Did God literally and visibly walk in the garden?

[Lonewolf]

From http://www.gotquestions.org/God-walk-garden.html [reference added by a moderator]

Genesis 3:8 says, “And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.” We know that God is spirit (John 4:24), so how exactly could He be “walking” in the garden?

First, it is clear from Genesis 3:8 that God’s approach in the garden was heralded by a “sound” or a “voice.” The verse begins by stating, “They heard the sound” of the Lord God. Whatever form God took, it certainly allowed for the physical production of sound. His walk was audible; He was making noise.

The verse also mentions the “presence” of God “among the trees” of the garden. It was a presence that Adam and Eve acknowledged and thought they could hide from. So, God’s garden walk included both sound and some sort of presence among the trees.

Even given these two statements, interpretations differ greatly. Some emphasize the fact that God the Father is invisible and cannot be seen by humans. According to this view, God did not appear in the flesh; rather, He took on a symbolic, incorporeal appearance, such as a cloud, much like He did with the Israelites in the desert with Moses (Deuteronomy 31:15).

Others suggest that the idea of God “walking” refers to a theophany—an appearance of God in a tangible, human form. Theologians who hold this view point to a parallel in Genesis 18, where God appears as one of three (seemingly human) visitors to Abraham.

Another theory is based on the Hebrew phrase translated “the cool of the day.” This could be literally translated “the wind of that day.” Some think this might refer to a strong wind. If so, Adam and Eve’s reaction makes more sense. They heard God’s approach as a terrible wind lashed the trees of the garden, and they took cover. God called (using a Hebrew word that also means “to summon”) Adam to face judgment. Acts 2 records an interesting parallel: the coming of the Holy Spirit was accompanied by “a sound like the blowing of a violent wind” (verse 2). Also, God spoke to Job “out of the whirlwind” (Job 38:1).

It is clear God Himself confronted the sinners (Adam & Eve) and issued judgment, but did God appear in human form or in a cloud, or did He made His presence known by a windstorm?

[Furstentum Liechtenstein]

The Bible says what it says: God walked and was seen. God also walked and was seen in Genesis 18. God also walked and was seen, John 1:10.

FL

[Philip]

he Bible says what it says: God walked and was seen. God also walked and was seen in Genesis 18. God also walked and was seen, John 1:10.

Could not that have been the Son, the preincarnate Jesus?

[Lonewolf]

John 1:18 reads, 'No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him.'

Exodus 33:20 reads, 'But He (God) said, "You cannot see My face, for no man can see Me and live!"'

[Silvertusk]

The Bible says what it says: God walked and was seen. God also walked and was seen in Genesis 18. God also walked and was seen, John 1:10.

FL

I would add then that this was a theopany and this was actually the Son and not the Father.

[Furstentum Liechtenstein]

Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is One, Dt 6:4.

We cannot see God the Father and live. We can see God the Son and live, and many have seen Him.

FL

[PaulSacramento]

Genesis 3:8 says, “And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.” We know that God is spirit (John 4:24), so how exactly could He be “walking” in the garden?

First, it is clear from Genesis 3:8 that God’s approach in the garden was heralded by a “sound” or a “voice.” The verse begins by stating, “They heard the sound” of the Lord God. Whatever form God took, it certainly allowed for the physical production of sound. His walk was audible; He was making noise.

The verse also mentions the “presence” of God “among the trees” of the garden. It was a presence that Adam and Eve acknowledged and thought they could hide from. So, God’s garden walk included both sound and some sort of presence among the trees.

Even given these two statements, interpretations differ greatly. Some emphasize the fact that God the Father is invisible and cannot be seen by humans. According to this view, God did not appear in the flesh; rather, He took on a symbolic, incorporeal appearance, such as a cloud, much like He did with the Israelites in the desert with Moses (Deuteronomy 31:15).

Others suggest that the idea of God “walking” refers to a theophany—an appearance of God in a tangible, human form. Theologians who hold this view point to a parallel in Genesis 18, where God appears as one of three (seemingly human) visitors to Abraham.

Another theory is based on the Hebrew phrase translated “the cool of the day.” This could be literally translated “the wind of that day.” Some think this might refer to a strong wind. If so, Adam and Eve’s reaction makes more sense. They heard God’s approach as a terrible wind lashed the trees of the garden, and they took cover. God called (using a Hebrew word that also means “to summon”) Adam to face judgment. Acts 2 records an interesting parallel: the coming of the Holy Spirit was accompanied by “a sound like the blowing of a violent wind” (verse 2). Also, God spoke to Job “out of the whirlwind” (Job 38:1).

