Let's dive into one.
Before Adam was even a twinkle in God's eye, the Big G was contemplating a cosmic dilemma. As we learn from Tree of Souls, there were already two kinds of beings populating existence: celestial ones and earthly ones. Think angels, or other heavenly creatures, versus the animals roaming the earth.
The angels, these celestial beings, were created in God's image. Pretty impressive, right? But here's the catch: they didn't reproduce. On the other hand, you had the earthly creatures – animals, beasts, all the living things that did reproduce. They filled the earth, but they weren't made in God's image.
So, what to do with humanity? Should we be more like the angels, or more like the animals?
God, in this myth, is almost having a debate with Himself. "If I make man entirely from celestial stuff," He muses, "he’ll live forever!" Sounds pretty good, doesn't it? But then, "If I create him from earthly stuff, his life will be brief." Not so appealing.
So, what's the solution? According to this tradition, God decides to create humankind from a mixture of both celestial and terrestrial elements. A bit of heaven, a bit of earth. The best of both worlds, perhaps?
But there's a catch, of course. A condition. God says, "The choice will be his: if he sins, he will die; if he does not sin, he will be immortal." Whoa. Talk about pressure.
That’s right, Adam was given a choice – the ultimate choice, really. And this sets the stage for the story we all know so well: the Garden of Eden, the Tree of Knowledge, and the fateful decision to eat the forbidden fruit.
The Zohar tells us some pretty wild things, but even it doesn't go into this much detail on the leadup to the big moment.
In a way, this myth fills in a blank. It explains God's intention behind the command not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. It wasn't just a random rule. It was a test, a chance for Adam to choose immortality. And, well, we know how that turned out.
Genesis Rabbah 14:3 offers some interesting insights here. It tells us that humans share four characteristics with the celestial beings: we were created in God's image, we stand upright, we speak and understand, and we have peripheral vision. Pretty cool, huh?
But we also share four characteristics with animals: we eat and drink, we procreate, we excrete, and… we die. So, we’re a mix. A little bit angel, a little bit animal.
It’s a sobering thought, isn't it? We’re caught between two worlds, with the potential for greatness and the reality of our own mortality.
Perhaps that's why there's that old proverb that humans are a little lower than the angels. We have the spark of the divine within us, but we're also bound to the earth. We grapple with choices, with consequences, and with the knowledge that our time here is limited. But maybe, just maybe, that's what makes our lives so precious in the first place.