This commentary is about the spiritual Garden of Eden - the symbolism and doctrine of the trees. Now is to time to think not in darkness but in Light.
The observant reader should ask, "What happened to the Garden Paradise?" Scripture never mentions the Garden destroyed. Cherubim guarded it, that did not happen! (Gen 3:29). The Garden of Eden is referred to as "the Garden of God" (Gen 13:10). Is there still a paradise where God's Garden still exists?
I submit that since it is now populated, that Garden has become a City. The City of God is in the Paradise of Heaven: "And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband" (Rev 21:2). New Jerusalem - the City of God - will descend from Heaven (Rev 21:10) to where? From whence it came - Jerusalem "the foundation of peace." There will never be peace on earth (Mat 10:34) until Heaven comes down to it is foundation. Christians will populate the Garden of Eden (meaning "delight") again, when it becomes the City of God. At this moment, the souls of the dead inhabit God's City but at the rapture, real people will again inhabit Paradise, inclusive of Adam and Eve!
Where did the Garden go? Possibly, it ascended into Heaven, leaving only the foundation, or firmament on which it stood. That makes sense! Jesus ascended to his Kingdom in Heaven. It is not illogical that his earthly Kingdom and Heavenly Kingdom are the same! God went to prepare for us a place; His desire is that where He is we be also (John 14:3). That includes Adam in the Garden and Christians in Heaven, both the same place of God! God created Heaven in he beginning (Gen 1:1). He said later that He would prepare the place he created - a new creation, a New City.
The Garden of Eden is the spiritual Heaven. (That's my hunch.) The Garden was the abode of two souls made flesh. Heaven is the place of two fleshes made spirits. (Refer to part one of this commentary about the meaning of 1 Cor 15:45). The former refers to God's Spirit made flesh as with Jesus. The latter refers to Adam whose flesh was made spirit. Earlier we examined the natural Garden, now let's examine the characteristics of the spiritual Garden of Eden.
The focal point of the Garden are two trees: (1) The Tree of Life, and (2) The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (Gen 2:9) with the former standing also in the midst of the Garden. I always thought that the Tree of Knowledge did as well, but it seems that also refers back to Adam and Eve standing in the midst of the Garden. Also points back to what was said previously. The Tree of Knowledge was subsequent to "also." I believe that perhaps it stood somewhat with the other trees since gardens have more than two trees.
What is seen in my mind's eye is one Tree standing at a central point, with other trees surrounding that one Tree. Among those trees was one tree which had quite an influence over the other trees. What I "see" are trees walking. One Tree, in particular was walking in the Garden in the cool of the day (Gen 3:8). That was merely a "voice" walking. The Voice is the word which we find from the Book of John chapter one is Jesus the Christ. Hence, whenever God manifests Himself, he is called Jesus and called the Messiah (Mat 1:16; 1:25). There in the midst of the Garden with Adam and Eve was the Messiah (Hebrew), called "the Christ" in English from the Greek.
The Supreme Tree in the center of the Garden would be spiritual Jesus. That is made quite clear with this passage:
And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. (Rev 22:1-2)The keys to the identity of the Tree of Life are two: (1) Jesus is the Lamb of God, and (2) the leaves were for the healing of the nations. The first is how reference is made to Jesus throughout scripture, and the latter Jesus's purpose. The Tree of Life is obviously Jesus. In my book, The Skull of Adam, I elaborate on the Tree, its Root, the source of its life, and its fruit.
The entire nature of the Tree of Life is that what can be seen was symbolic of Jesus, the root as symbolic of the Father, the Living Water beneath the roots fed to the Tree by the Root, and the twelve manner of fruits of the Holy Spirit. I see the Tree of Life as God walking, and the visible tree with its leaves, as Jesus walking. It's fruits are the twelve mentioned above and named in the Latin Vulgate version of Galatians 5:23. Hence, I see the God as a Tree walking, and Adam and Eve as trees walking.
