Why is there death if a perfect and loving God created the world? According to the Orthodox, the real issue at the heart of Genesis 3—the biblical story of “the Fall”—is not focused on establishing a causal model regarding the sin/death relationship and how we inherit a moral stain from our ancestors, but is mostly concerned about the etiology of death and who is to blame for introducing death into the world. In other words, the Eastern Orthodox tradition understands Genesis 3 to be more about theodicy (a story about where death came from) than soteriology (a story about where sin came from).
