You’re right. Whether or not Genesis was figurative or literally still serves the same purpose to explain as you mentioned: Free will, sin, and our fallen nature.
But like @Andrew0409 said it’s a really hard topic to “explain God with our finite minds and limited language”. Andrew is absolutely right in this regard.
And he knew we were imperfect–he created us that way, so he created sin.
I don’t see why you would choose to deny this. God created everything, didn’t he? He created the rules that determine what sin is and what isn’t, right? Maybe he had reasons for it. Maybe it was necessary for free will as Andrew notes. But he did it. It’s logically undeniable.
As a humanist, I find this kind of thing offensive (no offense). Hence my reaction here. Not like, oh noes, I’m offended offensive–it literally offends my sense of propriety. Why is it God doesn’t get credit for the bad (as best as we can tell) he did as well as the good? Own it.
Adam chose disobedience. God did not tempt, coerce, or lure Adam into disobedience. The devil was the one who tempted Adam and Eve into committing the first act of sin. God provided the opportunity to sin, but He did not create or instigate sin. Having the opportunity was good; without it, human beings would be little more than robots. The opportunity to sin is inherent in our freedom of choice. If God didn’t create us with the potential to sin then we would just be mindless and programmed to love Him and be perfect forever. Since we were created in His image and He is free, we are too.
We’re free, I get that. So he had reasons for creating sin. That’s fine.
It’s just a story to me FWIW. I understand there are lots of ways of interpreting it, which is fine too. I’m fine with everyone holding their own beliefs about such things.
I’d say that the full nature of reality is difficult to explain, and maybe impossible for us. I don’t understand it fully, so I can’t exclude anything. But to me it looks like we simply don’t understand it, which is to say we can’t say anything authoritatively about it including whether gods exist etc.
Everything was anti-gay until about 50 years ago. Case closed.
From my understanding, it’s not like God made a list of what is and isn’t a sin. Basically, God can’t do anything he wants. There is one thing God can not do and it’s to go against his nature and sin. And this nature is what we can define as “good” with our language. So sin a basically what goes against the nature of God and therefore a transgression against God.
Think of it this way, our compasity to love is a better result of free will. We can’t love someone if you are forced to or don’t have free will. Unfortunately that also gives us th opportunity to basically rebel and go against and not accept and love God or one another. So from my understanding is that free will is actually given so we can love. It just happens we therefore also are given the opportunity to sin.
Hell is purely the absence of God. And the gates are closed and locked from the inside.
I’m also a humanist @tempogain. Is your confusion and take offense on why God allows evil and allows bad things to happen?
The Romans seemed to be pretty cool with it. As were the Greeks. Lots of evidence of medieval gay marriages.
Am I right then that you think this good or nature exists independently of God? He didn’t create it on his own? Pug mentioned “his law” (as I noted) which has a different connotation.
I understand this, but it doesn’t contradict what I’m saying (except the conclusion you drew in the last sentence.) God could have created sin as part of the creation of free will. He could have created sin specifically to enable free will. How do you know that God didn’t create sin, and free will was just a by product of our ability to sin or not sin? I suggest that “free will” seems like a good thing, and “sin” seems like a bad thing, so you’re framing the argument in this way. They look like two sides of the same die to me.
I’m also a humanist @tempogain. Is your confusion
Confusion? Sorry?
and take offense on why God allows evil and allows bad things to happen?
No. There are other reasons why I don’t believe in gods, and this really isn’t a big issue that angers me or makes me disbelieve or something. I understand the issue a bit, and that it is a big problem for some people, while some believers have ways of explaining it. My offense was as I described it–I dislike arguments that seem to seek to give God all the credit for creation and the good things in human nature, while disavowing responsibility for the bad things.
Yes, in fact Paul specifically wrote against such practices.
I was replying to Pinoco’s comment that everything was anti-gay until about 50 years ago. That clearly isn’t the case.
My point is, when did things start getting anti-gay? I think this squares with Pinoco’s intended point.
I don’t think the Bible is the only source of such feeling in humanity, but it probably has played a significant role.
My theology is a little rusty. It’s been a while since I have had any philosophical and theological conversations. But from what I understand is that it’s his nature. Like he is basically what we call good. It’s not independently from God however. Because morality would need a moral law giver so to say. So without God, morality would not exist. Or at least it would be pointless if it’s just a social construct or whatever.
I’ve been practicing lately 
But from what I understand is that it’s his nature. Like he is basically what we call good. It’s not independently from God however. Because morality would need a moral law giver so to say.
This sounds like you want to have it both ways. Is there a difference between “immorality” and “sin”?
So without God, morality would not exist. Or at least it would be pointless if it’s just a social construct or whatever.
That’s a whole other road to go down I disagree that it can’t exist otherwise, much less would be pointless, certainly.
I would say without gods. I mean religions played big roles on morality in any cultures.
This is a hard question because it depends on what you means by immorality. My definition of immorality is what goes against the nature of God and therefore yes it’s the same as sin.
But I guess your hang up is why God isn’t credited as creating sin?
I was speaking to morality in general. Surely either one religions God or gods is true or there is no God or gods at all. So yes different cultures may have a different religion and morality based on that. But surely not all of them all right? I don’t believe in moral relativism is what I’m saying.
Yeah, it would probably take all night to go over everything and have this conversation. It is interesting but let’s just say we can save it for another time.
It’s usually a doozy 
Anytime, if you like.
I’m not sure whether I understood your posts correctly, but if you are saying, without your God, absolute morality wouldn’t exist, I feel it a bit offensive.
Put it simply, for there be absolute morality, there must be a moral law giver. It’s a philosophical deduction.
Or else why debate about morality?
I’m not sure what is absolute morality, but I think common morality could be created among different societies without a single rule giver.
I must say I hated some of Christian teachers at my highschool imposed their morality on us, which is different from the morality in our culture.
I know that the idea of cultural moral relativism sounds all good and tolerant. But it runs into some real philosophical problems. It would basically defeat the purpose of morality if everyone has their own set of morals since that would run into the problem of infallibility.
Simply put, if one culture says human sacrifice is ok, the other says no it’s not. One must be right? If both are right…what’s the point of us even talking about it. Everyone is right then. I mean why don’t I just make up my own set of morals to what I like.
And there would be a moral law giver, if its cultural. It would be us.