Total depravity Gen. 2:17. Does Gen. 2:17 say that after Adam's eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, all humans are conceived and born totally depraved, i.e. with every faculty corrupted and unable to do anything good?
Gen 2:15-17
15And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.
16And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
17But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
What does the text say?
!. After making Adam, God put him in Eden.
2. God gave Adan a responsibility to fulfil, to dress and keep it.
3. God gave Adam permission to eat from every tree in the garden except one., the tree of the knowledge of eood and Evil.
4. God told Adam that within a "YoM" of eating the forbidden tree, he would die.
5.
During creation in chapter 1, and 2:1-3 each YoM was defined as including one evening and one morning. Possibly , either a period of daylight ending in evening and a period of darkness ending in morning; or possibly a period of darkness beginning with evening followed by a period of light beginning with morning. The Jewish teachers were divided on whether the "YoM" began at darkness of began dawn. But either way, it was a 24 hour day. The creation narrative of Chapter 1 to 2:3 was possibly being described from the creation's perspective rather than God's. A YoM was therefore probably the 24 hour light and dark cycle.
6. Chapter 2:4 -25 is possibly being described from God's perspective, so that a Yom could be one of God's days of 1000 years. The second creation account starts with "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created,
IN THE YoM that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens. " It seems to me that this
YoM ,
or time interval, includes at least the five days of creation preceding the creation of man, and probably also includes the sixth, so it is not a 24 hour YoM. Peter writes of God having days/YoMiYM that are 100 of our years. Since 2:4 says that days 1-5 of chapter 1 happened in one day in chapter 2, it is not possible that a YoM in chapter 2 is a 24 hour day, and would likely be a 1000 yer long day, since Adam died within 930 years of stealing the forbidden fruit, and as we will see, God had warned Adam that he would "to die be dying" in the YoM he ate the fruit.
v5. And every plant of the field before
it was being (qal incomplete, imperfect) in the earth, and every herb of the field before
it was growing (qal incomplete, imperfect). For the LORD
had not caused it to rain (hiphil complete, pluperfect)., and [there was] no man to till the earth.
v6. And-a-mist
was going up )incomplete, imperfect) from the ground
and-was-watering (weqatall perfect sequential, hence an imperfect sense) the whole face of the ground.
v7.
And-had-formed (qal wayiqtol, imperfect sequential therefore a completed sense) the LORD a man of the dust of the ground,
and-had-breathed (qal wayiqtol, imperfect, hence an opposite completed sense) into his nostrils the breath of life;
and-had-become the man (wayiqtol imperfect sequential, therefore an opposite completed sense) a living soul.
v8.
And-had-planted (qal wayiqtol, incomplete sequential, therefore an opposite completed sense) the LORD God a garden in Eden eastward
and-he-had-put (qal wayiqtol imperfect, hence an opposite completed sense) there the man whom he-had-formed (qal perfect, no waw, therefore the actual completed sense).
v9.
And-had-made-grow (hiphil wayiqtol imperfect sequential, hence the opposite perfect meaning) the LORD God out of the ground every tree pleasant to the sight and good for food. And-the-tree of life in the midst of the garden, and-the-tree-of the knowledge of good and evil.
v10. And-a-river going out (qal participle absolute) of Eden for to water the garden. And-from-thence
it-was-parting (Niphal imperfect)
and-was-becoming (qal weqatal perfect sequential, therefore opposite imperfect sense) into four heads.
v11 The name of the first [was] Pison, that compassing (qal participle absolute) the whole land of Havilah, where [was] gold.
v.12 The gold of that land [is] good: there [is] bdellium and the onyx stone.
v13. And-the-name of the second river [was] Gihon: the same [was] it compassing (qal participle absolute) the whole land of Ethiopia.
v14. And-the-name of the third river [was] Hiddekel, that going (qal participle absolute) toward the east of Assyria. And-the-river fourth [was] Euphrates.
v15. And-had-taken (qal wayiqtol imperfect, therefore an opposite completed sense) the LORD God the man, and-had-put-him (hiphil wayiqtol imperfect, therefore with a completed sense in the garden of Eden to dress it (qal infinitive construct) and to keep it (qal infinitive construct).
v16. And-commanded (piel sequential imperfect, therefore an opposite completed sense) the LORD God the man saying (qal infinitive construct) , "Of every tree of the garden you will be eating (qal imperfect ) freely:
v.17 But-of-the-tree of the knowledge of good and evil you-shall-not-be-eating (qal imperfect) of it: for in the YoM that you eat (qal infinitive construct) from it to die (qal infinitive absolute) you-shall-be-dying (qal imperfect)."
The chains of sequential verbs that follow the rules for sequential chains of waw-prefixed verbs are in colours and bold. The first verb in a chain is waw-less. Subsequent verbs added to that chain have a waw prefix but are in the opposite aspect to their apparent form. A chain is broken by any verb without waw. And a new chain or waw-prefixed verbs follows until the next waw-less verb.
From this we see that God forewarned Adam that in the YoM Adam ate the fruit he would "to die be dying", which sounds to me like dying slowly until completely dead. So, he did not die immediately when he ate. He began to die, and died at age 930 years. Gen 2:17 does not support the Calvinist claims made about it: that Adam died immediately and was therefore incapable of doing any good. And their claim that we similarly are conceived already dead and incapable of doing good. We begin to die when we are conceived, and eventually die in physical death.
Now, it is in Charlie's court to explain how Gen. 2:17 says we descendants of Adam are afflicted with total depravity from conception. If his very first listed ext is spurious, the rest are likely to also be spurious.