The Simple Answers… To Life’s Most Important Questions.
Bible Study Course Lesson 7 -7
I don’t know what’s such a big deal about knowing the difference between good and evil. Do you?
I mean really, be honest; what’s the harm? What law does it break for Adam and Eve to know the difference between good and evil?
Yes, yes, yes, I know; God told them not to, and that’s enough to make it a sin. Sure; but why forbid it in the first place?
Does God not want us to be able to know the difference between good and evil? Hebrews 5:14. Does God not think we can decide for ourselves right and wrong? Deuteronomy 30:15. So why make such a fuss?
These are fair questions. Questions that cannot be answered by saying “because God said so”, as so many might do. But questions which today, I think we can finally answer.
FRUIT OF THE FORBIDDEN FRUIT
Knowing good and evil was hardly something God wants us to avoid; in fact, He specifically tells us to do just that on several occasions. And yet, for Adam and Eve, there was some good reason why the fruit was forbidden. They, for some reason, could not eat of that fruit.
But then… why create that tree at all? Why put it in the Garden at all, within their grasp, if they were never intended to use it? James 1:13. So it had a purpose, a purpose for them, one which did not involve temptation.
Otherwise, we’d have to believe that God put an appealing-yet-deadly tree in the Garden for the sole purpose of seeing if they could resist eating it. That is the textbook example of “tempting them with evil”, therefore God didn’t do that.
To see what the tree is, we need only to see what it caused (Matthew 7:20); and the fruits of this tree were in Genesis 3:5, 22. This fruit “made one wise”, and “opened their eyes” and made them “as Gods, to know good and evil”, as God said “as one of us”.
We know what all those symbols mean: clearly, this fruit made them souls. That is to say, they certainly had souls before then (Genesis 2:7), but they weren’t using them; their eyes were closed, like a kitten. They had no wisdom. They exercised no judgment.
Now why would God possibly be upset by their suddenly becoming wise souls, judging their world? Once again, I think I have to ask… what was such a big deal? What was so wrong about them knowing the difference between good and evil?
KNOWING GOOD AND EVIL
“Knowing good and evil” is an odd expression, when you think about it. Apparently, children under 20 don’t “know” this (Deuteronomy 1:39, Numbers 14:29-32). Yet that’s obviously not true –teens can certainly tell the difference between right and wrong!
But again, look at the effects of their not knowing good and evil; God didn’t hold the children responsible for their choices to rebel against Moses. Why? Because they didn’t “know” good and evil. Therefore, “knowing” good and evil doesn’t really mean that at all; it means bearing responsibility to choose good from evil.
When Adam and Eve ate the fruit, they promptly became aware of their nakedness. Something which, just like any children, they hadn’t noticed yet. They were not self-conscious. Think about that term; conscious of the self; aware of themselves. Self-aware. Capable of looking at themselves, judging themselves. Something we are all striving to become!
Their souls had not been involved in judging themselves until now! Because that fruit represented the opening of the eyes (Genesis 3:5, 22), the new responsibility of their souls to choose for themselves.
Before then, God didn’t hold them accountable because they were not legally adults. Therefore, all their choices were made for them, by their parents –the Elohim! (Genesis 1:26, Luke 3:38). Any sins by Adam and Eve would fall on their parents, and not on themselves.
But there is one exception! The statute in Deuteronomy 21:18-21. If a child says “I will not obey you”, then clearly, the parent cannot be responsible for their sins after that, can they? If a child openly refuses to follow your judgments, then he must choose his own path… and live, or die, with the consequences!
This right to choose your own destiny is called knowing good and evil.
RESPONSIBLE FOR GOOD AND EVIL
The tree of life gave only life, and never death –hence the name. If you simply do what the Lord says blindly –eat of the tree of life –you’ll never die. But if for any reason you were to lose access to that tree, without its continual guidance and nourishment, you would die (Genesis 3:22). Which is what Jesus was telling us in John 6:58.
But the other tree conferred either life or death… depending on your own choices! (Deuteronomy 30:19). The effects of the tree of life are temporary; but the effects of the other tree are eternal… whether good or evil.
If you choose life from that tree, you will never have to eat of that fruit again to live eternally. You won’t just live indefinitely, as Adam and Eve did in the Garden or the Israelites did while eating manna… you will not be able to die (Luke 20:36).
