What commandment was broken in Paradise?
God, in his love, gave Adam the commandment not to eat of the fruit of the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil, with the warning that to eat of it, the outward sign of an inward, spiritual decision, would bring certain death (Gen 2:16–17; see Q158).
In truth, both great commandments were broken in Paradise and in a definite order. Adam and Eve first failed to love God, and this failure began not with the eating but with the doubting: distrust of God’s love preceded and produced the disobedience, for no one disobeys a love of which he is certain. They failed to love one another, for neither sought the other’s highest good, as the mutual blaming after the Fall makes plain: “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree” (Gen 3:12–13; see Q119). Doubt of divine love thus fractured, in one stroke, both communion with God and communion between human persons.
