God. So to be spiritually dead is to be separated from God. In Genesis 2:17, God tells Adam that in the day he eats of the forbidden fruit he will “surely die.” Adam does fall, but his physical death does not occur immediately; God must have had another type of death in mind: spiritual death. This separation from God is exactly what we see in Genesis 3:8. When Adam and Eve heard the voice of the Lord, they “hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God.” The fellowship had been broken. They were spiritually dead. The immediate spiritual death resulted in Adam’s separation from God. His act of hiding from God (Genesis 3:8) demonstrates this separation, as does his attempt to shift blame for the sin to the woman (Genesis 3:12).
When Jesus was hanging on the cross, He paid the price for us by dying on our behalf. Even though He is God, He still had to suffer the agony of a temporary separation from the Father due to the sin of the world He was carrying on the cross. After three hours of supernatural darkness, He cried, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” (Mark 15:33-34). This spiritual separation from the Father was the result of the Son’s taking our sins upon Himself. That’s the impact of sin. Sin is the exact opposite of God, and God had to turn away from His own Son at that point in time.
A man without Christ is spiritually dead. Paul describes it as “being alienated from the life of God” in Ephesians 4:18. (To be separated from life is the same as being dead.) The natural man, like Adam hiding in the garden, is isolated from God. When we are born again, the spiritual death is reversed. Before salvation, we are dead (spiritually), but Jesus gives us life. “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins,” (Ephesians 2:1 NKJV). “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins” (Colossians 2:13).
To illustrate, think of Jesus’ raising of Lazarus in John 11. The physically dead Lazarus could do nothing for himself. He was unresponsive to all stimuli, oblivious to all life around him, beyond all help or hope—except for the help of Christ who is “the Resurrection and the Life” (John 11:25). At Christ’s call, Lazarus was filled with life, and he responded accordingly. In the same way, we were spiritually dead, unable to save ourselves, powerless to perceive the life of God—until Jesus called us to Himself. He “quickened” us; “not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy” (Titus 3:5).
The book of Revelation speaks of a “second death,” which is a final (and eternal) separation from God. Only those who have never experienced new life in Christ will partake of the second death (Revelation 2:11; 20:6, 14; 21:8).
Hello Anonymous,
We have our own spirit which I believe is what was breathed into Adam to make him a living soul and is the life within all of us. At death our spirit is separated from our body. We don't need the Holy Spirit to keep us physically alive, just to keep us spiritually alive once we become saved.
After he sinned, God told Adam that he would die and this, I believe, referred only to physical death. I am told that, in Hebrew, when Adam was told he would die it was worded, "in dying you will die". This meant that physical death had begun it's work in him.
God bless,
Mick
The spiritual death referred to in Genesis 2:17 is echoed in Ezekiel 18:20, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him," as well as Romans 6:23, "For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." So again, it was man's soul that died spiritually.
Job 33:4 is similar to Job 27:3, "All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils." It simply means that Job is alive and has life within him.
The Bible says, “The LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being” (Genesis 2:7).
Genesis 7:21-22 says, "And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man: All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died."
"Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers" for Genesis 2:7 says, "The word translated “soul” contains no idea of a spiritual existence. For in Genesis 1:20, “creature that hath life,” and in Genesis 1:24, “the living creature,” are literally, living soul. Really the word refers to the natural life of animals and men, maintained by breathing, or in some way extracting oxygen from the atmospheric air. And whatever superiority over other animals may be possessed by man comes from the manner in which this living breath was bestowed upon him, and not from his being “a living soul;” for that is common to all alike."
The "Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary" says, "the breath of life—literally, of lives, not only animal but spiritual life. If the body is so admirable, how much more the soul with all its varied faculties.
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life—not that the Creator literally performed this act, but respiration being the medium and sign of life, this phrase is used to show that man's life originated in a different way from his body—being implanted directly by God (Ec 12:7), and hence in the new creation of the soul Christ breathed on His disciples (Joh 20:22)."
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