But if you eat of that tree and choose death, you can no longer eat of the other tree which gives life to all –for that is for the innocent, it gives life to the ignorant regardless of their works… but it is not for those who chose death from the other tree.
So the tree of good and evil is high reward, but it is also equally high risk. Too high of a risk for a child to take. But a risk that all of us must take eventually. Sooner or later, you must eat of the knowledge of good and evil and begin to acquire wisdom –something only adult souls have (2 Chronicles 1:10, 1 Kings 3:9,28 etc.).
All the tree ever represented was working out your own salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12). Eating of that tree represented adulthood; the right and burden of bearing their own sins and making their own choices.
Something that everyone must do –but something we can’t do without being properly prepared for it as all children must be prepared for the real world (1 Peter 2:2). All children eventually grow up to make their own choices; that’s the point.
Their eyes (soul) are supposed to be opened, so that they can see themselves and change things they don’t like. But this should happen gradually, over the course of two decades, under the watchful eye of a parent who holds a safety net!
You don’t want your children to do this too young, because you know they don’t have the experience needed to make good choices. So you demand that they trust your judgment, until they’re wise enough to see why they should make judgments like this when they’re on their own.
And knowing how hard that can be –and how high the price of failure –you would no doubt want your children to delay their eating of that fruit as long as possible, to give them the most experience possible. And yet without eating of that tree, we never truly become adults; for if we always live in the shadow of some authority figure, what is there for our souls to do?
God never intended to make our choices for us forever; He meant to guide us in judgment (Psalms 25:9-13). Nor did He intend for Noah, Moses, or our own parents to make our choices forever –however good our lives might have been had we simply followed someone like Noah, God needs leaders, not followers.
How can we ever learn by use to make good choices, if all we do is obey the choices of someone else –whether that’s a parent, a preacher, an angel, or God Himself? Whomever we obey blindly (with closed eyes, not using our soul), we aren’t making choices for ourselves.
THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD
Genesis 2:17 But 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.
When we read this, we see a warning. But it was so much more than that; it was an explanation of this tree’s purpose. And a glorious purpose at that! For our flesh was made selfish; and it was always meant to die once. And this tree was going to make that happen!
We could have trained our spirits to copy the statutes of Jesus’ spirit; eating of the tree of life, as it were. But that wouldn’t kill the selfishness in our hearts; it would only fence it off. Sound familiar? Just like the fence around the Garden! Just like all statutes, it ropes off sin but doesn’t destroy it!
This tree, on the other hand, was going to actually kill our hearts. Its purpose was to kill us because parts of us need to die! To become like God, we must all mortify our flesh with the lusts and afflictions thereof (Colossians 3:5); how could we do that, if this tree didn’t exist?
Far from being a terrible thing, this tree’s fruit was the only path to life! Because in the day we eat its fruit, we start to die! Eating of this fruit represents the soul being aware of its own flesh, and realizing it was naked (Genesis 2:25, 3:11)… and then taking action to do something about that nakedness (Genesis 3:7).
But the process involves killing a piece of your heart daily (Romans 8:13). Adam and Eve’s first choice after realizing their nakedness was to kill a plant instead. So God showed them that the only way to correct their nakedly self-serving beast was by killing it (Genesis 3:21).
Living off the tree of life, as Adam and Eve were living, was always meant to be temporary; because the only path to eternal life always lay through the death of their flesh (Galatians 5:24). Yet as you kill the selfishness of your heart daily (1 Corinthians 15:31), your soul is simultaneously beginning to live.
INDEFINITE, NOT FOREVER
Adam and Eve were always going to get to eat the fruit; they just weren’t ready for it yet. God knew that Adam and Eve had not followed in His footsteps long enough to know the true path. Therefore, taking to themselves the responsibility to choose that path was foolish; it was certain that they would sin before a single day was out, and die as a result.
They didn’t begin to die until they ate of the fruit (Romans 5:12); but not, as is commonly believed, because of divine retribution. Rather, because the fruit represented the responsibility, the burden, of making your own choices –the same thing that separates children from adults even today. The responsibility of punishing their own hearts, and bearing their own sins.
