The Epic of Eden: A Christian Entry into the Old Testament

by Sandra L. Richter

This deliverance is for all people. Not just the Jews. Not just the righteous. Rather, the unclean, the foreigner, the sinner—if they will believe as Rahab did—are welcome. Not merely welcome into the new community, but welcome even into the lineage of the Christ.

In essence, Adam and Eve are free to do anything except decide for themselves what is good and what is evil. Yahweh reserves the right (and the responsibility) to name those truths himself.

In our driven, workaholic world, in which we are trained to think that the only measurable value of our lives is the quantity of labor we can produce before our broken bodies are laid in the ground, our Creator says, the essence of the one made in the image of God is not work.

Humanity was designed to rule over all creation (the sixth day) under the rule of God (the seventh day). But Adam and Eve refused this plan; in essence, they rejected the seventh day.

In sum, when the stewards of Eden are returned to their proper place in God’s perfect seven-day structure by means of the re-creative power of redemption, when their treasonous choice is reversed, so too will the cosmos be “freed from its slavery to corruption,” and returned to its pre-fallen state.

What John is describing here is what Christians call “heaven.” But unlike the images common to our imaginations—disembodied spirits, clouds and wings, harps and chubby cherubs—the biblical author is describing heaven as a new earth. The garden has been restored, the primordial deep (“chaos”) has been defeated, and Ezekiel’s city/temple is being lowered from the heavens to serve as the residence of the redeemed.

we could summarize the plot line of the Bible into one cosmic question: “How do we get ʾAdām back into the garden?” In Genesis 3 humanity was driven out; in Revelation 21–22 they are welcomed home.

In the incarnation the veil is ripped in two, the holy of holies is thrown open, and the lost, the sick, the deformed, the disabled, even the ostracized foreigner who deserved her reputation as a loose woman, are invited to draw near.

In the flesh of Jesus, Adam will pay the penalty for his crime, but rather than being consumed by the great enemy Death, this Last Adam will rise from the grave and give birth to a new lineage, a new people of God, and thereby fulfill the impossible rescue plan first hinted at in Genesis 3:15.