Genesis 3, 1-24

„The Lost Paradise“
„The Lost Paradise“ is the name of an exhibition of paintings by Paul
Gauguin, shown in Berlin at the end of last year. Gauguin painted paradise as
he saw it: in the middle of a south-sea landscape, women are moving in tune
with nature, often half dressed, or totally naked. In one picture, one sees a
young girl holding a large fruit in her hand, probably picked from the branch,
hanging over her head. She has her face half hidden from the observer, and
looks at us with a thoughtful, somewhat melancholy expression. The artist
sought the kind of life that he always dreamed of, far away from the busy city
of Paris, with its addiction to riches and its social intrigues. He found
paradise on the Tahiti island where he revered and depicted the lives of the
Maori people but at the same time kept an observant distance. He was shut out
from this paradise, he stood before the gates full of esteem and yearning,
ready to be allowed in but for him, a European, the paradise was lost to him
and to return there was impossible. He could only admire the beauty and harmony
from the outside and long for what he had lost.

We too have lost paradise, we don`t live anymore in a wonderful original
state, in harmony with everything that nature surrounds us with. Instead, we
labour at our work, suffer pain, and know that our lives are restricted by
death. Exactly this understanding is reached at the beginning of the Bible in
the mythical story where Eve eats the forbidden fruit. The story begins with
someone looking around and describing what he sees. He opens his eyes and
becomes aware of what exists. There are men, and there are women. The women
give birth to children and during their pregnancies suffer all kinds of
symptoms.The men dominate the women, often telling them what to do and how to
do it, although the men don`t have it any better. Their daily routine is
littered with burdens. They work in the fields, in the sweat of their own
faces, but all too often, they reap only thorns and thistles. After all their
efforts, they die and are given back to the earth, according to chronicles,
from where they were made by God. These are the facts, not particularly rosy or
aspiring. The years of our life are threescore and ten, or even by reason of
strength fourscore; yet their span is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone,
and we fly away.

And he who has established all this asks himself: do our lives have to be
like this? Is there no other intention? Did God imagine our lives to be like
this, he who only wants the best for us, his children?

The answer is, God must have planned our lives differently, and the author
weaves a picture of how God originally intended the world to be. God planted a
garden full of trees and rivers, inhabited by animals and birds and placed
mankind there to build and protect. Mankind existed of a pair, man and woman,
who lived in this paradise garden. A wonderful original state, almost too
beautiful to be true. Somewhat different from the hard labour in the unfertile
fields and the exhausting baring of children. And now comes the question that
had to come: Why do we not live in this paradise anymore? Why don`t we nourish
ourselves from the fruits of the garden, drink the waters of the rivers and
live in harmony with the animals? How did we fall from heaven, so to say, to
earth? This is answered through the story of Eve and the serpent which explains
how paradise was lost. The serpent goads Eve to do something that God has
strictly forbidden, he creates an image of what effect the fruit will have.
„Then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and
evil“ Eve lusts after the fruit and is tempted by the fact that she can
become clever by partaking of it. Her curiosity and desire for knowledge holds
her back no more, she grabs, takes and eats and also gives it to her husband,
„and they knew that they were naked.“ Can they now distinguish
between good and evil? Are they like God? It remains open but they must carry
the consequences of overstepping the line that God had laid down for them. As a
punishment they must leave the garden of Eden and take on a life of toil. The
biblical story clearly tells of a life more comfortable and aspired for, than
that of life otherwise. I ask myself therefore, if a constant life in paradise
is better than life on earth. Would you like to live in paradise? I think that
after a while I would be quite bored with it all. It would be a dreamy
existence amongst nature, surrounded by flora and fauna. Without straining
oneself by having to work, one would still reap the benefits, without having to
bare children, one could still watch them grow up. One would be a constant
child in this life in paradise, no carrying of responsibilities, no thoughts of
work and how to nourish oneself, it would all be taken care of. Eventually our
childhood must come to an end, so that we can take responsibility and build our
own lives for ourselves and our partners.

Without Eve and her curiosity, we would still be in the golden cage of
paradise, in a tight prison of childhood. She disliked the necessary step to
break out of the strict prison of childhood but it helped us to get our lives
into perspective. She wanted to know more, be more clever than she was made to
be. She wanted to break through the barriers set before her. I can quite
understand this craving for knowledge.

On the other hand, in the Bible this is interpreted as a betrayal of gods
will, which should be accepted by all. Eve is later seen as a picture of sin
who rebelled against God. But did God not cast the first stone of rejection?
When one may eat from all the trees in the garden, except from the tree of
knowledge and the tree of life, is it not to be expected that these trees are
particularly irresistable? God should have known that sooner or later man would
not be able to resist the temptation to taste the forbidden fruit. Perhaps He
wanted to put them to the test…perhaps He anticipated that it would come to
this.

We must not see the thirst for understanding in a negative light, we must
realise that leaving paradise is an important step to adulthood despite the
repetetive feeling of longing to return. We demand to know the answer to the
question: Why is life so difficult? Why must mankind suffer and die? Why do we
hate and kill each other, like Cain and Abel? In us is a yearning for a perfect
world full of happiness, and free from pain. We dream of a paradise in which
everything is allright again . „Once upon a time….“ And so we wish
for ourselves, in the future, a paradise in which we can live blissfully .

Each of us has many memories of our own childhood, perhaps looking back we
paint them somewhat brighter. We were safe in the midst of our family, knowing
that we were loved and cherished. We lived out our games and phantasies, built
hollows in the woods, or sank ourselves deep in our favourite books. We weren`t
conscious of obligation or duty. Any of us, who has lived such a childhood,
carries a treasure inside him, which he looks back on with enjoyable longing.
At the same time, he knows that there can be no return to that childhood state,
that now, as an adult, he has a duty to perform, although the nostalgic
memories remain.

What happens to us now outside the lost paradise? In the biblical story, God
casts Adam and Eve out from the garden of Eden and prohibits their return but
despite this He doesn`t stop caring or looking after them. When they realised
that they were naked and were ashamed, He made them coats of skins and clothed
them. Although they disobeyed His commands, He did not reject them from His
love and care but carried on looking after them. He may have cast them from
paradise but not from His love. That is just as true for us, as it was for Adam
and Eve. We may not live in the Garden of Eden or in our own childhood
paradise, despite this we are not seperated from God or forgotten by Him. He
makes sure that we receive what we need to live, He has not forgotten us and
does not leave us alone.

That is why we can go on our way, on the outside of paradise, in the
knowledge that He is always with us.

Amen

Note:

In my preparations for this sermon, I have tried not to be hindered by the
knowledge of the different interpretations of the text throughout history. In
Genesis, chapter 3, there is no mention of sin or downfall, and only the
serpent and land are cursed. The punishment for disobeying God`s commands was
to be driven from paradise. M.E. understands Eve s violation of the
commands, the grasping of the fruit but at the same time a departure from
innocence and therefore an enlightening action. Here stems the question of
wether our lives have a positive or negative worth.

My sermon has the title „The Lost Paradise“ and I want to make it
clear that we long to regain the idillic original state. On the other hand, we
have to master everyday life which is full of labour and tasks.

Luise Stribrny de Estrada, Pastorin in der Matthias-Claudius-Gemeinde in
Kiel-Suchsdorf
email: marclui@ki.comcity.de