Could the Garden Have Sustained an Unfallen Humanity Forever?

[Aaron]

...Let alone the Earth?

With no death, the earth would have been fully populated long before the days of Noah. What then?

 

[Alan Dale Gross]

"Could the Garden Have Sustained an Unfallen Humanity Forever?"​

The Garden, of course, no different than Heaven will be Sustained, Forever.

No worries, however, because God Chose to Create man mutable, which meant that
"inevitably" Adam would choose to disobey God and since God Knew that was an unavoidable matter that was certain to happen,
God had Prepared a Lamb Slain before the Foundation of The World.

"Father, I Will that they also, whom Thou hast Given Me,
be with Me where I Am; that they may behold My Glory,
which Thou hast Given Me: for Thou Lovedst Me before the Foundation of the World." John 17:24.

 

[Aaron]

The Garden, of course, no different than Heaven

The Garden...vastly different than Heaven...but that's for another thread.

No worries, however, because God Chose to Create man mutable, which meant that
"inevitably" Adam would choose to disobey God and since God Knew that was an unavoidable matter that was certain to happen,
God had Prepared a Lamb Slain before the Foundation of The World.

God prepared a world with finite resources...meaning it was never going to go on indefinitely.

 

[atpollard]

The land area of the Earth is 510,100,000 square kilometers.
The maximum Carrying Capacity of an agrarian society (with simple farming) is about 2000 people per square kilometer.
That places the maximum population of the earth at over 1,020 billion people.
If they advance to “hydroponic agriculture”, then the population can increase to 6,500 billion people.
If God allows “vertical farming” in this unfallen earth, then the population can increase to 50,000,000 billion people.

I am just saying that even without death, it will take a while to fill the Earth.

 

[Deacon]

In the land of Eden, God made a special controlled environment, a garden.
There he placed Adam and Eve.
The possession of immortality was dependent upon humanity's access to the Tree of Life in the garden.

Rob

 

[Aaron]

The land area of the Earth is 510,100,000 square kilometers.
The maximum Carrying Capacity of an agrarian society (with simple farming) is about 2000 people per square kilometer.
That places the maximum population of the earth at over 1,020 billion people.
If they advance to “hydroponic agriculture”, then the population can increase to 6,500 billion people.
If God allows “vertical farming” in this unfallen earth, then the population can increase to 50,000,000 billion people.

I am just saying that even without death, it will take a while to fill the Earth.

No animals were dying either. All were vegetarians.

 

[Aaron]

In the land of Eden, God made a special controlled environment, a garden.
There he placed Adam and Eve.
The possession of immortality was dependent upon humanity's access to the Tree of Life in the garden.

Rob

Certainly one tree couldn't provide for an exponentially expanding human population, but death wasn't an issue prior to the advent of sin.

 

[Aaron]

The land area of the Earth is 510,100,000 square kilometers.
The maximum Carrying Capacity of an agrarian society (with simple farming) is about 2000 people per square kilometer.
That places the maximum population of the earth at over 1,020 billion people.
If they advance to “hydroponic agriculture”, then the population can increase to 6,500 billion people.
If God allows “vertical farming” in this unfallen earth, then the population can increase to 50,000,000 billion people.

I am just saying that even without death, it will take a while to fill the Earth.

If each couple had only 2 children, and no one died they would reach over a thousand billion individuals in only 55 generations, about 1200 years.

 

[Reformed]

...Let alone the Earth?

With no death, the earth would have been fully populated long before the days of Noah. What then?

Could the Garden have sustained an unfallen humanity forever? If it was God's purpose to do so. The question is moot because sin entered the world and its resulting death to all men (Romans 5:12).

 

[atpollard]

No animals were dying either. All were vegetarians.

Using the 1 trillion population and the 100 years per generation of the first few generations after Adam, it would require 40 generations of population doubling to reach the 1 trillion people population limit. 40 generations x 100 years per generation is 4000 years of peaceful cooperation to "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it" [Gen 1:28].

It seems reasonable that in 4000 years of cooperation, 1 trillion people would have “subdued” the Earth, and the Moon and moved on to subduing Venus and Mars to spread the Garden of Eden throughout God’s creation.

Look what we accomplished from 2000 BC to 2000 AD (4000 years) with a fallen and divided population on a cursed world and imagine what a true People of God could have accomplished working together in that time period with God’s blessing.

