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I would like to research the common ground for our understanding of G-d's original plan of the creation if Adam didn't sin.

According to Sanhedrin 38, he was fully developed at noon, having 6 hours before Shabbat:

שעה ראשונה הוצבר עפרו, שניה נעשה גולם, שלישית נמתחו אבריו, רביעית נזרקה בו נשמה, חמישית עמד על רגליו, ששית קרא שמות, שביעית נזדווגה לו חוה, שמינית עלו למטה שנים וירדו ארבעה, תשיעית נצטווה שלא לאכול מן האילן, עשירית סרח, אחת עשרה נידון, שתים עשרה נטרד והלך לו

I heard source needed that if he could stay on that path, the first Shabbat would become the Days of the Messiah and he would be "happily ever after". That leaves him only 6 hours to act.

What were Adam's objectives in the original plan for the rest of the day and maybe for the Shabbat to reach the goal of the Creation? And what was on his to-do list to meet those objectives?

This question ("what-mitzvos-did-adam-have-in-gan-eden") focuses on the list of the Mitzvos Adam was/wasn't commanded, but I focus more on the general objective as the Mitzvos are only the tool to reach that objective/s.

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  • He was supposed to spend six hours not eating from the tree, and he becomes Mashiach. What’s the problem?
    – DonielF
    Mar 20, 2019 at 0:33
  • @DonielF First see my comment to YeZ. Second, it sounds really dull - the whole huge creation - the universe of stars, myriads of angels, millions of species - and all for not doing anything? Third, while eating from the tree was a warning, that couldn't be the purpose.
    – Al Berko
    Mar 20, 2019 at 14:06
  • You can pretty much ask that question even with creation as it is. Particularly if you take 6000 years metaphorically, all of humanity’s existence is just a blip in the grand scheme of things, both in time and space. The whole huge creation, and all for not doing anything in the grand scheme of things?
    – DonielF
    Mar 20, 2019 at 14:41
  • @DonielF If you notice, there's a flaw in our thinking. We derive tons of Halochos based on our common sense, but here you say - don't count on your logic. Yes, it is illogical and that's what the question is about. Nobody (esp G-d) toils for 6 days for a 6-hour not-doing-anything one-man show.
    – Al Berko
    Mar 20, 2019 at 14:54
  • כי לא מחשבותי מחשבותיכם
    – DonielF
    Mar 20, 2019 at 14:55

2 Answers 2

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I heard in a shiur from R' Moshe Shapiro that Adam was specifically supposed to do nothing.

He was created with tremendous spiritual capability, to the point that Midrashim tell us that angels had the notion of singing praises to him. And his challenge was to not do anything - that Hashem told him to nullify himself. The tremendous challenge was to overcome his ego and his need to assert himself as the one accomplishing.

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  • Wow, I'm truly amazed. Still, can't imagine that reality. what about וירדו בדגת הים or אכול תאכל? What about פרו ורבו? How does he treat the Gemmorah about having relations - was that a transgression? What part of the Chumash hints to that?
    – Al Berko
    Mar 20, 2019 at 14:02
  • @AlBerko He was eating and he was having children!
    – DonielF
    Mar 20, 2019 at 14:41
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Hashem gives Adam a job. Bereishis 2:15

וַיִּקַּ֛ח ה֥' אֱלֹקִ֖ים אֶת־הָֽאָדָ֑ם וַיַּנִּחֵ֣הוּ בְגַן־עֵ֔דֶן לְעׇבְדָ֖הּ וּלְשׇׁמְרָֽהּ׃

And Hashem, G-d, took the human and put him to rest in Gan Eden to work it and to guard it.

Ibn Ezra notes a tradition that "le'avdahh" refers to positive mitzvos and "lshomrahh" to prohibitions.

And 6 of the 7 mitzvos benei Noach were given to Adam. Except, Adam was commanded to be a vegetarian, rather than Noach's more limited prohibition of "eiver min hachai -- flesh from a living animal" [and all blood].


I don't know how to take the word "plan"... Hashem knew, after all, that Chavan and Adam would be eating the fruit. So would He have a plan for what to do otherwise?

Even just for the sake of preserving free will, the kind of free will they had before the sin is entirely unlike what we experience, now that we have to choose between good and evil. So again, I don't know if we can trace the applications to whether an alternate reality was possible. (Pre-sin Adam's free will could have been Compatibilist rather than Libertarian.)

Even worse... Physics doesn't accomodate an arrow of time. Spacetime is 4 dimensions, which of those directions is "time" is not the same for all observers. That was the big epipheny behind Special Relativity -- two people at motion relative to each other have different time vs space axes! There is nothing in the math to distinguish past from future.

Rav Dessler (Michtav meiEliyahu vol II pp 150-154, "Yemei Bereishis veYemei Olam") holds that the whole idea of a flow of time, that it’s a line running from past to present to future is an artifact of the human condition. And that before Eve and Adam ate from the Tree of Knowledge, people too related to time in a more complete way. Or, as our sages put it, the original Adam and similarly a baby prior to being born into a body “could see from one end of the universe to the other” — which Rav Dessler presumes includes time as well.

So, at this point there is no "future", even from Adam's perspective (and the concept never has meaning from G-d's) nevermind having any plans for it.

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  • Your answer is closer to my intention than the Q you marked as a duplicate. I rewrote mine to emphasize on the goal not on the Mitzvos as tools.
    – Al Berko
    Mar 20, 2019 at 21:19
  • 1. לעבדה doesn't look like a commandment, actually nobody says he was "commanded" to לעבדה only since the Torah mentions it it needs interpretation. 2. I would love R' Dessler to say those things some 200-300 years ago, but after R' Einstein said it it sounds less persuasive. 3. Nobody says Adam was in a different space-time reality (well, nobody was aware of the very existence of different viewpoints), but even though he should have had an objective, not only some Marshmallow test - if you don't eat the cookie you'll get an infinite number of them.
    – Al Berko
    Mar 20, 2019 at 21:25
  • Here's an interesting point for you. Say a litle kid should be commanded not to cross on the red light. But a grown-up man should not, as he understands that on his own - it is self-evident. THere's a contradiction between Adam's infinite knowledge and the need to command him on something he didn't know. If he was grown-up and all-knowing he would know the right and the wrong. And still he's commanded. Whyis that?
    – Al Berko
    Mar 20, 2019 at 21:28

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