Tree of the knowledge of good and evil , was a tree that God had planted in the middle of paradise. He had forbidden Adam to touch it under pain of death: quo enim die comederis ex eo, morte morieris . There is dispute over whether the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil were the same tree. Opinions are divided on this. Here are the reasons presented for and against the view which holds that they were two different trees. Moses says that God having planted the Garden of Eden, he put all sorts of good trees in it, and in particular the tree of life in the middle of paradise; likewise, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil . And when he placed man in paradise, he said to him: eat of all the fruits of the garden, but do not eat of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil; because from the moment you will have eaten it, you will die. And when the serpent tempted Eve, he said to her: why did God forbid you to eat of all the fruits of the garden? Eve replied: God has allowed us to eat of the fruits of paradise, but he has forbidden us from consuming the fruit which is in the middle of the garden, for fear that we should die. The serpent replied: you will not die; but God knows that as soon as you will have eaten it, your eyes will be open and you will be like gods, knowing good and evil . And after Adam and Eve had violated the Lord’s commandment, God drove them out of paradise and said to them: Here is Adam who has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; but now out of fear that he not also pick of the fruit of life, that he will eat it and live forever, he placed him outside of paradise. Genesis ii. 9 ; ibid., v. 17; Genesis iii. 1.2.3 and v. 22.

From all these passages one can infer in favor of the opinion which accepts only one tree, the use of which God had forbidden Adam. 1) That it is not necessary to recognize two of them; the same fruit that would confer life on Adam also being capable of giving knowledge. 2) Moses’s text can very well signify a single tree: God planted the tree of life, or the tree of knowledge. Often in Hebrew the conjunction and is equivalent to the disjunction or ; and in the same way, out of fear that he not also pick the fruit of life , can be explained in this sense: out of fear that, as he has picked it in the belief that he will find knowledge there, he will return again to find life there. 3) Finally, the devil truly attributes to the same tree the fruit of life and the fruit of knowledge: you will not die; but God knows that as soon as you will have eaten of this fruit, you will know good and evil. He reassures them against the fear of death and promises them knowledge in offering them the forbidden fruit.

But the opposing opinion seems better founded in the letter of the text. Moses manifestly distinguishes these two trees, the tree of life, and the tree of knowledge ; why wish to conflate them unnecessarily? Life and knowledge are two completely different things: why wish that they be produced from the same fruit? Is it too much to forbid Adam the use of two trees? The speech that God gives to Adam after his sin seems to be expressly to distinguish two trees here: out of fear that he not also pick of the fruit of life and live forever , as if he said, he has already tasted of the fruit of knowledge, he must be distanced from the fruit of life, out of fear that he not pick it also. The devil, it is true, reassures Eve and Adam against the fear of death: but he only offers them the fruit of knowledge, saying to them that as soon as they will have tasted it, they will be as enlightened as gods; from which it follows after their sin, that it is said that their eyes were opened . These reasons make us prefer this second opinion over the first. See Saint Augustin, book VI of the imperfect work against Julian, chap. xxx, p. 1359 ff .  [1]

The question is asked, what was the nature of the forbidden fruit. Some have believed that it was wheat, others that it was the vine; others the fig tree, others the cherry tree; others the apple tree: this last opinion has prevailed, even though it is no better founded than the others. As proof, the passage from the Canticle of canticles is cited: I have awakened you under an apple tree, it is here that your mother lost her innocence ; as if Solomon had wished to speak in this place of the fall of the first woman. Rabb. in Sanhedrin, folio 70;  [2] Theodos. apud Theodoret. quaest. xxviij. in Gent. Indor. Pelus. book I, epistle ii;  [3] canticle viii, 5 .  [4]

Several of the Ancients have taken the entire narrative of Moses in a figurative sense, and have believed that one could only explain this narrative as an allegory.

Saint Augustine believed that the virtue of the tree of life and of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was supernatural and miraculous; others believe that this virtue was natural to it. According to Philo, the tree of life represented piety, and the tree of knowledge prudence. God is the author of these virtues. The Rabbis recount incredible and ridiculous things about the tree of life. It was of prodigious size; all the waters of the earth flowed from its roots; if one walked five hundred years, one would have scarcely walked around it. Perhaps all of this is nothing but an allegory; but it is not worth tiring oneself out to seek the hidden meaning. Augustine, On the Literal Meaning of Genesis, book VIII and book II ; On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, chap. xxi ; Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, book 1 ; Bonaventure, Hugh of St. Victor, etc .; Philo, de Opificio mundi [On the Creation] , page 35 ; Basnage, Histoire des Juifs, book VI, chap. xii, art. 18 ; Calmet, dictionnaire de la bible, vol. I, letter A, p. 205 . [5]

1. Saint Augustine, Against Julian, trans. Matthew A. Schumacher (New York, 1957).

2. The reference here is to line 22 of Sanhedrin 70a of the Talmud: “As it is taught in a baraita : Rabbi Meir says: The tree from which Adam the first man ate was a grapevine.” The second reference

3. This seems to be a reference to Theodoret of Cyrus (c. 393-c. 458/466), The Questions on the Octateuch , which was in part a response to the literalism of Theodore of Mopsuestia (c. 350-428) in a letter of the ascetic Isidore of Pelusium (d. c. 450).

4. This is a reference to line quoted from the Canticle of Canticles (Song of Solomon).

5. The last two references are to modern works: Jacques Basnage, sieur de Beauval (1653-1723), Histoire des Juifs, depuis Jésus-Christ jusqu’à présent (2 ^nd ed., the Hague, 1716); and Augustin Calmet (1672-1757), Dictionnaire historique, critique, chronologique, géographique et littéral de la bible (new ed., Paris, 1730). In fact, this entire article is borrowed from Calmet’s article on the same subject cited here.