I especially don’t find your argument in the second paragraph convincing, where you posit that Jehovah’s commandment or law is the “implied object.” That seems fishy to me.

The Garden was for man a “training ground,” getting him ready for his work outside the Garden. Man is in the Garden as a priest, and a priest is a a worker in the Garden-sanctuary. Priests in Scripture “serve” and “guard.”

Furthermore, worship would take place only on one day. God left Adam alone at the end of the sixth day. We know that because He came back the next day, in Genesis 3. There’s only one day in the week in which God is present “as the Spirit of the Day,” contrary to those who claim that God used to walk with Adam in the breezy evening (”the cool of the day,” which is an impossible translation). What was Adam to do on Sunday through Friday, when God wasn’t present?

I think the solution is to understand the implied object as (Jehovah’s) commandment or law (which is always femanine). He is to “obey it” (the command) and to “fulfill it” (the commandment). The obvious purpose of man in the Garden is not simply to do what he would do after he sinned only “enjoying” it. The point is that his purpose in the Garden (as the temple sanctuary) is to live a God-ward life. The Garden itself is only a means to his fellowship and communion with God, and it is the place where God has provided everything that he could need or enjoy to live. In the Garden, he is a worshiper, not a worker.

So, yes, i agree that Adam is the High Priest of God in the Garden-temple. But my point is, simply, that such a role is best described in terms of worship and fulfillment of God’s commandment than in terms of being the Garden sexton, even if in a pre-fall state.

But in response to Trey, I’d want to point out that the verbs for “serve” and “guard” have feminine suffixes indicating the object or person being served and guarded. While the word I’ve translated “serve” may have something to do with worship in other places in Scripture, here the feminine suffix indicates that it’s not God who is being “served.” Now I grant that the word for “garden” here is normally masculine, so that’s a bit mysterious, but if I remember my research correctly, it does appear to be feminine in at least one passage in Scripture.

Moreover, later on, when Adam is driven out of the garden, he is sent out to “serve” the ground. It’s the same word and it’s likely that the word is being used in the same sense here.

As for “guard,” I wonder if you can point to any passage where the word means “obey.” Perhaps you’re thinking of the passages that say, “Keep the commandments.” But even if I grant that the word means “obey” there, which itself is something that needs proof, that usage isn’t an absolute use of the verb. There’s an addition (”the commandments”). Can you find a place where the word all by itself means simply “obey”?

I’m satisifed that these words mean “serve and guard” and that their object is the Garden, which, of course, includes the Woman who is (and is in) the Garden.

Day 5 does not match Day 2. It matches Day 3. The fish swim in the waters alright, but it is the waters between the lands, and not simply the primordial deep. The fowl of the air are considered land animals though. They are told to fill the earth, not the firmament. Neither fish nor fowl are called “rulers” either, and thus the Kingdom and Kings setup fails.

With this in mind we see that the days (all 7 of them) make a chiasm, with Day five working as the center, paralleling both first and last.

Having just preached through this a few months ago, my own translation of the “tend and guard” would be “worship and obey.” Of course, the translation has to do with the object. If the object is the guarden, “worship” makes no sense. But i’m convinced that the garden is not what the text intends as the object. Rather, Jehovah himself is the object. God put Adam in the garden to worship and obey him. He gave him the sanctuary and all privileges and gifts, and all he asked was for man to fulfill the purpose for which he was created.

Of course, this just shows that, even in the idealest circumstances, man wouldn’t do what he was called to do, which was the heart of the sin–failure to worship Jehovah only and obey what he said. Rather, man chose to abandon the one who had created him and given him all that there was to give to follow Jehovah’s enemy and the piddly promise gaining “wisdom.” Man showed that he would not worship as God called him to (i.e., he’s an ingrate), and that he would not obey (i.e., that he’s a rebel).

This pattern is repeated in Genesis 6, when, just like in Genesis 3, the men who had been called to worship (through sacrifice) and obey God (living out the cultural mandate) refused to do so, but rather followed the “sons of God” (i.e., like the being behind the serpent, an angel who, in the words of Jude, left their proper abode in order to seek out carnal lusts). The men of Noah’s day (even the descendants of Seth, who, by the way, were not the “sons of God”) chose to give their daughters in marriage to “men” who showed no restraint or godliness, and they also chose to honor and revere the children of these unnatural marriages (i.e., they were the great ones and men of repute) rather than cherishing what was honoring to God in what he instituted was good and proper.

Neiswonger