The Fall

In Orthodoxy, the ultimate purpose, or telos (Greek word meaning end or goal), of humanity is to achieve unity with God through participation in the divine life. Unfortunately, after Adam and Eve sinned and were exiled from paradise, the connection or primordial relationship between God and humanity was severed, causing all of humanity to lose access to eternal life. In order to rectify this, God sent His only Son, Jesus, to restore the relationship. To ensure we are in constant communion with Him, we have to choose to partake of the life of Christ (Eucharist) and reject sin (moving away from God/the source of life) to maintain our unity with God. Adam willingly disobeyed God’s original commandment and strayed from God's path to perfection, thus separating himself from His Creator, the Source of life.

So what happened?

In the beginning, we read in Genesis that “God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him” (Gen 1:27). In this, we understand that humanity is fundamentally created as good, as Adam and Eve are created in the image of God who is the standard and definition of the Good. Furthermore, all of God’s creation is described as "very good" (Gen 1:31), meaning that God created the world and humanity to exist in their original state in a perfect, peaceful and harmonious relationship. God gives Adam the task of naming all of the animals and stewarding the Earth (Gen 1:26, Gen 2:19). In the same way that God has dominion and authority over humanity, Adam, created in God’s image, is called to live in communion with God and to steward His creation.

Therefore, we understand that God created us in union with Him at the very beginning and made in His image and likeness. While man is made in God’s image, the reverse is not true. Being made in the image of God does not mean that God possesses human-like features, but rather the reverse: the statement is figurative language to describe how God bestowed a special honour unto humankind, which he did not confer unto the rest of creation. Indeed, we are made in His image in that God bestows upon humans the special grace of sharing in His eternity, as we read in Scripture: “For God created man to be immortal, and made him to be an image of his own eternity.” (Wisdom of Solomon 2:23)

Tempted by the serpent in the Garden, Eve and Adam chose disobedience over trust, grasping for divinity apart from God. In that moment, the image of God in them was distorted, and sin entered the human heart (Genesis 3). In doing so, we lost this special grace of sharing in God’s immortality. Because of Adam and Eve’s transgression, they were separated from God, the source of life, and tended towards the dust to which they were originally made without the breath of God. After the fall, God proclaims the truth to Adam about his own nature: “for dust you are and to dust you will return” (Genesis 3:19). God is therefore explaining that He is the source of life and we have no life outside of Him - meaning that the natural consequence of sin, which is to willingly turn away from Him, is death.Indeed, after the fall, the image of God in man was distorted; corruption was introduced into human nature, which simply means a predisposition and a tendency towards death and decay.

Therefore, after the fall of Adam and Eve, humanity inherits a corruptible human nature that has the tendency towards decay, as separated from its original source of life. Thus death reigned over all humanity as St. Paul said, “Through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned” (Rom 5:12).

All of creation was also affected by the fall, God told Adam, “Cursed is the ground for your sake” (Gen 3:17). God has given dominion of the world to Adam and due to Adam’s sin “death entered the world” (Rom 5:12).

So why did God put the tree in the Garden in the first place?

God, who is Love, created man and woman with the gift of free will. Love must be free—it cannot be coerced. So, in His goodness, God gave Adam and Eve a single commandment, inviting them to choose trust and obedience: “You may eat of every tree… but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat” (Genesis 2:16–17).

The tree was not a trap but a choice: an opportunity to choose God, which means to love Him. God foresaw the Fall, but because God is love (1 John 4:8), He cannot do something that is against His nature and force humanity to love Him or obey His commandments. True love results in freedom and trust, and love without freedom is obsession. Therefore, freedom and trust involves choice. So we need God to give us the freedom to choose him or not, and God needs us to trust him. Therefore, God permits evil in the form of morally and spiritually wrong choices and actions because He respects our freedom. Therefore, God gave humanity free will, to choose him or not choose him, allowing for genuine love. Evil therefore is not through the direct activity of God but through the abuse of freedom by men.

The serpent's deception led Eve and then Adam to disobey God, introducing sin into the world. Satan offers mankind counterfeit for what God has offered. The satanic temptation of man takes the form of a distortion of divine truth - the Fall results in a turn from unselfish love with God to selfish love. Egotism, self-centric love, and self-love are therefore introduced into the world. Adam and Eve chose pride, disobedience, and desire to be "like God" on their own terms, because sin is an act of the will leading to a revolt against God; it is "a conscious act of disobedience, a deliberate rejection of God's love, a freely-chosen turning from God to self” (Fr. Kallistos Ware, in The Orthodox Way)