The problem with that is the inconsistency with the text. The humans created in Gen1, if they had free will, could they have been expected to carry out the commands of God to “be fruitful and multiply” or to “fill and subdue the Earth”? Could God have deemed them “good”?
The even larger problem with that is that this would mean all humans before Adam/Eve were capable of being “good” in God’s eyes with free will, which it would seem would lessen the significance of Jesus’ accomplishments.
Humans before the age of Genesis did exactly as those commands said, consistently and systematically. So it seems to me this perspective lines up both biblically and historically/scientifically.
Adam and Eve are illustrated as being capable and willing to behave contrary to God’s command/will. So, in this way, they are not in the image of God.
What is free will other than the capability to behave independently of God’s will? And if that’s the case, is that consistent with the “image of God”?
Of course God could see them as good. It’s not like God is some kind of Mary Poppins:
[1] God intentionally stopped the Pharaoh from agreeing to the terms Moses gave him … so that God could magnify His glory by means of the final plague – assigning the debt of Moloch upon all of Egypt! Sweet.
[2] God intentionally uses an indiscriminant flood (instead of the pinpoint precision of The Destroyer used during the 10th plague) … wiping out infants, toddlers, animals (not to mention animal infants!).
[3] Romans 9 describes God as the potter, and the potter’s creations as without right to complain.
[4] And most of us would reverse the entire process God used on Adam and Eve. He took an ignorant pair, who nothing of Good and Evil, and let them affect the fate of millions of future humans. In the human frame of reference, most of us would be predisposed to wait until AFTER a person knows the difference between Good and Evil before letting them carry a loaded gun, drive a car, or destroy all of Eden.
Yes. And it is in instances like this that understanding the purpose of God’s actions throughout the OT are imperative.
Like what I said before about breeding Jesus being the priority. This is part of that. The Israelites “wanted” to leave. Being enslaved in Egypt kept them safe, kept them together, and kept their breeding within the group. But they wanted out. And their will was respected by God.
But for them to leave Egypt means leaving the safety of that organized society. If God was going to manage them in the wilderness, where no laws of man existed and no walls kept anyone at bay, they were going to have to trust Him. Unlike the rest of the world, God has no control over humans. They (We) have wills of our own. That show of power over the Pharoah of Egypt was part of that. The priority was this breeding project.
Does it say all these people/creatures were wiped out? Seems a pretty catastrophic thing to not come up again later.
All God had to do to breed from this line is isolate. A regional flood with your breeding stock on a boat accomplishes that.
I see no issue with that.
Adam and Eve breaking the garden rule is all about their capability to do so. It’s a test scenario. One in which God literally did not know what was going to happen. He created a new element unlike anything in the universe. Something that, by design, He has no control over.
We weren’t doomed by this action. We were realized. You and I being two different individuals with our own thoughts and desires, that’s when this existence was given to us. Everything else in the natural world just exists. Just behaves exactly as it’s meant to until it perishes. We are alive. God made us creators. What we create isn’t “of God”. We add things to God’s universe that He did not create.
It’s a most significant gift and I see a lot of wisdom in the way it was brought about. Not something I’d suggest reversing.
This right here is important. How are we to come to know good and evil? It seems wisdom is not something that can just be given. It must be earned. Experienced. That’s what this life is. That’s why this all-knowing God put Adam and Eve in that situation or tested Abraham to see what he’d do. Because He does not know otherwise.
A free will is exactly that. It is independent of God. God cannot know what we will do unless we’re given the opportunity to do it. Like Abraham, God knows the future, but if there is no scenario that causes a response from Abraham, there is no decision to see in that future for God to know. It has to happen. We have to exist and be who/what we are.
In this environment we create our own experience. That’s why we have no right to complain. God gave us existence and the keys to the car. What can we complain about? Existing? Because everything else is up to us.
If we are going to exist and truly have minds of our own, then we have to first gain the wisdom of good and evil. There still has to be order. To exist eternally with millions of individuals intermingling, there must be order. So there must be an authority that everyone agrees to.
But to agree you have to exist. To know what you’re agreeing to you have to be given the opportunity to experience. That’s what this is.
This isn’t about God “magnifying His glory”. There’s a purpose. And it’s a big undertaking to realize.
Given what we know about the universe and how it’s described biblically, if the universe began then time and space began with it. So the creator of this universe exists apart from it.
So from God’s perspective there’d be no difference between then/now/here/there. God doesn’t have to wait through the time from one moment to the next. It all exists all at once.
Like with Abraham, God created a scenario that forced Abraham to make a choice. Once that choice existed, it was part of the picture.
So, in that way it’s “predestined”, but not fully orchestrated by God. Facilitated. We play a primary role in how it all plays out.
Of course, but God is not capable of evil. Evil is something outside of God’s will. God defines what “good” is. Like cancerous cells in the body. They don’t adhere to the behaviors of the body’s DNA code. God is like the DNA of the universe. And we’re wildly dangerous and destructive cancer cells. Very much a part of the universe, but a destructive element.
What God is is what “good” is. He knows evil. But is not capable of evil. Evil is made possible through the freedom to act outside of God’s will. Not everything outside of God’s will is bad, but it does make it possible. Inevitable, really.
I think the bible is clear that God does evil.
Curse the world
Drown the world
Command Genocide
Kill people for touching his box
Creating scenarios where evil can flourish
Employing lying spirits
Etc
You mean like Cain knew his wife? You might want to think about the biblical meaning of that before you have God doing it with evil. Think of the children.
Because they are two different words.
Holy means Consecrated.
Evil means Bad.
Knowledge of good and evil is making you deny God, just as Ad n Eve tried to hide.
Just accept that God has evil in the same way you accept that Apple has evil
This level of moral nihilism and unquestionable obedience is something that has always horrified me. Maybe it makes me a bad Christian or whatever but that’s just not something I could ever achieve. Thankfully.
We are the World 
We are the children