THE EDENIC COVENANT
Scriptures:
Genesis 1:28-30:
“And God blessed them. and God said unto them Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth and subdue /f and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens, and over every living fling that moves upon the earth. And God said Behold, I have given you every herb yielding seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you, it shall be for food. 30 Also, to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food”; and it was so.”
Genesis 2:15-17:
“Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
Hosea 6:7:
But they like Adam have transgressed the covenant: there have they dealt treacherously against me.
The Participants in the Covenant
The Edenic Covenant was made between God and Adam in which Adam stood as the representative head of the human race. Thus, the actions of Adam are attributed to the whole of humanity.
The Provisions of the Covenant
Altogether, there were a total of seven provisions in the Edenic Covenant.
First: man was told: Be fruitful and mu//t§/y and replenish the earth {Gen. l: 28a. The earth was created for the purpose of being the habitation of man, and then man was created on the sixth day. Man was told to populate the earth; so, the increase in population is part of his commission. The earth was to be filled with humanity.
Second: man was told to subdue the earth (Gen. 1:28b). Previously, authority over the earth had been given to Satan (Ezek. 28:11-19a. But when Satan fell, he lost his authority over this earth. That is the reason Genesis l:2 describes the earth as being covered by water and darkness being over the face of the deep. Hence, God began to form and fashion the earth anew to make it habitable for man, and this time He would give man the authority over the earth. Man was to subdue it; he was to use the natural resources and energies of the earth that God had provided for him. However, this did not mean he was allowed to pollute it!
Third: man was given dominion over all living things (Gen.1:28c). The earlier provision gave man authority over the earth as far as nonliving things were concerned. This provision extended man’s authority over all living creatures. The entire animal kingdom on the earth, in the air, and in the sea was put under the authority of man. The first exercise of this authority was man’s naming of the animals (Gen. 2:19-20}.
Fourth; this provision concerned man’s diet (Gen. l:29-30; 2: l6). At this point, man was to be a vegetarian. There is nothing in this covenant that allowed him to eat of the animal kingdom although he was to exercise authority over it. No blood of any kind was to be shed.
Fifth: this provision directed man to dress and to keep the Garden of Eden (Gen. 2: 13. Even in his unfallen state, man was not to lead a life of pure leisure; work was part of the human ethic even before the Fall. However, labor was easy, and the land would produce easily; it was not toilsome.
Sixth: the sixth provision forbid man to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen. 2:17). This was the only negative commandment in the entire Edenic Covenant and was the one point that would test man’s obedience. He was free to eat of all the other trees of the garden but was to refrain from eating of that one. This was the one test to see how man would respond to the will of God; it was a test of the recognition of and the submission to the will of God. Man was not to assume that, because he was given authority over the earth and the animal kingdom, he himself was independent of God and exempt from God’s law. The question that raises is, “Will man, like Satan before him, reject God’s right to rule and declare himself independent of God?”
Seventh: this provision contained the penalty for disobedience: spiritual death (Gen. 2:17b). This does not refer to physical death because man did not die on the very day that he disobeyed the commandment. So, the death spoken of here is talking about spiritual death. In the day that he eats of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil/, he will be separated from God and will die spiritually.
The Status of the Covenant
The Edenic Covenant was the basis for what many call the Dispensation of Innocence. The record of the Edenic Covenant being broken is found in Genesis 3:1-8.
Satan appeared in the Garden of Eden as a fallen creature. This shows that man was not created in a perfect universe, for sin was already in existence. Although it was not yet existent in man, it was already present in Satan. The devil did his work of tempting man in the same three areas as set forth in I john 2:16.
Eve gave in to the temptation and disobeyed the one negative commandment. Adam recognized what had happened, but he still chose to join his wife in disobedience. Their first reaction was an attempt to hide from the presence of God, which only illustrated the truth of Genesis 2:17. Man at that very moment died spiritually and could no longer share the same communion with God he had experienced before his disobedience. With that act, the Edenic Covenant, being conditional, came to an end.