I created humankind in my own image, in the image of God I created them—male and female. I blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it; manage the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and every living creature that moves on the ground." I said, "Behold, I have given to you every herb bearing seed that is on the face of the ground, and every tree that bears fruit with seed; to you I have given these as food. As for the wild animals of the ground and the birds of the air and every living creature that moves upon the earth, I have given grass as their food." And thus it was. I saw everything that I had made, and it was very good. There was evening and morning—the sixth day. All creation was completed. On the seventh day, I finished the work of creation and ceased all my labors, resting. I blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on that day I had finished my work of creation and rested. The account of how I created heaven and earth, on the day I formed heaven and earth, was as follows: the wilderness had no grass or vegetation, and no crops had yet grown in the fields, for I had not sent rain upon the earth, nor had any human been there to till the soil. Yet there was mist rising from the earth, watering it abundantly. I formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and he became a living being endowed with spirit, named Adam. I established a garden in the east, called Eden, and placed the man I had formed there. I caused all kinds of trees to grow from the ground, beautiful to the eye, bearing fruit suitable for food; and in the midst of the garden there were the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and it divided into four streams. The first stream was called Pison, flowing around the entire land of Havilah, where gold was found, and the gold was of high quality, and there also were pearls and rubies. The second stream was called Tigris, flowing around the entire land of Cush. The third river is Hiddekel, flowing east of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates. I placed the man in the Garden of Eden, and instructed him to tend and care for it. I said to him, "You may freely eat of every tree in the garden, except the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day you eat of it, you will surely die." I said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make a helper suitable for him." I brought before him every wild animal of the field and every bird of the air, and named each one as he saw it; and whatever he named, that was its name. The man gave names to every animal and every bird of the air and every wild beast of the field, but he did not find a helper for himself. Then I caused him to sleep, and while he was sleeping, I took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh. I took the rib that I had taken from the man and formed it into a woman, and brought her to the man. He said, "This is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, for she was taken out of man." Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were naked, yet they were not ashamed. I have made only one thing more cunning than any other living creature in the field—the serpent. And the serpent said to the woman, "Did I really say, 'You shall not eat from every tree in the garden'?" The woman replied to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from every tree in the garden, but about the tree in the middle of the garden, we were told not to eat from it nor to touch it, or else we would die." Then the serpent said to the woman, "You will not die. For I know that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will know good and evil." So the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eyes, and desirable to make one wise; and she took and ate it, and also gave some to her husband, who ate it too. Their eyes were opened, and they knew that they were naked; so they took fig leaves and made themselves tunics. A cool wind arose, and I walked in the garden. The man and his wife heard my voice and hid themselves among the trees in the garden, to avoid meeting me. I called to the man and said to him, "Where are you?" He answered, "I was in the garden and heard your voice; I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid." I said to him, "Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?" He said, "The woman whom you gave to me to be my companion brought me the fruit from the tree, and I ate." I turned to the woman and said to her, "What have you done?" She replied, "The serpent deceived me, and so I ate." Then I said to the serpent, "Since you have done this, you shall be cursed more than any other animal or wild creature; you shall crawl on your belly all your life, and you shall eat dust." I will also make enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. Her offspring will wound your head, while you will wound his heel. To the woman I said, "I will greatly increase your pangs in childbirth; you will bear children with great suffering. You will long for your husband, and he will rule over you." To Adam I said, "Since you have listened to your wife and eaten from the fruit of the tree I commanded you not to eat from, the ground will be cursed because of you. You will toil all your life to earn your food from the ground. The ground will produce thorns and thistles, and you will eat your food from the plants in the field. You will sweat until you die, for you were formed from the dust, and you will return to dust." Adam named his wife Eve, because she was the mother of all living. I made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them. I said, "He has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. But now, perhaps he will reach out and eat from the tree of life, and thus live forever. So I will send him out of the Garden of Eden to cultivate the soil of his own origin." And I sent him out. I also stationed cherubim at the east side of the garden, and placed four rotating swords blazing with fire, to guard the way to the tree of life." Then the Lord God recounted in detail the process by which He had originally created all things—Heaven, Earth, and everything in them—so that everyone present was deeply amazed, falling to their knees and praising Him with their voices. "A God of immense power! Indeed, the entire world was created by Your holy hands!" Gao Liang, under Ying'er's guidance, had read the biblical passages in the Book of Genesis, chapter by chapter, verse by verse, and now remembered them clearly. What the Lord God had just described matched the Bible exactly. It seemed clear that the Bible was a divine revelation, the very word of God. God's creation of the heavens and the earth, and of humanity, was without error. The only thing that was wrong, however While the highlights were striking and everyone was bewildered, the Lord God spoke: "I should not have created the serpent! I did not know that the serpent was more cunning than any other living creature in the field." The divine words left everyone astonished, all eyes fixed upon Satan, who was kneeling on the ground—the embodiment of the serpent, the ancient king of darkness and source of evil. It was through this serpent that temptation took hold, leading humanity to sin, driving them out of the Garden of Eden, and thus introducing sin into the world. From that point on, humanity lived in sin, and death entered into existence.