Had they allowed God to make choices for them, allowed Him to carry the burden of deciding right from wrong –in other words, not eaten of that fruit –they would never have chosen anything for themselves. And they would have lived indefinitely –but not forever.
To live indefinitely, you need only eat the fruit of the tree of life. Simply put, that you obey God’s judgments, without hesitation or objection. And that’s a great thing… when you’re a child (Hebrews 5:12-14). But not so much, when you’re forty.
Because to live forever, you must not be capable of death; which means you must not be capable of sin (1 John 3:9). And you can’t learn how to do that by letting someone else choose for you! The only way to learn is to choose for yourself right from wrong, over and over, until you’re good at it.
Because the only thing capable of making those choices and correcting your spirit is an awake soul; your own awake soul. Mine can judge your flesh, and perhaps even break your spirit; but no one can hear the truth of your heart and spirit but you; and no one can be there, hour by hour, to answer their arguments, but you.
God knew that, and always meant for their own souls to make their own decisions. But He was going to teach them how to do it a little at a time, in a sandbox where their bad decisions would not lead to death. Just as every parent teaches their children today (Isaiah 7:14-16). And just like a rebellious teen today, they rejected the opportunity for supervised training and did it the hard way.
MOSES AND NOAH: TREES OF GOOD AND EVIL
Thus any parent is, in effect, eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil so that their children don’t have to; and, by commanding them to obey their judgments (“as long as you live in my house you’ll live by my rules!”), they are forbidding them from eating the forbidden fruit.
Noah was, in effect, preventing his children from eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Noah had made all the major path-related choices for the family; which is why everyone who followed him could live for a thousand years.
By making spiritual choices for them, they had no urgent need to be self-aware, just like any children. But when Noah died they found the job of judging much harder than they imagined… because their souls weren’t capable of judging well.
After the Flood, God greatly multiplied the number of judgments we’d have to make; because the best way to teach someone why their choice was foolish is to bury them in the fruits of it. If you think you want flesh… eat it until the idea of meat makes you vomit (Numbers 11:18-20).
So we wanted to judge for ourselves, and God said “Fine! Let them judge until they’re so weary of it, they beg Me to judge for them again!” Because we cannot navigate the flurry of decisions we must make in life well enough to live a full day without God guiding us in judgment (Psalms 25:9).
Just like with the spies of the Promised Land; only those who were glad to let God guide them were able to live a natural lifespan in the wilderness (Numbers 32:11-13). All others were cut off in the midst of their days. As always, the same pattern repeats over and over again.
Moses had made every path-related decision for Israel since they left Egypt; he was also eating of the tree so they wouldn’t have to do so. And only those who disobeyed him died Deuteronomy 1:29-39, based on the statute in Deuteronomy 21:18-21.
Because they had, by choosing to reject the judgment of their father Moses (Numbers 11:11-12), eaten of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil too early! And only those who could not legally choose (Deuteronomy 1:39) were spared, because they couldn’t reach this fruit to eat it!
But in Deuteronomy 30, Moses knew his death was imminent, and now he was officially offering them the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil to eat for themselves ( Deuteronomy 30:15). And what they did with the power of that choice would determine whether they lived or died (Proverbs 18:21, Matthew 12:37).
THE TREE OF JUDGMENT
As you well know, we are expected to follow the spirit of the law today; and yet determining what the spirit of the law is requires that we judge the letter. We have to determine that we need not go outside the camp and dig a hole to use the toilet; that flushing does the job just fine. But when we do that, we have become a judge of the law: James 4:11.
We have to determine for ourselves that a polyester-cotton blend isn’t what God meant to forbid in Leviticus 19:19; whether or not using an elevator or a microwave violates the spirit of Leviticus 23:3; and so on, for a thousand things. We must do these things, for not choosing is itself a choice.
And everyone who decides something like that, who defies the letter of the law for any reason, however well considered, has eaten of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil! And by eating thereof, has not (necessarily) sinned! He has simply judged, for himself, right and wrong… as he is supposed to do!
God had always intended to teach Adam and Eve those things; but they tried to judge the spirit when they didn’t even know what the letter said –exactly as every religion in the world does today (1 Timothy 1:7).