The atmosphere in the Garden was love. The Tree of Life represents, I believe, the love of God which is The Great Commandment. It's corollary is to love others as ourselves. God endowed mankind with a degree of self love, and we are to love others with that intensity. The other trees in the Garden represent those people in "love thy neigbour" (Mat 22:39). Adam was assigned to "dress and keep" the Garden (Gen 2:15). That, it seems, is to love the Tree of Life mostly, and to demonstrate that love, to love the other trees as well. How were they to show love? With the twelve fruits of the Tree of Life!
You might say, "But there were no other people in the Garden!" That is true, but their pre-existing souls were there just waiting to be people as Adam and Eve multiplied. Their assignment was to plant those "trees" (Gen 1:22). In the spiritual Garden, their job wasn't to populate people but more so to love the the trees (the souls) in the Garden by tending to them and the Tree of Life. Love is desiring that souls not perish (John 3:16). I see all the pre-existing people in the Garden as trees walking!
Read at what Ezekiel wrote about Jesus long before he was made flesh:
The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty. I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches: so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied him. (Ezek 31:8-9).Ezekiel saw the Tree of Life as Jesus. He saw the other trees of the Garden as lesser trees than Jesus! I saw what Ezekiel saw before I even knew Ezekiel saw men as trees! God opened my eyes to truth. He revealed to me that those in the Garden were as trees walking!
What about the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil - the Serpent's tree? I saw that as the Serpent on his pole (John 3:14) that Jesus showed Nicodemus. When God's Flesh died on his tree (Acts 5:30), I see Jesus - the Tree of Life - hanged upon his tree. Well, God didn't die; that's when Satan died vicariously on his tree, only to really die in the end! Abimelech was a type of tree and a type of Serpent:
Then said all the trees unto the bramble, Come thou, and reign over us. And the bramble said unto the trees, If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then come and put your trust in my shadow: and if not, let fire come out of the bramble, and devour the cedars of Lebanon. (Jud 9:14-15)."The bramble" are the followers of Abimelech, but are spiritually other "trees." The bramble deceived the other "trees" to anoint a king to rule over them. That "king" is Satan, represented by Abimelech. The "shadow" of the tree is Satan operating in the darkness of deception. The cedars of Lebanon represent the righteous people. The author of the Book of Judges saw people and Satan as trees walking! Examine this next simile:
How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel! As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river's side, as the trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters. He shall pour the water out of his buckets, and his seed shall be in many waters, and his king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted. (Num 24:5-7)The line of Jacob - Israel - are written of as "trees." What's more his "seed" are his descendants but are referred to as seeds for trees. I submit, and there are many more examples, that trees are symbolic of people.
One day after my theorizing, I read a verse which reinforced my hunch. Remember that to truly see the Lord, Jesus blinded Paul. Only with his vision gone, the shadow from the Serpent's tree disappeared into the darkness, and Paul only saw the Tree of Life (Acts 9); he saw the Light only in darkness. That was not the first occasion of the blind seeing. Perhaps it happened often but I came upon an unexpected occurrence:
And he (Jesus) cometh to Bethsaida; and they bring a blind man unto him, and besought him to touch him. And he took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the town; and when he had spit on his eyes, and put his hands upon him, he asked him if he saw ought. And he looked up, and said, I see men as trees, walking. After that he put his hands again upon his eyes, and made him look up: and he was restored, and saw every man clearly. (Mark 8:22-24)We don't know if the man was born blind or not, but his amazement at actually seeing men seemed to point that out. Jesus didn't immediately heal the blind man. He did it in two stages. I believe the first stage was failure to see men clearly, but like Paul, he saw Jesus as the Tree of Life... and walking! He saw Jesus and the others as trees walking. Stage two was Jesus making the blind man see clearly. It indeed WAS men walking. He saw Jesus as a tree before he saw Jesus as a man!
The blind man, in stage one, was like me. He saw the trees and the movement of them, but in stage two he clearly saw that it wasn't really trees walking but men! I submit that the blind man's two stage healing validate my hunch that the Garden of Eden was a Garden of Trees Walking (symbolically) just as I suspected. He saw men as trees walking, and I saw trees as men walking.
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