Abstract: This paper investigates the pragmatic aspect of communication between God and our first parents while in the Garden of Eden—the psychological impact of placing them under contradictory injunctions that result in a situation of “damned if you do and damned if you don’t.” God could not introduce knowledge that, by definition, also involves introducing evil, which is a prerequisite for choice. Instead he issued a paradoxical injunction that placed Adam and Eve in an influence-free decision-making environment with the implied message of “make a decision!” The beguiling influence of Satan provided additional information, a way to escape the paradox. Hence, the paradoxical injunction became an instrument to influence a decision-making process without God having to introduce evil and without having to make an argument in one direction over another.





The study of human communication can be subdivided into three areas: syntactics, semantics, and pragmatics. Syntactics is the grammatical arrangement and order of words in a sentence that add up to a valid thought or idea. Semantics is the analysis of those words and how they relate to each other. Pragmatics, by way of context or situational interaction, uses both verbal and nonverbal communication to clarify a message. For example, picture a father and son standing in the kitchen. In an angry voice, the father states that the garbage is piling up. A completely different message is sent if the father and the son are standing at the city dump, and the father casually makes the same [Page 240]statement. The words are exactly the same, though the intention of the message has completely changed based on the context and non-verbal communication. It is the pragmatic aspect of communication that drives home the meaning and interpretation between sender and recipient. In short, while syntax is mathematical logic and semantics is philosophy, pragmatics is psychology.1

The pragmatic aspects of the communication between God, Adam, Eve, and Satan are complex. Far from being based on clear, precise, unidirectional, and congruent messages between the actors in the Garden of Eden, God’s intent is to stay clear of influencing our first parents in a given direction. Instead, His objective is for the couple to arrive at a decision by themselves. The tools employed for such interactions involve verbal and non-verbal behavior, contextual meaning, implied messages, and paradoxical injunction. To examine such communication tools, it is helpful to consider the building blocks of pragmatic communication theory.

Axioms of Pragmatic Communication

Fundamental to the premise of this paper is a basic understanding of the pragmatics of communication theory—the building blocks of how people influence each other, employing verbal and non-verbal messages within the context where exchanges take place. The building blocks of how people relate to each other are found in the axioms of communication theory.

The inability not to communicate

Behavior has no opposite. One cannot not behave. Therefore, all behavior is a form of communication. Human communication is defined by exchanging messages between individuals. Such messages may consist of words—the spoken language—but always include non-verbal language.<a id="footnote2anc" href="#footnote2sym" title="2. Julian Hochberg, “Review of Birdwhistell’s Kinesics and Context: Essays on Body Motion Communication,” The American Journal of Psychology (1972): 441–55, researchgate.net/profile/Adam-Kendon/publication/308054625_Review_of_birdwhistell’s_’kinesics_and_context’/links/5a990603aca27214056d9d3d/Review-of-birdwhistells-kinesics-and-context.