Without knowing what God thinks is right, they judge the spirit based on what seems right to them (Proverbs 16:25). That’s why that tree is death to them. Yet when you think about it… we were never forbidden from eating of that tree.
Only Adam and Eve were, along with all children in their father’s house (Ephesians 6:1). That’s why immediately after judging, and explaining, the spirit of the Sabbath law, Jesus commanded us to do the same: John 7:19-24. It is our job, we who follow the spirit, to judge all things 1 Corinthians 2:14-15.
We were supposed to follow God in the letter… when we were children (Galatians 3:24-25). The tree was that schoolmaster! And the metaphorical fence around its fruit represented our innocence, and our excuse for our sins of ignorance.
But as we mature, we must reach a point where we understand the glory behind the letter of the law (2 Corinthians 3:6-11), the glory which sees past the veil and strolls past the flaming sword to go boldly into the Holy of Holies to eat from the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good! Hebrews 4:16.
Because if we succeed, it will not be the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for it is only evil if we choose the wrong choice. And if we succeed… we would know better.
THE TYPE OF TREE
Most things are just not that hard. There were two trees in the Bible. Two literal trees, of species which still exist today. Remember, God made all these things both to hide and to reveal the truth; just as you learned about the rainbow.
There is a tree, right now, in the world that God designed to be the tree of knowledge of good and evil. One that is, in every way, a metaphor of everything that tree represents. And to find it, we just have to listen to the Bible.
There were three things in the midst of the Garden of Eden –the tree of life, the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and the river that parted into four different rivers; Genesis 2:9-10. Now we’ve already said, long ago, that these correspond to the spirit, soul, and heart, respectively –and that the Garden as a whole represented the human body.
The Temple also represents the human body (1 Corinthians 3:16-17). And thus, we find the same things inside the Ark of the Covenant, which contains Aaron’s rod that budded, a bowl of manna, and the two tablets –written on all four sides (Hebrews 9:4).
Thus the Garden and the Most Holy Place are overlapping symbols; both versions are telling the same story, but in a different way. Just as we learned long ago in Series 3 about merging prophecies, so we also merge symbols to reveal more details about the same image.
The stone tablets, with spiritual words (spirit=water), is water flowing out of a stone (Exodus 17:6). And since on these tablets, it flows out on all four sides, it is clearly a river that parts and flows four ways.
Just as the human heart has four chambers, and the law has internal, external, positive, and negative parts. Likewise, the human heart has four “rivers” flowing out of it, the arteries/veins that connect it to the rest of the bloodstream. We could riff on this all day, but let’s not get too sidetracked.
The bowl of manna is clearly, and I mean clearly, Jesus, according to almost any verse in John 6. And since Jesus was Himself symbolic of the tree of life (Luke 23:31, John 17:2), the tree of life is for the healing of the nations (Revelation 22:2). Who did that, if not Jesus? Psalms 67:1-2, Malachi 4:2, plus almost any verse in the gospels.
This means that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil must correspond to Aaron’s rod. Now that’ s a funny story… because we aren’t told what kind of wood that rod was made of. Or… were we? Numbers 17:1-11. What sort of branch yields almond blossoms and almonds? An almond tree, of course! Because we know the tree by its FRUITS.
This strongly suggests, just from where we find these items, that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was an almond tree! But there’s more; because the whole reason why this context happened was to prove who should make the judgments for Israel! (Numbers 16:1-3).
They were upset by this, because THEY wished to “lift themselves up above the congregation of the Lord” ( Numbers 16:7-10). And clearly, God chose Aaron (Numbers 16:40). But this was a dispute among Levites; the entire nation then challenged their authority immediately (Numbers 16:41). To see who should be eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil!
That rebellion was quieted, but God needed to magnify Aaron in the eyes of the people, to minimize future uprisings –just as He did the apostles (Acts 5:12-13). And that’s why Numbers 17 happened: to prove, unarguably, who wielded the almond branch of responsibility over Israel.
This proved that only Aaron (and Moses) had a right to eat of that fruit. That only they were adults, in God’s eyes. Which is why only they were allowed inside the Most Holy Place where the contemporary symbol of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was kept.
Now compare that to Jeremiah 1:4-12. Jeremiah complained that he was only a child, but God showed him otherwise by giving him a vision of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil! To show that HE COULD EAT FROM IT! And that eating gave him authority over the nations!
