Apple Sanity

Apple Sanity (Ăp’əl Sǎn’ǐ-tē) is the name of an alternative interpretation to the Abrahamic story of "The Fall" of Adam and Eve. Contrary to the traditional Christian doctrine that The Fall represents the loss of God's divine grace (thereby creating the necessity for all to find salvation), the philosophy of Apple Sanity claims that humankind should embrace its fate of inheriting pain, suffering, and mortality, as part of the worldly knowledge gained from eating fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. That is, the expulsion from the Garden of Eden should be viewed as a gift instead of a curse.

Origins

The term, Apple Sanity, was coined by Dinah Cheshire, a contributor to a website of the same name, applesanity.com According to this site, the concept of Apple Sanity is defined as:

1. The soundness of judgment and reason that is gained after eating fruit from the Tree of Knowledge
2. The quality and condition of inheriting original sin, taking residence east of the Garden of Eden, and losing divine, supernatural grace

Hence or otherwise, one of the main foci of the website is to provide accounts of the so-called "depravities" of human nature, both historial and recent. Examples range from articles concerning the Donner Party, the Symbionese Liberation Army, to current and controversial issues such as the War on Drugs.

Interpretations

Christian Tradition

The traditional, mainstream Christian interpretation of The Fall holds that this event marks the origin of original sin, which is different than personal sin, in that the former is the sin of humankind, and is thus, inherited. While Adam and Eve were born into paradise and blessed with immortality, the condition of being born with original sin is that all of Adam's progeny must endure the pain and suffering associated with mortality. Passages that outline this condition include Genesis 2:16-17:

16. And the Lord God commanded the man, ‘You may freely eat of every tree of the garden;

17. but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.’

Additionally, the inheritance of original sin is given in Romans 5:12:

Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned—

Consequently, the lives of all humans are marked (and to an extent, defined) by struggles, instead of living in bliss.

In the letters of St. Paul to the Romans, the fifth chapter continues by describing how humankind's original state of living in paradise and supernatural grace was a "free gift" that God bestowed upon Adam. However, in verses 15-17, St. Paul writes:

15. But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died through the one man’s trespass, much more surely have the grace of God and the free gift in the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for the many.

16. And the free gift is not like the effect of the one man’s sin. For the judgement following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brings justification.

17. If, because of the one man’s trespass, death exercised dominion through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness exercise dominion in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

Here the traditional Christian interpretation of original sin becomes clear. St. Paul has answered the question of why humans inherit the sin of adam but not the sins of their parents: Since all of Adam's children (and in turn, all of humankind) were born outside of paradise, they cannot receive the gift of paradise. Accordingly, the only possible route back into paradise is the acceptance of Jesus Christ as savior.

Apple Sanity Reaction

The "Apple Sanity" viewpoint is essentially a rejection of the conclusions drawn by St. Paul, concerning the true nature of The Fall. In contrast, it takes the Felix Culpa interpretation to its logical extreme. While Felix Culpa holds that The Fall is a gift in disguise because it allows for humans to have the free will of choosing between good and evil (thereby making salvation more meaningful), Apple Sanity sees The Fall as purely a gift, undisguised, and without the traditional necessity for salvation. This viewpoint even surpasses the interpretation written by Phillip Pullman in His Dark Materials, which states that bliss is not worthwhile if innocence comes with ignorance.

The conclusion of Apple Sanity is a total embracement of the human condition. The difference lies in the fact that both the Christian and Felix Culpa interpretation perceive mortality as a curse. However, the Apple Sanity perspective stipulates that mortality is actually a gift, and the defining element of humanity. Taking inspiration from Wallace Stevens' poem, "Sunday Morning," the argument is that with mortality comes the ability to understand finality: life and death, beginnings and ends, and bliss and suffering. An excerpt from Sonnet V argues:

Death is the mother of beauty; hence from her,

Alone, shall come fulfilment to our dreams

And our desires.

Additionally, Sonnet VI questions whether immortality in paradise is truly a paradise at all:

Is there no change of death in paradise?

Does ripe fruit never fall? Or do the boughs

Hang always heavy in that perfect sky,

Unchanging, yet so like our perishing earth,

With rivers like our own that seek for seas

They never find, the same receding shores

That never touch with inarticulate pang?

Instead of dreading of fearing death and mortality (or seeking salvation as away to live on in an afterlife), the conclusion drawn is that death is an essential, defining aspect of life that is to be accepted. If one were to go in the direction of St. Paul and tradition Christian teachings, one would actually be denying a mortal death for an immortal paradise. Seeking salvation under the intent of rejecting mortality, therefore, becomes a contradiction of Apple Sanity principles.

See also

• The Fall of Man
• Original Sin
• Epistle to the Romans

External links

• Apple Sanity, Sunshine [...], available at url: http://www.applesanity.com/
• National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America