On its surface, Genesis 3 tells a relatable story: two people capitulate to temptation and face the consequences. A serpent in the Garden of Eden persuades Eve and Adam to eat some fruit which God has forbidden (v. 1-7). There is a reckoning, as God asks them to account for their actions (v. 8-13). God then articulates how things will change as a result of their decision: the serpent’s power will be limited, Eve will experience sorrow in raising children, and Adam will have to work hard to obtain food (v. 14-21). Additionally, they are expelled from the garden and blocked from partaking of the fruit of the tree of life (v. 22-24).
The message seems straightforward: beware of temptation, and choose wisely to avoid unpleasant consequences. But Lehi saw much more in this story.
His family had completed a difficult journey in which they had experienced hunger (1 Nephi 16:19-20), the death of a family member (1 Nephi 16:34-35), a furious storm on the high seas (1 Nephi 18:13-15), and extreme contention including violence (1 Nephi 3:28-29; 1 Nephi 7:16; 1 Nephi 18:10-12). Now, as he approached the end of his life, he wanted to help his children make sense of these afflictions and take responsibility for their own decisions. The story of Adam and Eve helps him address both issues: explaining the need for suffering and encouraging proactive decision-making. For Lehi, Genesis 3 does not explain how to avoid suffering, but why suffering is unavoidable and how to choose wisely anyway.
Lehi first frames life as a collection of opposites, including good and evil, life and death, happiness and misery (2 Nephi 2:11). He points out that contrast is educative. For example, sorrow enables us to recognize and appreciate happiness. But then he goes further: Not only does opposition allow us to know; it empowers us to choose. Agency is impossible without meaningful and understood options, and therefore it cannot exist in a world devoid of opposition.
Lehi is quite definitive on this point. He goes so far as to argue that everything falls apart without opposition:
If ye shall say there is no law, ye shall also say there is no sin. If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness. And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness. And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished away.
2 Nephi 2:13
This is a striking piece of ontological reasoning. The life Lehi has experienced, so unlike Eden, is the kind of life that makes agency possible. Sorrow may not have given way to happiness, but it has made happiness recognizable and choosable.
With this backdrop, Eden looks quite different. Instead of an ideal setting, it now seems sterile and unfruitful. Lehi underscores this interpretation by emphasizing Adam and Eve’s childlessness:
If Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the garden of Eden. And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever, and had no end.
And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.
2 Nephi 2:22-23
But there is one element of Eden which generates opposition, and it is this crack in the door which gives Adam and Eve a way out of this perpetual stasis. The author of Genesis identifies two contrasting trees in the garden: the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:8-9). For Lehi, this dichotomy is the key to Eve and Adam’s agency and ultimately to their opportunity for happiness:
To bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, after he had created our first parents, and the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and in fine, all things which are created, it must needs be that there was an opposition; even the forbidden fruit in opposition to the tree of life; the one being sweet and the other bitter.
Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.
2 Nephi 2:15-16
The author of Genesis mentions the two trees but places the serpent at the center of the narrative, framing the decision primarily as a response to God’s commandment. Lehi, by contrast, acknowledges the serpent (whom he identifies as the devil) but shifts the emphasis to the trees themselves: it is the trees that entice, and the decision is between two kinds of fruit. The forbidden fruit is bitter because it introduces sorrow and death into the world, but as Lehi has already explained, without sorrow and death, there is no happiness and life. And happiness and life are the ultimate goal.
The classic argument against the existence of God holds that an omniscient and perfectly loving Being would not create a world of pain and suffering. Lehi anticipates and deflects this argument by asserting both the omnipotence and the love of God:
All things have been done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things.
Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy.
2 Nephi 2:24-25
Having explained the need for suffering, Lehi now urges his children to use the gift of agency provided by the decision of Adam and Eve. They chose the bitter fruit which expanded humanity’s liberty by expanding its options. Subsequent generations, including Lehi’s children, face a different dichotomy, made possible by the redemption of a Mediator:
The Messiah cometh in the fulness of time, that he may redeem the children of men from the fall. And because that they are redeemed from the fall they have become free forever, knowing good from evil; to act for themselves and not to be acted upon, save it be by the punishment of the law at the great and last day, according to the commandments which God hath given.
Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself.
2 Nephi 2:26-27
The opposition required for agency consists not merely of adversity but of optionality. Adam and Eve’s decision introduced the adversity. While Lehi doesn’t elaborate on the nature of the redemption provided by the Messiah, he does characterize it as offering a meaningful alternative to the death and sorrow introduced into the world by Adam and Eve’s expulsion from the Garden.
In one sense, Lehi is encouraging his children to make the opposite choice from Adam and Eve: life instead of death, turning to God instead of following the devil. But in another sense, he’s urging them to follow their examples. Just as they chose the agency-expanding option which freed them from the immobility of the Garden, Lehi’s children can choose the liberty offered by the Mediator, instead of the captivity and sorrow offered by the devil.
Today I will make agency-expanding decisions. I will choose liberty and life, even recognizing that the opposition inherent in expanded choices will also expose me to sorrow and pain.
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