It is clear God Himself confronted the sinners (Adam & Eve) and issued judgment, but did God appear in human form or in a cloud, or did He made His presence known by a windstorm?

Most, and that includes me, Christians believe that it was Christ that was walking in the garden.
The Son IS the WORD of God and in the OT whenever GOD spoke or was "seen", it was the Son.

We must always remember that when we read about God that it means Father, Son and HS, you can't have one without the others, it simply doesn't work that way.

[1over137]

Lonewolf, please always provide a link if you copy-paste something into the quote. It is in our guidelines also.
Thanks.

[Jac3510]

I actually think that Gen 3:8 is poorly translated when we render it something like, "Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day." For reasons I'll briefly outline below, I suggest a much better translation is something like, "They man and his wife heard the thunder of the LORD God--the wind of the storm--going to and fro throughout the garden."

Now reread the entire account with that translation and see if the whole thing doesn't make more sense, both contextually and in Adam and Eve's immediate response in 8b.

As for a very brief defense of that translation (since it is not attested to in any major translation):

The key words in question are (from the standard translation) the words for "sound," "walking" and "day." The first is qwl, which usually means sound or voice. There is no indication in the text that God was talking, so perhaps on the standard translation they heard his footsteps. But the word in question, when it means "sound" usually has a much bigger idea in mind. When we look at the standard Hebrew lexicon, the BDB, we see its other meanings include things like thunder, approaching runners, stampedes, earthquakes, the sound war, etc. Doesn't much sound to me like pleasant footsteps! It certainly, though, could be the sound of an approaching and severe storm.

The second word is hlk, which straightforwardly means "to walk." So the picture is God walking about the garden. But, again, "to walk" is not the only meaning possible here. In this case, the verb is in a rarer form (the hithpael, if you want to know) that usually has the idea of repeating the action over and over again. So "walking about," even if that were the correct translation, wouldn't seem to have the idea of a pleasant stroll but rather a running to and fro throughout the area, filling it, searching it. It's more urgent and could well describe very graphically a windstorm shattering the otherwise normally serene calm tht was Eden.

The final word is "day," which you probably know is yom. The actual phrase is ruach yom, lit. "the spirit/breath/wind of the day," and so translates take "wind" here to mean "the breeze of the day," from which they get the idea of the cooler part of the day. That's a lot of steps to get to that translation. Moses had a perfectly good word for "cool" if he had wanted to use it. And besides, I, for one, didn't know there was a part of the day that was particularly breezy. On the other hand, we can take the word yom to be a totally different word--a homonym--(which is common enough in Hebrew), and here take yom to mean "storm" (which is an attested meaning, by the way). In that case, the proper rendering would be "the wind of the storm."

Anyway, do with that what you please. The traditional translation is attested as far back as the LXX, so it needs to be given great weight. But, I just think that, in this case, contextually, the rendering I have suggested is better. For more on this, see the article "The Cool of the Day?" in Gary Pratico's Basics of Biblical Hebrew. Forgive me for not having the page umbe exactly, but it is somewhere around page 400 if memory serves me correctly.

God bless!

edit: tl;dr - I think God "appeared" in a storm. That is, it was a storm theophany. I don't think God was there walking around in human form. Besides, I take it that mankind, being the image of God, is understood in Genesis 1-3 as the physical, visible representation of the immaterial, invisible God. So God doesn't need to present himself in human form. That sort of takes away a little bit of the force of what Adam and Eve actually are, in my mind. So long as they are in God's will, things are calm and the world works. It is when they break God's will and cease to function as what they actually ARE that problems start. So the storm theophany is a very powerful image of the nature of what had just happened (and, for the observant reader, what is still happening when the believer fails to be what he or she actually is as God's representative).

[Furstentum Liechtenstein]

I actually think that Gen 3:8 is poorly translated when we render it something like, "Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day." For reasons I'll briefly outline below, I suggest a much better translation is something like, "They man and his wife heard the thunder of the LORD God--the wind of the storm--going to and fro throughout the garden."

It does make more sense as ''The man and his wife heard the thunder of the LORD God - the Wind of the storm - going to and fro throughout the garden'' especially since what was about to transpire was Judgement on them for their sin. God the Father shows up here and there as a dark cloud/brooding storm in the Bible when judgement is at hand.

Thanks for something to think about, Jac.

FL

[PaulSacramento]

I actually think that Gen 3:8 is poorly translated when we render it something like, "Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day." For reasons I'll briefly outline below, I suggest a much better translation is something like, "They man and his wife heard the thunder of the LORD God--the wind of the storm--going to and fro throughout the garden."

