by Jakob Lint

Created on: October 17, 2008

The Fruit in Question

I wish to argue that the fruit which got Adam and Eve into hot water was not an apple; a rather bland, commonplace fruit, that inspires no real desire. I think a rewrite of our conception is in order, one in which the apple becomes something else, some other fruit. First thing that comes to mind would be a mango, maybe a kiwi, or at the very least a cherry. Actually, a cherry would be perfect.

A plum, blood-red cherry - only one - hanging off of an apple tree. Why not? It can work. It would make more sense. It would be infinitely more tempting than an average apple hanging amongst its friends. Why in nine hells would anyone reach for one of those? It's simply not tempting enough, not worth the effort. Unless, but I don't want to go into deep here, analyzing theological symbols to draw out of them, or rather infuse into them levels of unnecessary meaning is not my style. I deal with simple things.

Apples are boring, while Cherries pop. Which would you rather represent the fall of man?

When cherries disappear, when they are devoured, it is always with vicious appetite, and afterwards one is left satisfied, and a little ashamed of the "manners" employed in the consumption. This adds perfectly, as clearly, after Eve had handed Adam her cherry, and while he was in the process of devouring it, they both felt as though they were doing something wrong. Just that adds enormously to the relatability of the situation. With the way things are now, the fruit perceived to be an apple and all, people are having trouble relating. I've met more than one religious person who had a bone to pick with Eve. They often use expletives to describe her, vulgar words barely befitting a flapper, much less so the mother of mankind. I think that they would have an easier time forgiving her if it were a cherry.

Now, I know there are those of you who say that we shouldn't mess with the word of god, but if you read the bible closely you will notice that the fruit in question was never specified. God never said, "Eat anything, but leave my apples alone." No, the bible mentions a fruit, not a particular fruit. So really all we are doing here is changing our perception of what the fruit was. Thanks to a number of prominent artists throughout history we believe that the fruit was a stale apple, when in truth it may have been anything, maybe even a juicy cherry.

You are wondering what it is we can do to rectify this injustice. You think that maybe the ship has set sail with the apple on board and that the cherry missed its chance. I disagree. All we need to do is tell people about the cherry. Whenever you are in a conversation with a friend, or coworker, or enemy simply bring up the apple thing, tell them that it in fact was a cherry and with that we should have this problem solved. Also, and this is very important for future generations, if you know an artist who may be producing a work of art depicting the garden of Eden, tell him to paint a cherry, for Eve's sake, a cherry.

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