Arkitech:
You've asked this kind of question before. The following paragraphs are a cut and paste from a response I made to your earlier thread (around March 20, 2001) "A question for bible scholars." Since few here seem interested in retreading this ground, perhaps you should email me directly or p.m. me if you want to discuss it.
March 20, 2001:
<< Forgive the length of this post. The story of Eden is powerful and I feel constrained to respond with some depth to your question.
The biblical concept of sin is huge. There are several different Greek and Hebrew words that emphasize different aspects of sin. "Sin" can be as generic as "missing the mark" or "failing to fulfill the purpose for which one was created" or as malevolent as "deliberately stepping across a line" or "defiantly claiming a position for oneself that is delusional, false and destructive."
Humanity still has much to learn from the story of the garden of Eden. The lessons we are intended to grasp are far more important than the literalness of the story itself.
By looking at how the rest of the Bible looks back on the Garden of Eden account, one can get a better understanding of the core lessons involved.
For example, in Romans 5:12-21, the Apostle Paul teaches that, in its infancy, mankind transgressed against God. This means that mankind ("Adam" means "Man"😉 defiantly claimed a position for itself that is delusional, false, and destructive.". This truth is poetically contained in the Eden account itself, where the "serpent" said, "You shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." In other words, the lie is that mankind can decide for itself what is right or what is wrong, that there is no objective "Way" or "Code". Instead, we have embraced a path where we decide what is right and no one can challenge it. BTW, the Hebrew word for "serpent" is the same root as the word for "spell" or "sorcery." Hence, the Eden account is saying that, in mankind's infancy, we fell under a spell, a basic lie that destroys our ability to experience the presence of God. Note that, upon believing the lie and transgressing, humanity was driven from the Garden. Humanity lost the sense of God's presence.
Romans 5 is the key passage in the New Testament that gives insight into mankind's predicament.
If one reads Romans 5 carefully, one finds that it isn't so much that God "blames" humans for the choice of three individuals. Rather, Paul teaches that we are all "in" Adam; we are all human. We are connected. We are one. The collective human "soul" is infected with a tendency that began in mankind's earliest days. Because mankind "transgressed" and claimed a false position for itself, mankind perpetually "sins" and "fails to achieve the purpose for which it was created." We miss the mark. We are malignant, and unaided by the chemotherapy of God's Word, we are terminal.
But the story doesn't end there. There is a "Second Adam" (Romans 5:15-21, 1 Corinthians 15:42-49). There is a "New Beginning for Humanity." God's Word (John 1:1-18), His Chemotherapy, has already entered into the Body of Humanity in one individual cell: Jesus of Nazareth. In its infancy, humanity transgressed and became malignant. After the malignancy had reached terminal proportions, radical chemotherapy was initiated. Incarnate the Word anew in yourself and you "attach" to the new humanity that began with Jesus of Nazareth.
That is where the story of Eden leads. In "mythic" or "poetic" form, Genesis itself tells us this. "Eve" receives a proimise: "Your seed will crush the serpent's head."
So, God isn't blaming six billion people for the choice of two ancestors and a reptile. Rather, humanity is like a stream, or a tree. We are individual branches, but we share a common trunk and a common root system. If disease gets into that trunk and that root system, it spreads to every branch and every leaf. God isn't blaming us as individuals for what "Adam and Eve" did. He is challenging us to deal honestly with our spiritual malignancy, to take responsibility for who we are and to trust His way of curing our disease.
This seems harsh and flies in the face of fierce western individualism, but perhaps fierce western individualism is one more sympton of that intital disease: we want to decide for ourselves what is right and have embraced a psychology of entitlement that minimizes our common ground (for good or bad), and responsibility to, all of humanity.
Besides, the "common source" of the human "collective soul" works in our favor as well. The disease may have originated outside of my individual self, but so does the Cure. We may have inherited trendencies that destroy our ability to experience God, but because we are all interconnected as common humanity, we also inherit, through no merit of our own, the opportunity to connect with the Cure. Each one of us is related by blood to Jesus of Nazareth. The Cure is Human. If we submit to the Chemotherapy of the Word Became Flesh (Jesus of Nazareth), we are the start of a new humanity. This willful submission and trust is an undoing of mankind's initial willful transgression. It is one small step in unraveling the "spell". It is the first step in the journey back to the Presence of God, which is all Eden really represents.
That is the Story of Paradise Lost, and Paradise Regained. That is one aspect of the story of Eden that humanity fails to ascertain.
Does it answer all of my questions? NO. Does wrestling with these concepts get me moving in the right direction? YES. Movement in the right direction is movement towards truth and redemption.
God knows humanity needs it. >>
