Chapter II.
That the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was in paradise, and that the serpent was there, is not to be condemned. And what some understand by the serpent, Adam and Eve.
7. However, there was also the tree of knowledge of good and evil in the garden. For you have this: God brought forth a beautiful tree for sight, and good for food, and the tree of life in the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil (Gen. II, 9) Afterwards, we will see whether this beautiful tree for sight, and good for food, was like the rest. For in that place it will be more opportune to discuss this, where we find that man was deceived by tasting from this tree. In the meantime, we have nothing to criticize, although we may not understand the reason. For we should not rashly condemn the creature of the world, if anything seems difficult to us to understand and incomprehensible to our intellect, like the creature of serpents or some venomous animal; indeed, we are still unable to understand and know by what means each individual thing has been made. Therefore, in divine Scriptures, let us not easily criticize something that we cannot understand. For there are many things that are not to be measured by our own intellect, but are to be valued from the depth of divine arrangement and the word.
For put, without prejudice to the assertion to come, therefore you dislike this tree of the knowledge of good and evil, because after men tasted of it, they understood that they were naked; however, I will tell you concerning the fulfillment of the divine operation and this tree sprouted in paradise, and therefore it was permitted by God, so that we may know the excellence of good. For how, indeed, if there were no knowledge of good and evil, would we discern any distinction between good and evil? For we would not judge something to be evil unless there was knowledge of good; but knowledge of good could not exist unless there was good. And likewise, we would not know something to be good unless there was knowledge of evil. Take an example from the very condition of the human body. Indeed, it has a certain bitterness of bile, which if considered in common, is found to be useful for the health of man. Therefore, what we think is evil is often not entirely evil, but useful in common. For just as a good thing is in part of the body, and yet is beneficial to the utility of the whole body: so God, knowing the knowledge of good and evil, established it in part, so that it would be beneficial to the common good.
9. Finally, you find the serpent in paradise, surely not begotten without the will of God. However, the devil is in the form of the serpent. For even the prophet Ezekiel teaches that there was a devil in paradise, when he says about the prince of Tyre: 'You were in Eden, the garden of God' (Ezek. 28:13). And we understand the prince of Tyre in the figure of the devil. Shall we then accuse God, because we cannot comprehend the hidden treasures of His height and knowledge in Christ, unless He deems it worthy to reveal them to us? Nevertheless, it is revealed that we may know that the malice of the devil can also be beneficial to the salvation of men. Not because the devil wishes to benefit, but because the Lord turns his malice, even while resisting, to our salvation. Indeed, by virtue of this malice, Job, the holy man, became more illustrious in his virtue and patience. By means of this malice, his righteousness was tested, so that he might strive and conquer, and that a crown might follow victory. For no one is crowned except the one who has legitimately striven. Joseph's chastity would never have come to our attention if his master's wife, incited by the burning arrows of the devil, had not tried to seduce him, and ultimately caused his death, in order to highlight the purity of a man who would choose death over compromising his virtue. Do you want to know God's plan? It seems that, with the devil as author, death is prepared for just men and even the murder of their children; yet the Lord also tested Abraham in this way, by asking him to sacrifice his own son to Him. By the temptation, Abraham was proven faithful to the Lord, in that he was not recalled from the duty of devotion nor from mercy for his beloved son. Likewise, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in paradise; which was beautiful to look at, and appeared good for food. Yet it was not good for food, for its food seemed to obstruct humans. Therefore, it harms individuals but benefits the community, just as the devil harmed the Jews, but he crowned all the apostles except him, who overcame his temptations.
Therefore, it is neither to be doubted nor to be criticized that the devil was in paradise; since he could not block the way for the saints, so that no one could ascend. For he did not snatch away the dwelling of the righteous as a possessor. For even if he may have turned away some lazy and wicked ones from the possession of the heavenly dwelling, that which will be excluded by the prayers of the saints is much more august and much more beautiful, when this is fulfilled: I saw Satan falling like lightning from heaven (Luke 10:18). Therefore, let us not fear him, who is so weak that he himself is about to fall to the ground. He has indeed received permission to tempt: but he has not received the opportunity to overthrow, unless the weak affection, which does not know how to seek assistance for itself, falls of its own accord. And therefore, by what deceit he tempted the first man, and what he thought was to be tempted in man, in what order, by what art we must know, so that we can beware.
However, most of those who wish to assert that the devil was not in Paradise, although we have read in the Scriptures that he stands in heaven with the angels, interpret this passage according to their own understanding so as not to seem to be contradicting our language. For before us, there was Philo in his book On the Creation of the World, who declared that a transgression had been committed by man through pleasure and sensation, taking the form of a serpent for delight and constituting the sensation of the soul and mind in the form of a woman, which the Greeks call αἴσθησις. But with a deceived sensation, he asserted that the mind followed the transgression, which the Greeks call νοῦς. Therefore, in Greek, the νοῦς of the man received a form, the αἴσθησις of the woman. Hence, some have interpreted Adam as the earthly νοῦς. However, the Lord placed those virgins in the Gospel (Matthew, XXV, 1 et seq.) waiting for the bridegroom's arrival with their lamps lit or extinguished, representing either the intact senses of the wise or the corrupted senses of the unwise. For if Eve had possessed these lit lamps, that is, the senses of the first woman, she would never have ensnared us in the tangles of her transgression, nor would she have fallen from the immortality of virtue.