What fruit?

The scriptures below (Genesis 3:1-7) refers to fruit. What fruit? I have seen it said some place that it was an apple. If so is it the same apple we have or it was different?Any insight will be helpful.GENESIS 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?GENESIS 3:2 And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden:GENESIS 3:3 But of the fruit of the tree which [is] in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.GENESIS 3:4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:GENESIS 3:5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.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, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.GENESIS 3:7 And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they [were] naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.

some answers are best left unsaid.

Ummm... and why is this important? Just wondering. [laughs] I remember when my youth pastor taught this, he said it was a persimmon just because he hates those. I thought it was funny. I, uh, don't really think that detail matters. Why do you want to know?

No Idea!It doesn't say. I think people just use an apple as an example cause it's the most common fruit. Everyone knows what an apple looks and tastes like. It must have been pretty tasty and appealing though...

I had also read somehwere that it was sex. not sure if the serpent was a man tho? or a beast has sex with Eve?

The suggestion would be consistent with the strange "serpent-seed" doctrine taught by (if I recall correctly) William Branham in his later years. I don't think the suggestion was intended to be wantonly vulgar, if the poster was familiar with Branhamite teaching, but I'd be very wary of anyone believing it (it includes a rejection of the doctrine of the Trinity, a somewhat moderate form of Jesus-only).

I agree the teaching is wildly heretical and grotesque. I feel the same zeal that people not fall for falsehood.Let us simply expose and deal with the false as it comes up, teaching sound doctrine whenever we can.May God guide us, in Spirit and Truth.

A more interesting (to me) matter comes from here:GENESIS 3:4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely dieI believe we're hearing this same lie today, indeed often we're flooded by it, under the title "Once Saved, Always Saved."

II Peter 1:5-8, is the kind of fruit that God commands His children to add to their faith. The reason I said 'command' is because the word 'add' is imperative mood. God is not inviting anyone to do anything. "He's saying, he that hath an ear to hear, now HEAR." This is what it means in the original text.We don't know for sure what the fruit in the garden looked like. Eve wasn't walking in the Spirit, so she was drawn away and enticed. For all we know that fruit could have been just different from all the other fruit, and that is what enticed her, when she wasn't staying in tune with God.It's no different with anyone of us, if we are starving we will probably eat anything just like Israel did when they continually turned from God, and He brought famine. They ate their children, heads of goats, carcasses of dead birds, etc.Because of disobedience.The "fruit" of the Spirit is not talking in tongues for 2 hours, and chewing wood off of the ceiling in a praise service. And then proclaiming to the world false doctrine. That is the fruit of apostasy, bringing forth good fruit requires more than, just appearing to the eyes to have it.

Apples are the fruit of an Apple treeOranges are the fruit of an orange tree...Would it not be the case that the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil is the knowledge of good and evil?

"Would it not be the case....?"Yes.Stephen Kaung makes precisely this point in "Christ in Genesis: Adam's Tree" -- available for download here at SI.(I'm computer "challenged". Sorry I can't link you.) :-)

Stephen Kaung Christ in Genesis: Adam's Tree(Still a 'challenge' for me also Roger, just ask Greg :-( )

I know I know... it was a pear!!! Not an apple. Not an orange. Put a pear! Then again, maybe it was a Plumb.

I believe as to what type of fruit it was is not particularly important.Eve was tempted (as well as Adam) and sinned because of unbelief. The seed was planted when the serpent said "Can it really be that God has said" (Genesis 3:1 AMP) and Eve believed the lie that is implicit in the serpent's beguiling of Eve. Is God holding out on me? Once the seed sprang forth it resulted in sin but the root of it at least in my mind is when she believed what the serpent said.Sin begins to look appealing when we believe God is not interested in our lives, in our problems, etc. The root sin in Adam and Eve's life was unbelief.

You asked for clarification about this statement."The "fruit" of the Spirit is not talking in tongues for 2 hours, and chewing wood off of the ceiling in a praise service. And then proclaiming to the world false doctrine. That is the fruit of apostasy, bringing forth good fruit requires more than, just appearing to the eyes to have it."Ok, without veering too far from the topic,what I meant here is that too many people within the pentecostal/charasmatic circles, follow after experiences and not doctrine. And much of the teaching is based on experiences of speaking in tongues. In fact if a person has never spoken in tongues, they are told that they have not received the Holy Spirit, and therefore they are not saved, isn't that right? I know it is because I sat in a UPC church for six years, hearing this constantly, and watching people beg God for this experience.If it was your birthday, and your Dad offered you a gift, would you fall on you knees and beg him for it? I've seen people leave God because someone kept telling them that they have to have this salvation requirement. And when they try sometimes for years and years, and don't receive it they feel rejected by God, and condescended by those who have.While many of those people show no real fruit in their lives. I'm speaking in general terms, I'm not saying that this is the case with every pentecostal.Love is what activates all of the fruits of the Spirit. And love is agape, not phileo, it is bowing to the will of God, dying to self, and receiving the hagias pneuma, Holy Spirit, to speak the same words or (confess) all the truth as Jesus Christ, and the apostles did.Jesus said that He is the vine, we are the branches, and if we are in Him, we all will speak the same words.This is not happening in these movements, as well as many others, therefore something must be wrong with the fruit. This is what the bible says.

While that kind of error is sadly common in Pentecostal circles, the UPC is not typical of all of them. For one, it's Jesus-only Oneness if I recall correctly, which is blatant heresy. The belief that tongues is the initial evidence of the Baptism of the Holy Ghost is quite common, and I'm not sure I disagree, still trying to figure that out myself. The idea that someone who hasn't received the fullness of the Holy Spirit isn't saved, however, I very much disagree with, and I know whole movements of Pentecostals who feel the same way.The movements are very much in need of revival or replacement, but not all of them have gone the way of the heretics. As for speaking in tongues and making doctrine up off of it, in the circles I know tongues are fairly rare (in service) and if it's not Scripturally justifiable they're not going to take it as doctrine.Don't judge the Pentecostal movement by the UPC, just as you wouldn't judge the Reformed Baptists by the Primitive Baptists.

Keith-In my post, I said that I was speaking in general terms. I'm not saying that the entire movement adheres to these things. It's not only in the UPC that I've heard this though. I've also heard it in my uncle's Church of God assembly, in a few AOG churches, and a few like pentecostal groups as well.The thing that I have found most annoying though, is trying to perform for God's favor. Hearing things like "If you do X,Y, and Z, God is obligated to bless you" and on the other end of the pulpit " I wonder why I don't feel God, I tithed, I fasted this week, I prayed a lot," etc,etc.Or the self-appointed fruit inspection committee, who feel it's "of God" to tell people things like " I was in the bathtub last night when God told me to tell you, blah, blah, blah," It's unbiblical, and it can get way out of hand. I don't think that I've ever encountered these things in other denominations. If this is fruit, I'll stick to meat.