Already in Chapter 2, this fact was covered in brief. But the incident in the Garden of Eden set the course of human history from that moment. It determined the direction followed by humanity from the beginning until now. It is necessary that we understand more thoroughly - even at cost of partial repetition - just HOW the attitude of shame toward sex was injected into the human tradition.
God had told the first man Adam that he as a man, was wholly physical. Here was the newly created man. Grasp the significance if you can! Suddenly a full-grown adult MAN received consciousness. He looked around. Everywhere he saw BEAUTY! There were colorful flowers, stately trees, green lawns, entrancing shrubs, shimmering pools, the audible laughter of a rippling stream. He was surrounded by breathtaking magnificence.
Then the man looked at himself. He must have wondered, "WHAT AM I?" Once I remember, I fainted. Then when consciousness again came suddenly, the question was gasped involuntarily, "Where am I?" But Adam must have wondered not only where, but WHAT!
And God told him. "You are DUST." After the man had sinned, God said "...out of [the ground] wast thou taken: for DUST THOU ART, and unto dust shalt THOU return." God did not say "dust your BODY is." He said the conscious MAN was dust - composed of matter. The revelation of God is plain: "God formed MAN of the dust of the ground" (Gen. 2:7). This man, composed of physical matter from the ground, became a soul (same verse). This scripture does not say God put an immortal soul into a material body. It says God breathed BREATH into his nostrils - into the MAN'S lungs. God breathed this breath - this air - into the man's nostrils, just as all men breathe air in and out of their nostrils - just as dumb animals do!
This man, composed of matter out of the ground, became a breathing living soul. The soul then came out of the ground. The soul is composed of matter, not spirit. The word "soul" is translated from the Hebrew nephesh. It means "life of animals." But what has all this to do with the origin of this teaching that sex is evil? IT HAS EVERYTHING TO DO WITH IT!
Satan uttered the first recorded lie in the history of mankind. He told mother Eve she would not surely die - or in other words, that she was an "immortal soul." But GOD says souls that sin SHALL DIE (Ezek. 18:4 and Ezek. 18:20). God said to Adam and Eve that if they took of the forbidden fruit, "Thou shalt surely die."
God gave the first man and his wife full instruction in regard to His intended purposes and uses of sex, as we shall cover in detail later. God ended His instruction - His teaching - of necessary basic spiritual and physical knowledge, as recorded in Genesis 2:24: "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh." Then follows verse 25, "And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed."
NOTICE CAREFULLY! God had been personally with Adam and Eve. The three had been talking together. Adam and Eve were naked. Nothing in God's instruction regarding husband-and-wife relationship had caused them to experience any sense of shame in regard to sex. In the privacy of this one married couple, bound in marriage by the Holy God who was speaking with them, there was absolutely no sense of shame in regard to sex.
Now continue right on - next verse! See what now happened! Remember as originally inspired and written, the Bible was not divided into chapters and verses. These were added by uninspired men much later, as a matter of convenience in biblical study. The very next verse, continuing immediately, is verse 1 of chapter 3:
"Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the ETERNAL God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?" Immediately Satan begins to discredit revelation as the fountain source of knowledge - that is, God's teaching. He subtly and craftily implies: "Look! God knows better than that! God was misrepresenting!"
God had told Adam and Eve that the wages of sin is DEATH - for eternity - ETERNAL punishment! God told them they were MORTAL and could DIE! Satan uttered the first recorded lie of history: "Ye shall not SURELY die!" In other words: "Why, God was deceiving you. He knew you are IMMORTAL SOULS!
As soon as Satan got in his lying deceptive talk, and the woman had obeyed him, eating the forbidden fruit, and her husband deliberately had eaten it with her, the next verses tell us this: "And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons" (verse 7).
Now continue next verse: "And they heard the voice of the ETERNAL God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the ETERNAL God amongst the trees of the garden. And the ETERNAL God called unto Adam, and said unto him, WHERE ART THOU? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I WAS AFRAID, BECAUSE I WAS NAKED; and I hid myself" (verses 8-10).
Notice God's answer! "WHO TOLD THEE THAT THOU WAST NAKED?" (verse 11). Yes, WHO put the sense of shame about sex in the minds of Adam and Eve? It was SATAN who had been telling them things! GOD DIDN'T!
All the time GOD had been talking to them, instructing them in true and right knowledge, they were naked. But NOTHING in all God taught them gave them any sense of shame toward sex. This idea that sex is evil CAME FROM SATAN. It was an accusation against GOD - an attempt to make what GOD designed appear to be contaminated and degrading. It was inextricably tied up with the false "immortal soul" lie!
When God had talked with Adam and Eve, immediately following their very creation, He was instructing them in a situation of husband-and-wife privacy. As long as they were the only humans, alone by themselves (so far as any other humans are concerned), God gave them no instruction to cover their bodies.
