Season 3 Podcast 248, Milton’s Paradise Lost, Bk IX, Pt XXVII, “Temptation of Adam C”

Season 3 Podcast 248, Milton’s Paradise Lost, Bk IX, Pt XXVII, “Temptation of Adam C”  In poetic form Milton brings to life the struggles of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden as they contemplate eating the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Milton shows that although Eve was deceived by the Serpent that our first parents understood the nature of the fall and why it was necessary for them to eat the forbidden fruit. Adam and Eve were married by the Lord. The first commandment God gave to them was to have children:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.If they had remained in their innocent state in the Garden of Eden, they could never have children, never know the joys of marital bliss, never know love, never know desire. One day would be like the next.  They would remain themselves like children not knowing joy because they couldn’t know sorrow. The forbidden fruit brought opposition into their lives because their bodies were changed from an immortal state to a mortal state. Opposition is a necessary requirement for agency. The experience of mortality was necessary for them to carry out God’s plan of salvation; however, it had to be entirely their choice. The purpose of the law of justice is to protect creation from uncreation. The law of justice is absolute. To break one law is to break all laws. You are either inside the law of justice or outside the law of justice. That is why eating the forbidden fruit caused both a spiritual death, cutting them off from the presence of God, and a physical death, separating the body and the spirit.To exercise freewill, agency, and liberty, they had to eat the forbidden fruit. The law of justice is different from the law of mercy. The law of justice is the ruling law of everything. It has only one standard—absolute perfection. It is the law of creation; it must be satisfied. God is just or he wouldn’t be God. God doesn’t just live the law of justice. He is the law of justice. He is the standard.  Nothing less can live with him in his kingdom. He never changes. If he did, he would cease to be God. Only those who are inside the law of justice can live in the presence of God. When Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, both fell outside the law of justice. They would have remained in their fallen state forever, being subject to Satan forever, if Christ had not volunteered to atone for their transgression. We too, as children of Adam and Eve, born into a fallen world, would remain in a fallen state forever if Christ had not volunteered to atone for our sins. The law of justice applies to a perfect world. The law of mercy apples to a fallen world. The law of mercy cannot violate the law of justice. The law of justice governs all laws. Without the law of justice, there would be nothing rather than something. It is because of the law of justice that God never changes. God cannot lie.That is why if you live with God you will be in a state of happiness forever. The law of mercy helps us survive in a mortal world. Morality deals with the sins of the flesh.  All moral laws pertain to our life here on earth. What purpose could the Ten Commandments serve if you lived in the presence of God?  Which one could you break? You would be so filled with the love of God and the love of your neighbor that being commanded to love God or your neighbor would be superfluous.