While I do not agree with everything in it, a recent book by Ian R. Harvey, The Lineage of the Life: Revealing Paul’s “Man of Sin” (Outskirts Press, 2018) which critiques the popular and rather naïve understanding Latter-day Saints tend to have about the Fall and related issues. I touched upon this in my review of Fiona and Terryl Givens, The Christ Who Heals (2017) who similarly reproduce the simplistic and overly positive view of the Fall of Man, notwithstanding the explicit witness of D&C 29 and other texts that speak of the Fall rather negatively. Here are some excerpts to whet one’s appetite if they wish to pursue this work and topic:
There is no mention of the “wisdom of Eve” anywhere in the Book of Mormon or for that matter anywhere in our entire canon. Nowhere in the Book of Mormon does it state or make the case or even insinuate that Eve was a heroine for having done that which Adam was either unwilling or unable to do—disobey God. In fact, every other prophets or the Bok of Mormon who talks about the Fall (aside from Lehi), does so focusing on agency’s consequences when exercised in unrighteousness. No other Book of Mormon prophet suggests divine purpose behind the Fall.
The false notion that our first parents—after being married by God Himself and introduced into the Garden of Eden with a promise of joy in their posterity—were mysteriously infertile became popular with President Young’s “Adam-God” theory. That false theory was entirely based on Eve’s statement objectively recorded just after the angel notified her and her husband of the contingent possibility of their rescue from exile, and when he had commanded them to repent. (Moses 5:11) Her response there comprises a statement of rationalization, not of truth. (D&C 58:43; D&C 93:24-25) Lehi lacked access to these divine litmus tests, and in 2 Nephi 2 believed her at face value but struggled to fit her perspective (vv.22-25) into his otherwise profound sermon. He said in v. 17, “I suppose, according to the things I have read . . . “ But we are not obliged to believe there was divine purpose to the Fall when such a belief contradicts the very words of God Himself in D&C 29:39-41 and in Moses 6:48. Can we legitimately say “wickedness was never happiness” while simultaneously holding fast to the myth that what Adam and Eve did (blatantly disobey God; exactly obey Lucifer—what we would normally call wickedness) actually gave rise to joy? When I read Moses 6:48, I learn that it was not joy at all that was produced by the Fall, but rather misery, woe and subjection to Lucifer. We would be much better positioned to explain the nature of evil in our fallen world with a clear recognition of why that evil is so wantonly pervasive: obeisance to Lucifer that made him “god of this world.”
I find that Eve is not heroic because of her disobedience to God, but rather because of her and Adam’s willingness to repent and to show us how to do the same . . . and to covenant with God. (pp.27-28)
Delusion
If not for our transgression we should never have had seed (Moses 5:11) is a delusion by definition since it fails the divine litmus test for truth and we are even told the ultimate source: Lucifer (the Lie “there is no other way”).
Note in D&C 93 the statements sowing how the divine test of truth applies specifically to Eve’s hypothetical never would have rationalizations (v.24, 25) and explicitly refers to the context of the Fall (v.38) relative to keeping the commandments (v.27, 28) as individual moral agents (v.30, 31) from the beginning (v. 25, 31, 38). (p. 184, emphasis in original)
We LDS claim that Jesus Christ is central to the Plan of Salvation. But having also insisted the Fall was necessary to bring about the Atonement, we find ourselves creating an Eve-worshipping culture at the expense of the self-consistent views of moral agency, at the expense of a truthful God, and at the expense of understanding the true purpose of the Eden portrayal inside our sacred temples. We LDS cannot suddenly claim belief in the grace of Jesus Christ while simultaneously clinging to some formerly favorite doctrines, principally that it was necessary that Adam and Eve and their posterity should become subject to sin precisely so that we might become privileged to work out our own salvation. (p. 34, emphasis in original)
The Prophet Joseph sought clarification of the Fall and received D&C 29 as answering revelation. This revelation again clearly assigns the causal transgressionary actions of our first parents to agency exercised in unrighteousness. (p. 35, emphasis in original)
