I shared an understanding of the Bible from my own reading and how it was explained to me in church.  The fall of Adam and Eve was a difficult concept to wrap my brain around and in many ways, that very story became the wedge that drove me away from religion for many years.

I cannot count the number of times I read or heard the story of the Garden of Eden and it always caused something in the pit of my stomach to turn over.  From a very early time, I questioned everything.  Although I like my world to fit in simple, explainable little boxes that I could organize, meditate on, and follow the chain of consequences backward and forward through the experiences I watched in others and later saw in myself, the Old Testament was a tough sell for me.

Positioning a perfect  and perfectly supreme, all-knowing and all-powerful entity that was the beginning and ending of all existence wasn’t the hard part.  That pill I can swallow easily.  I can accept that our lives and our choices were test and testament to our own value.  The difficult part was how this perfect entity of love was described to have very human failings and emotions.  Anger.  Jealousy.