Do Any Commentators Say Bananas were the 'forbidden fruit'?

Question

In an effort to have more kavanah when saying a bracha I began to learn about fruits and vegetables common in my diet. I stumbled across an amazing book called: Banana - The Fate of the Fruit that changed the world by Dan Koeppel. Practically his first order of business - chronologically - is addressing the idea that the banana considered (as he put it 'by biblical scholars') to be the forbidden fruit and not the apple.

His points range from the suggestive genital shape to the nutritional aspects the fruit provides. Considering other aspects of the book, I became open to the idea that - indeed- the banana could arguably be the forbidden fruit.

Are there any commentators that believe the same?

Answer 1

Jewish commenters do not believe the banana to be the Forbidden Fruit, yet mention of it is made:

In the Middle Ages, the notion that the Forbidden Fruit is the banana appeared in several places. In 1277 Nathan HaMe’ati translated the Rambam’s medical work Pirkei Moshe (Aphorisms of Moses) from Arabic into Hebrew. In the section detailing the medicinal effects of the banana (20:88), Nathan HaMe’ati calls it the “apple of Eden.” The sixteenth-century Rabbi Menachem de Lonzano, in his Ma’arich, a work explaining foreign words in rabbinic literature, says the banana is a well-known fruit in Syria and Egypt that the Arabs call “the apple of Gan Eden.” Today, some bananas are known by the Latin names Musa paradisiaca (fruit of paradise) and Musa sapientum (fruit of knowledge). Identifying the Tree of Knowledge with the banana appears to be a Christian tradition from at least the twelfth century that enjoyed popularity but was never adopted by rabbinic sources.

(Source: Ari Z. Zivotofsky; linked article in this answer.)

Answer 2

Apple is not a Jewish opinion. The Talmud, Sanhedrin 70a--b discusses a few options, including grapes, figs, and wheat. The Tosfos commentary there points out that the description of a tree would imply a perennial, so it's possible that wheat was a perennial back then.

As bananas aren't true perennials and they don't come up in that conversation in the Talmud, I'm not aware of any indication in Jewish sources that they were the forbidden fruit.

Answer 3

No there is no such opinion which specifically sayss a banana was the fruit. There are 6 other possibilities which includes grapes, figs, barley, an esrog, wheat, or unknown.

The unknown position reasoning is the fruit was never revealed so as not to dimish it in the eyes of people. According to this view it is possible that it could be any type of produce or plant, however, this gives us no reason to suspect any one specific fruit such as a banana and isn't proof that it could be either.