 

[Aaron]

Could the Garden have sustained an unfallen humanity forever? If it was God's purpose to do so. The question is moot because sin entered the world and its resulting death to all men (Romans 5:12).

It's moot for the likes of you and me, but not for those who say the earth was made for that purpose.

 

[Aaron]

the 100 years per generation

Why 100 years? You're saying it took 100 years for a child to grow up and get married off? Plus, you're forgetting the animal population.

 

[Aaron]

It seems reasonable that in 4000 years of cooperation, 1 trillion people would have “subdued” the Earth, and the Moon and moved on to subduing Venus and Mars to spread the Garden of Eden throughout God’s creation.

After all, the fertility of Mars and Venus and their temperate climates are well known.

 

[atpollard]

Why 100 years? You're saying it took 100 years for a child to grow up and get married off?

[Gen 5:3, 6 KJV] 3 And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat [a son] in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth: ... 6 And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat Enos:

Plus, you're forgetting the animal population.

I also used the least efficient agriculture. With the most efficient agriculture, that 1 trillion population would only need 1/50,000 the surface area of the earth, leaving 99.998% of the Earth’s land available for animals.

 

[atpollard]

After all, the fertility of Mars and Venus and their temperate climates are well known.

The US achieved a moon landing with the resources of 200 million people.
After 3000 years, the population of Eden Earth will be greater than 1 billion, allowing 1 billion to 1 trillion people, working together for 1000 years to unravel how to terraform Mars and Venus.

That does not seem like a technical impossibility when one considers what we achieved with fewer people from the year 1000 AD to the year 2000 AD and not working together.

 

[Charlie24]

...Let alone the Earth?

With no death, the earth would have been fully populated long before the days of Noah. What then?

The way I see it, it will be the same in the future as it would have been there in the Garden if sin never entered the world.

In the Garden there would have been no end to procreation, it would have carried on into infinity.

If you believe in a pre-trib resurrection that would mean there will be people just as we are now (without a glorified body) entering into the Perfect Age that carries on into infinity.

The seas are done away with, I guess to give the earth more room for population, and who knows why God created all those other planets, maybe for us.

 

[Aaron]

The US achieved a moon landing with the resources of 200 million people.
After 3000 years, the population of Eden Earth will be greater than 1 billion, allowing 1 billion to 1 trillion people, working together for 1000 years to unravel how to terraform Mars and Venus.

That does not seem like a technical impossibility when one considers what we achieved with fewer people from the year 1000 AD to the year 2000 AD and not working together.

Work is a curse, brother. Man didn't get bread by the sweat of his brow till he was expelled from the Garden. That's when he was tasked with plowing and irrigation and seeding and harvesting. Heck, he wasn't even clothed.

 

[Aaron]

who knows why God created all those other planets, maybe for us.

We're told why the heavenly bodies were created. They were created to measure time and seasons, and to give their light upon the earth.

In Scripture, there is no difference between a star and planet, so the composition of the light is immaterial. The sun is a fire, and the moon is a rock, but they're both called lights.

The way I see it, it will be the same in the future as it would have been there in the Garden if sin never entered the world.

In the Garden there would have been no end to procreation, it would have carried on into infinity.

If you believe in a pre-trib resurrection that would mean there will be people just as we are now (without a glorified body) entering into the Perfect Age that carries on into infinity.

The seas are done away with, I guess to give the earth more room for population,

Yeah, Dispensational Premillennialism has spawned a number superstitious notions.

 

[Charlie24]

We're told why the heavenly bodies were created. They were created to measure time and seasons, and to give their light upon the earth.

In Scripture, there is no difference between a star and planet, so the composition of the light is immaterial. The sun is a fire, and the moon is a rock, but they're both called lights.


Yeah, Dispensational Premillennialism has spawned a number superstitious notions.

We don't even know how many planets there are out there, or how far out they reach.

All of this is not for the times and seasons for the earth, there is a much bigger picture here.

 

[Alan Dale Gross]

The Garden...vastly different than Heaven...but that's for another thread.

God prepared a world with finite resources...meaning it was never going to go on indefinitely.

Really?

Could the Garden have sustained an unfallen humanity forever? If it was God's purpose to do so. The question is moot because sin entered the world and its resulting death to all men (Romans 5:12).