The Garden of Eden: A Parable
“These would look great in my new place.”
In the Bible, humans are expelled from the Garden of Eden. Taking a look at the nuances of that, we were only expelled from a Garden. There's a question of practicality of; was the garden ever home; a home? Another practical question is; how can a garden be a home? A garden that doubles as a home is for a pet, animals or livestock one has on their property. The question then has to be asked if Eden was ever truly a "home" for humanity or simply our starting point?
In the grand scheme of life and existence we began life as all creatures do under the care of another, but eventually their role of “guardian” must come to an end. Sin and the resulting expulsion may not have been a loss of innocence, but the beginning of maturity, an inevitability for all things that grow and evolve.
A garden is only home to pets, animals, or livestock so being placed there puts us in the same category as all the other creatures that resided there. The rise of moral self-awareness was inevitable, a sign of Consciousness’ Spiritual growth. Taking the apple and receiving knowledge, was a marker of our growing curiosity reaching a threshold. Once we mastered the garden and all the animals in it, the only thing left to tame and get under control and take care of was ourselves.
In our dedication to duty, the knowledge and wisdom of taking care of ourselves was unlike taking care of something else; for ourselves it's much harder to know what we need. We’d always been the ones provided for in that regard.
Life is a process, and the "process" is all there is.
Reality and existence is a process; God or the Soul is that process; the process that is creation; an eternal cosmos that is forever "creating." The act of change via the transfer of energy is Divinity itself. Divinity is dynamism, the act of change; it's a Process-Function; like matter and energy are one and the same as proven by E=MC2. Matter and energy are one and the same substance existing in different states of being; one's cool crust, the other is the molten lava moving underneath that crust; that is reality.
God being thee process of life, our "rebellion" of his authority and our subsequent exile was all part of the natural order of maturing. Akin to the idea of a home, once we've matured beyond our established boundaries in the homes we were born in, it's time for us to head out into the world to establish ourselves in homes of our own making.
If God is a process, then the story of the Garden is one of existent harmony with nature. Our break away from that, man's imbalance with the world around him is a reflection of that. Like all creatures we once subsisted simply on whatever was around, but unlike other creatures we realized those things could be more.
Leaving Eden is the phase in the process of life in becoming one's own provider. Not abandoning God but moving towards and into our own Divinity. The loss of Divine guidance isn't a loss, it is guidance being replaced by proactive motivation or determination. A shift in our being going from dependent on to having agency of their own.
The story of the Garden of Eden is a parable about enlightenment. Overcoming the influence or guidance of the world to impart our own upon it. The Universe recognizes this first before we recognized it in ourselves, in a sense the 'expulsion" was the Cosmos preparing itself for both of our next phases. The Cosmos’ next phase of being, our next phase of life. Because as we lose Eden, Eden loses us. God’s final act before our departure was to clothe us. In other words human being went from a state where we tended the world to a state where we use and exploit it. Using it and it’s resources to secure for ourselves the things we need to survive and evolve. Going from a provisional state to one of self responsibility.
It is not merely a departure from divine guidance but the beginning of self direction in every way. Our morals, values, beliefs, practices are no longer inherited, they are created by ourselves.
Eden was created and maintained by our presence and changed by our departure. However a new Eden will be made by what we become. We left Eden as humans to grow, change, and evolve as the Universe does. Through our own Godhood we will create a home and garden for ourselves. We did not leave Eden to fall away from divinity, we left in order to find and reclaim our own. No garden is a home, but all homes can have a garden. A being created in God’s Image will grow into God’s Likeness.
Eden was a nursery which we had to depart otherwise it would become a prison. Life then for humanity is a journey through the Cosmos towards our own Divinity.
We began in innocence. We awakened through curiosity. We suffer, struggle, and learn in order to create.
