Genesis 3:22-24, We Are Going Through This Because We ARE Going To Life Forever: The Way Of Eden

I just discovered an apparent difference in the ancient Aramaic point of view, per Victor Alexander's translation, from the modern Western theological understanding. It says in the Aramaic Genesis 3:22 that Adam "extended his hand and took from the tree of life and ate, so he could live forever (to the end of the universe)." So it is a given that we are to go on living forever. You know, of course, that the Western Bible says that God kicked Adam out of Eden "lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever." That is, God gave Adam the boot to keep him from doing it. But we are not in this state to keep us from eating of the tree of life; we are here because we did. This world is the because-you-are-going-to-live-forever-you-have-to-till-the-land program. Because Adam was (and is) going to live forever, "so He drove out the man."

I discovered this while looking into the word Horeb. I believe that Mount Horeb (Aramaic: Khooriv) is a particular meditative state. I once achieved it. I was actually driven to it in a vision. 'Horeb' means heat, to parch - a wasteland, desolation: a barren place laid waste by conflict, a hot, dry place of thorn bushes. No, it was not a happy place for me. It was a place of deep regret. Yet I am SO glad I found it, that I was driven to it by Jesus Christ. For it was through this emotional desolation that I received the Holy Spirit. Because of that experience I believe that the "burning bush" referred to in Moses' vision in Mount Horeb points to an emotional state he experienced in meditation, a meditation about Jethro, God's abundance. In my meditation I saw that I had enjoyed God's largesse without recognizing Him, honoring Him, or even ever thanking Him. I had robbed God of whatever use He purposed for me when He had given me life. He owned me, and I had stolen me. I was a rebel, a thief, and there was no rock big enough to hide me from the Infinite I was kneeling before. 

God brought me to "the flaming sword which turned every way (as thorns do), to preserve the way of the tree of life" (Genesis 3:24c KJV parenthesis mine; see Mount-Sinai by Jeff A. Benner), because I am going to live forever, and He wants me to become like Him. I have got to be submitted to Him, honoring Him, loving Him, delighting in Him for that to happen. Moses serves God in Horeb.

Victor Alexander's translation's footnote says, "And ejected him the Lord God, and climb up from the Easterlies the Paradise of Eden carob and the swords teeth and returnable would be to guard the road of the Tree of Life." "And the swords teeth" = the thorn bush: that distasteful, hard-to-accept, humiliating submission of the whole person to the will of God. Whole-hog un-ness. Total God acceptance.

KJV: "So He drove out the man; and He placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life." I enlarge on Bullinger notes in The Companion Bible: a) placed = Hebrew shakan, to place in a tabernacle, hence, to dwell. This is a watched holy place; b) "a flaming sword" = "the flaming sword, the thorny required submission; and c) "every way" is Hebrew haphak, meaning every way, effectually preserving submission as the only way of the tree of life.