WHY THAT TREE
These symbols told the Israelites who was in charge, and who had the right to make judgments for the nation. Indirectly, they show us that the fruit Eve ate was an almond. But now another question: do almonds REALLY look like they’ll make you wise??
Genesis 3:6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise…
How would one look at an almond and say “yep, that’s what I need to make me smart!” If you think that… you do need something to make you smart, but it probably isn’t this. And yet, obviously, I’m the idiot here, not Eve.
There was clearly some visible, obvious, intuitive way to connect almonds with wisdom. And there is… if you just look at it like Eve did. Below you can see ripe almonds –since the “tree was good for food”, it’s presumably at this stage she saw it.
Eve was not stupid. Her mind was not muddled with the traditions we have, and what she saw, she saw clearly. She saw that an almond looked like an opening eye, complete with eyelids! And the fruit itself looks like an eye –for even today, we say “she has almond-shaped eyes”.
This might seem a bit tenuous; how can someone look at something, and conclude that it would make them wise? Isn’t that a bit of a stretch? It might be… if that wasn’t exactly what the Bible said happened.
She ate something that she saw, and concluded just by looking at it that it would make her wise; something pleasant, specifically, to the eyes! Since we know it was an almond she saw, this suddenly becomes a much more logical reconstruction: it looked like an opening eye, and the devil had already suggested it would open her eyes (Genesis 3:5), so… how hard was it to make that leap?
The word “almond” comes from the Hebrew shaqed, which comes from the root word shaqad which means “to wake, watch, awake, be alert”. Thus even the Hebrew word itself tells us, this fruit is a conscious soul!
According to Strong’s, the almond was called shaqed because it was the first tree to bloom in the year. Brown-Driver-Briggs said it was “so called from its early waking out of winter’s sleep”. And isn’t that exactly what happened to Adam and Eve? They awakened from their sleep?
FIRSTBORN ALMONDS
This goes much deeper than you might think; God doesn’t make His metaphors lightly, they are thought through to the end (Psalms 119:96, John 10:35). Because just as making judgments can be deadly, if you pick the wrong ones… almonds can be both healthy… or deadly poison.
Almonds contain a compound called amygdalin which, when we digest it, is processed into cyanide –one of the most deadly substances there is. Modern almonds contain only traces of this, not enough to poison anyone; but wild almonds contain enough to kill you even in small doses.
Over thousands of years, selective breeding has created trees that reliably produce sweet almonds. But even a single tree, producing poisonous bitter almonds, can be changed into a healthy almond tree. A 4th century bishop wrote…
“Thus the sharp pomegranate and bitter almonds, if the trunk of the tree is pierced near the root to introduce into the middle of the pith a fat plug of pine, lose the acidity of their juice, and become delicious fruits.” (St. Basil’s Hexaemeron)
So literally, then, an almond tree can “bring forth bitter and sweet”, and eating their fruits can cause life or death. And Adam and Eve were clearly not yet qualified to choose which trees, or which fruit on those trees, would give life… and which would take it away.
Back to that word “to watch”, from which the Hebrews got the name for almond; in any city, the first to awaken to danger is de facto the one responsible (Leviticus 19:17, KJV margin; also Ezekiel 33:1-9). Thus, Moses and Aaron were the first ones God called in Israel, awakened to be the watchmen over Israel. So naturally, their rods were of almond wood!
But we are also the first ones wakened (Romans 13:11, 1 Corinthians 15:34). And those among us who are successful will be those whom God showed how to find the sweet almonds, or who made the bitter almonds sweet (compare to Exodus 15:25-26, 2 Kings 2:21-22, 4:41).
Using the knowledge of good and evil is, as I said above, the only path to eternal life in the FIRST resurrection. We were awakened to become more like Him (Psalms 17:15). And thus, eating the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is a step in that process. When the time is right.
When I was younger, I was obsessively strict about the letter of the law; which was as it should be. But as you grow, as you can be confident you fully understand the spirit and are making choices for the right reasons, you should be able to depart from the letter… if you see that the letter binds you unnecessarily to an outdated statute (like burying your dung, above).
