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    Look what you’ve done! – B’reshit

    Adam & Eve under the Tree of Knowledge, Charles Foster, 1897

    Adam & Eve under the Tree of Knowledge, Charles Foster, 1897

    Adam heard the voice of God calling Him with the question, “Where are you?” (Gen. 3:9).

    It can’t be a cognitive question, God wanting to know and Adam needing to explain.

    By definition God is All-Knowing and there is little point in asking Adam for information which He possesses in much greater depth than Adam does.

    It’s not a cognitive but a rhetorical question. Think of the person who sees that someone has smashed a vase. The smithereens are all around and yet they say, “What have you done?” It’s an exclamation: “Look at you, look at what you’ve done!”

    Similarly with Adam, “Look at what you’ve done with My world, look at the mess you’ve made!”

    Of course Adam is so new at this being-the-keeper-of-the-Creation experience that he hasn’t worked out how to handle his responsibility.

    This suggests the explanation for the later Divine statement, “Man’s heart is evil from (i.e. because of) his youth” (Gen. 8:21).

    When Adam gets older and more experienced his moral judgment will be more reliable.

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