Now reread the entire account with that translation and see if the whole thing doesn't make more sense, both contextually and in Adam and Eve's immediate response in 8b.

As for a very brief defense of that translation (since it is not attested to in any major translation):

The key words in question are (from the standard translation) the words for "sound," "walking" and "day." The first is qwl, which usually means sound or voice. There is no indication in the text that God was talking, so perhaps on the standard translation they heard his footsteps. But the word in question, when it means "sound" usually has a much bigger idea in mind. When we look at the standard Hebrew lexicon, the BDB, we see its other meanings include things like thunder, approaching runners, stampedes, earthquakes, the sound war, etc. Doesn't much sound to me like pleasant footsteps! It certainly, though, could be the sound of an approaching and severe storm.

The second word is hlk, which straightforwardly means "to walk." So the picture is God walking about the garden. But, again, "to walk" is not the only meaning possible here. In this case, the verb is in a rarer form (the hithpael, if you want to know) that usually has the idea of repeating the action over and over again. So "walking about," even if that were the correct translation, wouldn't seem to have the idea of a pleasant stroll but rather a running to and fro throughout the area, filling it, searching it. It's more urgent and could well describe very graphically a windstorm shattering the otherwise normally serene calm tht was Eden.

The final word is "day," which you probably know is yom. The actual phrase is ruach yom, lit. "the spirit/breath/wind of the day," and so translates take "wind" here to mean "the breeze of the day," from which they get the idea of the cooler part of the day. That's a lot of steps to get to that translation. Moses had a perfectly good word for "cool" if he had wanted to use it. And besides, I, for one, didn't know there was a part of the day that was particularly breezy. On the other hand, we can take the word yom to be a totally different word--a homonym--(which is common enough in Hebrew), and here take yom to mean "storm" (which is an attested meaning, by the way). In that case, the proper rendering would be "the wind of the storm."

Anyway, do with that what you please. The traditional translation is attested as far back as the LXX, so it needs to be given great weight. But, I just think that, in this case, contextually, the rendering I have suggested is better. For more on this, see the article "The Cool of the Day?" in Gary Pratico's Basics of Biblical Hebrew. Forgive me for not having the page umbe exactly, but it is somewhere around page 400 if memory serves me correctly.

God bless!

edit: tl;dr - I think God "appeared" in a storm. That is, it was a storm theophany. I don't think God was there walking around in human form. Besides, I take it that mankind, being the image of God, is understood in Genesis 1-3 as the physical, visible representation of the immaterial, invisible God. So God doesn't need to present himself in human form. That sort of takes away a little bit of the force of what Adam and Eve actually are, in my mind. So long as they are in God's will, things are calm and the world works. It is when they break God's will and cease to function as what they actually ARE that problems start. So the storm theophany is a very powerful image of the nature of what had just happened (and, for the observant reader, what is still happening when the believer fails to be what he or she actually is as God's representative).

Actually that is a very good possible interpretation.
I think that more natural reading seems to imply a physical "walking" of God and I think that if the writer had written that it was the Spirit of God or the "Cloud" of God ( as per Job for example) that he would have.
Now, it maybe that the writer wanted to give a certain "personification" of God to the event to make it more personal - God assumed human form to cast judgment, He came DOWN to Adam and Eve and din't just
"fly above them" in a position of Supreme All-mightiness.

[Lonewolf]

So basically what I'm understanding from all your responses is that man has only seen manifestations of God (i.e, in human flesh, or in the midst of a burning bush); but he has never seen God (the Father or the Son) in His true spirit image, right?

[crochet1949]

According to Genesis 3:8 "And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden ----" He is conversing with them. So why wouldn't it be literal and visible. Back in ch 1:26 "Then God said, "Let Us make ......" 1st mention of the trinity. I and My Father are One. And they were Also separate 'beings' in the New Testament. Jesus Christ was talking / praying to His Father in heaven.

[PaulSacramento]

So basically what I'm understanding from all your responses is that man has only seen manifestations of God (i.e, in human flesh, or in the midst of a burning bush); but he has never seen God (the Father or the Son) in His true spirit image, right?

I agree because of the warning that any that see God (in His true form) will die.
It is also my view that it was Jesus (Pre-incarnate) that Adam and Eve saw in a physical form.

[crochet1949]

Would the relationship that Adam and Eve experienced with God while in the Garden be Different than what He allows Now -- After the fall? In other wards God would have Allowed them to actually See Him and fellowship with Him visually while they were still in their innocence -- but once they were no longer in that original state -- and thrown out of the Garden -- He didn't allow Himself To be seen? Just thinking out loud. Never really thought about it until I saw this thread.