Because you can’t truly become like God if you’re afraid to make judgments –even though there is always risk involved. If you always err on the side of safety, you will never learn what truth truly is (Luke 19:12-27).
He could have told those servants what to invest in; but He didn’t, because He needs you to find the perfect answer. If God wanted you to know the perfect answer, He would have told you; He didn’t, because it’s more important that you find the answer… than that you have the answer!
But finding the answer requires judgment; it requires eating the fruits of the tree, and then when you discover you picked a bitter fruit, using it to kill the part of your heart that led you to make that choice.
Which, if you looked a little closer at bitter almonds, you’d have already known; for the CDC says…
“Cyanide prevents the cells of the body from using oxygen. When this happens, the cells die. Cyanide is more harmful to the heart and brain than to other organs because the heart and brain use a lot of oxygen.”
Bitter almonds, the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, prevent you from using oxygen –from using the SPIRIT, the tree of life. And because of that, they kill your heart, which caused you to lust after the fruit; and kill your brain, your soul, which chose the wrong fruit.
The scripture cannot be broken.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
Romans 16:19 For your obedience is come abroad unto all men. I am glad therefore on your behalf: but yet I would have you wise unto that which is good, and simple concerning evil. And the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.
This is the one verse that shows that this was already said plainly in your Bible. Note that the context of the verse is Genesis 3:15; all God ever wanted was for you to be full of the fruits of the knowledge of good, and empty of the fruits of the knowledge of evil.
Think about it; isn’t it strange that a single tree can yield good and evil? Isn’t it strange that a single tree can bear healthy food and deadly poison? Is it right that two results come from the same source? James 3:9-11. If a spring shouldn’t give salt and fresh water, then should a tree yield life and death?
The pre-mortal Jesus felt “these things ought not so to be”. Read Galatians 3:10-13 very carefully. Think about it. Do you see what I see? This tree was not some random tree… but a particular reference to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil!
The tree, by its very name, can bring you either one –life or death. If you choose wisely, you live forever; but if you choose poorly, even once, you die forever. And that’s why the eaters of this tree were cursed, for “in the day you eat of it, you shall die!”
God didn’t want it that way; He wanted you to be capable of choosing only good; but to do that, you would have to first learn the fruits of choosing evil. And unfortunately, all of us bring forth sweet water and salty, bitter fruit and good; and that should not be.
In Galatians, Paul also references Deuteronomy 27:26, which is a later version of the same curse. And it was this curse, and all others brought by that same tree, which Jesus came to remove: the wages of sin being death.
Protestants widely believe that Jesus was, symbolically if not literally, crucified on a cross made from the tree of life. They believe this because the cross is an ancient pagan sign of life, based on various versions of sun and sex symbols.
Yet Jesus had no reason to be hung on the tree of life; for there was never a curse in the tree of life. There was no fear in the tree of life; there was no judgment in it. If you ate the fruit, you lived. But to eat of the other fruit… It’s called the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil.
That tree contains both good and evil fruits; both life and death are in its branches, as they are in every one of your choices. It was wrong for a tree to bring forth good fruit and evil at the same time; so Jesus became a man to fix that, to take away the bitter and leave only the sweet.
He made sure this tree could no longer produce good and evil, but only good; so that people could choose for themselves good, and find life; and choose for themselves evil, and upon repentance, be healed and STILL find life!
He came to die on that tree in our place. Because the tree of life pictured Jesus, not the tree He was tortured on. The “cross” He was hung on pictured the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. So it is no surprise that the whole world worships the cross; they worship the instrument that killed Jesus, rather than Jesus Himself.
That is the tree 3 billion Christians bow down to every day; the tree that killed them, instead of the tree that was hung upon it to save them. They worship the tree that gave them the freedom to make their own bad choices; not the one that gave them the chance to make better choices.
So no, the cross is not a sign of life; it is, in fact, the ultimate sign of death. And it was specifically to eat of the fruit of that tree that Jesus became a man… so that He could “taste death for every man” (Hebrews 2:9). Get that… He tasted the fruit of the tree of death for every man!
By doing so, He bore the curse of the tree without deserving it –and thus, could remove the curse from anyone else who made the wrong choice and did deserve it.
So that God could take away the curse, and leave only the blessing of the tree of the knowledge of good.