Mistrust, Disobedience, and Death Theme Analysis

In the early chapters of Genesis, humanity’s proliferation soon leads to trouble: people quickly disobey God, leading to widespread conflict, violence, and death. This disharmony suggests that human beings are meant to obey God in order to live in harmony with him and one another. This is because disobedience is rooted in mistrust of God—as especially shown by the story of Eve listening to a crafty serpent instead of obeying God. As a result, Adam and Eve are expelled from their peaceful home in the garden of Eden, symbolizing the state of disobedient humanity as a whole—separated from God and therefore subject to suffering and death. By showing how mistrust of God leads to disobedience, or sin, the author of Genesis argues that sin leads to disruption and breakdown of human relationships—with God, with each other, and with creation.

Genesis underscores that humans are required to trust and obey God. When God places Adam in the garden of Eden, he gives the man a condition: “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.” Until now, death has not existed. God gives Adam a prohibition—he can’t eat from a certain tree. If Adam doesn’t obey God, Adam will die. The serpent (a talking animal who lives in the garden) deviously casts doubt on what God told Adam and Eve. The serpent says to Eve, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the garden? […] You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” By suggesting that God hasn’t told Eve everything, the serpent plants a doubt in Eve’s mind about God’s intentions for her and Adam. Hearing this, Eve eats the fruit and shares it with her husband, and “Then the eyes of both were opened[.]” That Eve gives in to the serpent’s hints suggests that she doesn’t trust God. When they disobediently eat the fruit, Adam’s and Eve’s eyes are further opened to the idea of rebellion against God, something unthinkable when they lived in harmony with God.

As Adam and Eve’s story shows, distrust and disobedience (or sin) brings disharmony and death into the world. As a consequence of Adam and Eve’s mistrust and disobedience, God places a curse on all of humanity: “To the woman he said, ‘I will greatly increase your pangs in childbearing […] and [your husband] shall rule over you.’ And to the man he said, ‘Because you have listened to the voice of your wife […] cursed is the ground because of you […] By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread […] you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” Sin brings conflict between the man and the woman; it makes toil more difficult, and worst of all, it leads to death. Whereas creation had begun harmoniously, that harmony has now been broken because of human sin.

At first, humanity enjoyed a dependent relationship with God in the garden, wherein God provided everything for the human beings who trusted in him. Now, because of the curse, humanity must fight for existence, rather than enjoying a life of peaceful reliance on God. God says, “See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil […] therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken.” Now that trust has been broken, with humans presuming to question God’s wisdom and loving provision for them, they will be forced to fend for themselves.

Genesis ultimately suggests that sin and its curse (death) are hereditary. Adam and Eve’s sons Cain and Abel illustrate the violence and disharmony that come about because of human sin. When the brothers each offer sacrifices to God, God favors Abel’s sacrifice over Cain’s, and Cain kills his brother out of jealousy. When Cain lies to God and says he doesn’t know where Abel is, God sees through the lie and declares that Abel is cursed. “When you till the ground, it will no longer yield to you its strength; you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth,” God says. The story of Cain and Abel echoes their parents’ expulsion from Eden in a number of ways. Once-harmonious relationships—both the brothers’ relationship and their respective relationships with God—are disrupted because of human refusal to accept God’s word (in this case, regarding God’s preference for one type of sacrifice over another). The disruption leads to further disharmony between humanity and the earth (“it will no longer yield to you its strength”), as well as a sentence of “wandering.”

The breakdown of harmony between humans and God, humans and one another, and humans and creation is summed up in the story of the flood, just two chapters later. When humanity descends into further corruption, God decides, “I am going to bring a flood of waters on the earth, to destroy from under heaven all flesh in which is the breath of life; everything that is on the earth shall die.” However, by preserving Noah and his family in an ark, God still offers hope for humanity’s survival and for harmony to be restored.