God is everywhere present at all times - omnipresent! When a husband and wife today are alone in the privacy of their own bedroom, GOD is invisibly present! But when their children, and other people - the PUBLIC - "ALL LIVING" - are introduced, then we read that GOD HIMSELF clothed Adam and Eve. Notice it! It appears later in the same chapter:
"And Adam called his wife's name Eve: because she was the mother of ALL LIVING [her children - their family - the public]. Unto Adam also and to his wife did the ETERNAL God make coats of skins, and clothed them" (Gen. 3:20-21). Notice the expression, "The ETERNAL God... clothed them." The Hebrew word God inspired Moses to write here for "clothed," is labash. It does not mean to cover shamefulness - to hide nakedness - or any such meaning.
The Hebrew word meaning to conceal nakedness is kasah. But the word Moses was inspired to write labash, means rather the donning of apparel, raiment. It refers rather to outer garments than underclothing. It implies the idea of adorning, or decorating, or displaying, rather than concealing or covering over, or hiding.
In the incident of Noah's drunkenness, he apparently had been violated by Canaan, son of Ham. Shem and Japheth, also sons of Noah, backed up with a garment on their shoulders, and "covered the nakedness" of their father (Gen. 9:23). They were hiding, concealing, the result of a sinful act. Here the Hebrew word for "covered" is kasah.
So notice God did NOT kasah Adam and Eve - did not hide shamefulness, conceal nakedness, but rather He labashed them - adorned, clothed them. Of course this clothing did cover nakedness. The difference between the two Hebrew words, labash and kasah, is one of purpose and intent, rather than the fact of being covered. Both do cover nudity. But the Hebrew kasah, carries the connotation of concealing, or hiding something that might be shameful, while labash includes no such meaning, and implies adding attractiveness rather than hiding shamefulness. In other words, although God's clothing did cover their bodies, it DID NOT imply any sense of shame in what God designed.
This does not mean, under any circumstances, that God would approve public nudity. NOT AT ALL. God CLOTHED man! God intended man to KEEP CLOTHED! God intended that we NEVER expose or exhibit the pubic region of our bodies except in the privacy of marriage - but THE REASON is not because the pubic region which GOD designed and made is degrading or evil, but rather as a matter of proper modesty and decorum!
It is a matter of propriety - of courtesy to others - that we take care of certain eliminative functions privately. This does not imply there is sin or evil in going to the toilet. It is a matter of etiquette - consideration for others - rather than to cover up something WRONG. In the same manner, God wills that we wear clothes - that we do not expose the sex region of the body - as a matter of decorum and propriety, and to avoid temptation that could lead to sinful wrong use - but NOT because the sex organs which God designed are themselves evil.
The second additional reason for avoiding indecent or lewd exposure is that undue exposure of the female body is automatically lust-arousing to the carnal male mind. Burlesque and girlie shows, strip-tease acts, and all such exhibitions, are deliberately intended to attract male admissions for profit through lust. Nevertheless, these passages in Genesis show positively that the origin of the concept that sex is evil and shameful originated with SATAN - and not from God!
The pagan world accepted this lie. As a teaching or doctrine, it became a universally accepted dogma. This fable was popularized by the Greek philosopher Plato, founder of the curricular system of education. Plato wrote it in his book "The Phaedo."
Thus the real MAN is represented as being spiritual, pure, good, righteous, already having immortality. It represents the body - the FLESH - as being essentially evil, filthy, nasty. Sex organs and sex functioning are physical - of the BODY, and therefore fleshly, sensual and evil. Thus Satan has implanted the concept that what GOD designed and created is evil, while man is righteous.
Remember Satan is a spirit person - the former archangel, the cherub Lucifer - with no physical body - no sex or power of reproducing himself. Therefore he is envious of these attributes bestowed on man. He tries to discredit them and represent them as evil - yet also to glorify them as objects of lust. Satan is the real author of prudish dualism. He also goes to the opposite extreme today. He also is the real author of the so-called "New Morality," which is in fact gross IMmorality. In this extreme, Satan deceives people into accepting sex as an IDOL of lust.
In both extremes, he deceives humanity into EVILS by which he seeks to DESTROY the human race! This satanic doctrine of dualism is the very antithesis of GOD'S revelation of the true FACTS. It is a diabolical LIE! God formed MAN of the dust of the ground. MAN IS FLESH - matter. And God beheld everything that He had made, and behold IT WAS VERY GOOD! It is what man thinks and does that is sinful. But Satan blasphemes the Holy GOD by saying that what God made was very filthy, nasty, evil and sinful.
This is the satanic dualism injected into the original Babylonic religion (Gen. 10). It spread into the pagan religions, and into Egypt. From there it flowed into ancient Greece and then the Roman world. We have already covered its injection into post-apostolic Christianity.