What is the dispensation of Innocence?

This dispensation extends from the creation of Adam in Genesis 2:7 to the expulsion from Eden. Adam, created innocent and ignorant of good and evil, was placed in the garden of Eden with his wife, Eve, and put under responsibility to abstain from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The dispensation of innocence resulted in the first failure of man, and in its far-reaching effects, the most disastrous. It closed in judgment: "So he drove out the man." See Gen. 1:26; Gen. 2:16,17; Gen. 3:6; Gen. 3:22-24.)

Dispensation of Innocence. This probably lasted a very short time. The record is covered by Genesis 2:7-3:24.

Adam was created innocent. Placed as head over the first creation. Given a helpmeet. One test was imposed upon our first parents, namely, not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. In their attempt to rise and become as gods they fell. Their act was prophetic of the rise of antichrist, who will make the greatest attempt to be as God. The dispensation ended in failure. It was closed by the fall of the creature and the introduction of the reign of sin.

In our minds we often couple innocence and irresponsibility together; as in the case, for instance of a very small child. In verses 16 and 17, however, we find that Adam though created in a state of innocence was put in a place of responsibility. He had no knowledge of good and evil, so that one tree was forbidden to him, though he might eat freely of every other tree in the garden. He was put under law in the simplest way, for the law consisted of only one commandment and that commandment concerned with only one tree. He might have had many commands given to him of an intricate and confusing nature or alternatively, he might have been forbidden all the trees in the garden save one. As it was, the Divine command was cut down to the barest minimum, just sufficient to keep before him that as the creature he must be subject to the Creator and walk in obedience.

But there was “Law” in Paradise — before man fell, and man was a responsible creature before he broke away from God: he was responsible to obey the law-prohibiting his eating the fruits of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil — before he became a “transgressor.” God had revealed His ways to him, as a Giver, in the largest and widest munificence. Nothing was withheld from man. The ten thousand tributary streams which contributed to his happiness in Eden, spoke of a God who would withhold no good thing. “Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat”; proclaimed the freeness and fullness of no niggard Hand. The man was to enjoy it all freely. One small interdict prohibited the eating of the fruit of one tree: a tree which marked a responsibility which, when accepted, would only entail evil: “In the day that thou eatest thereof, dying, thou shalt die.” It was that, in observing which, he expressed that his will was subject to God who had placed him there, and surrounded him with every creature blessing.

Genesis 2:15, etc. It was from God that the man had received his being, and it was by Him that he was placed in the garden prepared for him — placed there, not to be inactive, but "to dress it and to keep it." How absolute were God's rights over the creature that He had formed! All Adam's rights, as regarded the garden, the earth, and the various tribes of inferior creatures, flowed from the sovereign appointment of Him, whose, equally with Adam himself, they all were. How fitting that there be some test of whether Adam recognised these rights of His Creator: and if there were to be a test, how could there have been one easier or more favourable to man? In Genesis 2:16-17, observe, 1, God's authority — He "commanded the man;" 2, His bounty — "Of every tree," etc.; 3, His prohibition — "Thou shalt not;" 4, His threatening — "In the day," etc. Man is thus fully set in responsibility before that woman is created. She was to share the responsibility with him.

I affirm then that, when God thus made man, when He put him in Eden, the actual test was the interdict not of a thing which was in itself evil, but simply and prescriptively wrong for man because God had forbidden it. Such is the very essence of a test for an innocent man. In fact any other thought (such as the law) is not only contrary to scripture, but when you closely and seriously think of it as a believer, it will be seen to be an impossible state of things then. Consequently a moral test such as the wise and prudent would introduce here, and count a worthier reason why there should be so vast a ruin for the world ensuing, is out of the question. No, it was the simple question whether God was really Jehovah-Elohim, whether He was a moral governor or not, whether man was to be independent of God or not. This was decided not by some grave and mighty matter, of which man could reason and see the consequences, but simply by doing or not doing the will of God. Thus we see how the simple truth is after all the deepest wisdom.

Here was a test to man’s obedience. The wide range of delightful fruits made it no hardship to refrain from this one tree. Nay, further, it was a merciful hedging round of a real danger. Think for a moment. Adam knew the good. The good could only be a blessing to him. The knowledge of evil could only be defiling, and bring in its train nothing but sorrow.

God had given every tree of the garden for food save one solitary tree. This prohibition was a test of the creature's obedience to the Creator. Moreover the Creator knew that if they did eat of the tree of knowledge and evil, the result would be the ruin of man's innocence, the poisoning of his very system by the introduction of the knowledge of evil, with no power to resist it. Therefore His prohibition was merciful. Satan too knew that to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil would mean the ruin and fall of God's creatures. How evil was the great Adversary of set purpose to work such havoc and ruin. No one can faintly realize the awful tide of sin and wickedness that had its germ in this one act of disobedience.

In Genesis 2 it is found at the heart of things in the midst of the garden of Eden. Adjacent to it was the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Now while the latter was forbidden to Adam, the former was not. It seems certain that two actual and special trees stood there, to which God in wisdom attached certain moral lessons. That of the knowledge of good and evil represented Adam's responsibility to his Maker, while that of Life represented the privilege that he might enjoy as long as he remained unfallen. The forbidden tree was by no means a privation or a denial to Adam of pleasure or taste; for the Lord God had set in the garden every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. Upon it hung fruit truly; but the restriction imposed as to its consumption was purely to remind God's wonderful creature that he held all in trust under his Maker. Beneath man was everything in this lower creation. Above him, God. The one simple security for his tenure of the position, obedience. And obedience, not to a complicated code of laws, but to one simple command. Obedience would have maintained him in the knowledge of good and good alone. Disobedience would leave him with the knowledge of the good he had once enjoyed, but with the added knowledge of the evil he had acquired, which would overpower and condemn him. It was the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Now there is a two-fold danger of misapprehending Adam's state and place while unfallen. We may exalt it beyond the truth by confounding it with what grace gives in Christ; or we may lower it by making it a question of such reasoning and conscience as man acquired by the fall. In his original state Adam stood in relationship with God in thankful use of all He gave, but liable to death on disobedience. It was in no way heaven held out if he obeyed, as will appear more fully by-and-by. The danger was of losing his first estate by transgression. But God imposed no such moral government as the law; nor had Adam the knowledge of good and evil till the fall. Man was not holy but innocent, and tested solely by prohibition as the simple test of obedience on God's part. It was a blessed creature's responsibility to obey with the threat of death on transgression.