The story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is told using pictures, symbols, and poetry.  That alerts us to a deeper meaning in what happened there than could have been told in literal prose.  The story’s symbolism doesn’t imply that Adam and Eve aren’t literal; they were the first living human beings.  Many of the pictures we find in the New Testament don’t make sense without a literal Adam and Eve.  We can’t be reborn “in Christ” if we aren’t first born “in Adam”. The story begins in Genesis 2.

Two Trees

Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed.  The LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Genesis 2:8-9 NIV

The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.  And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”

Genesis 2:15-17 NIV

The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil seems to be a metaphor that symbolizes human free will.  We have free will to make decisions in many areas of our lives, but this is specifically about moral free will – our freedom to choose either good or evil.  As amazing as the world God created is, souls with genuine free will to make real choices and decisions might be the most amazing thing in all of God’s creation.  Without it, we could only mimic love, doing what we were programmed to do.  

But giving us genuine free will was also risky.  It meant we might choose to rebel against our Creator and join Satan in his mutiny.  It seems God decided our ability to truly love was worth the risk.