Adam's Transgression: A Necessary and Merciful Injustice
When I taught lesson 6 on "The Fall of Adam and Eve" from the Gospel Principles manual a month ago, and again last week while I listened to someone else teach the same lesson in Elders Quorum, the same question was asked: "Why did the Fall have to involve transgression?" It is a question on which the Church has no official position. Elder Dallin H. Oaks, of the Quorum of the Twelve, taught in a 1993 General Conference Address titled, "The Great Plan of Happiness" (and it's a MUST READ ), that "For reasons that have not been revealed, this transition, or ‘fall,’ could not happen without a transgression—an exercise of moral agency amounting to a wilfull breaking of a law.” No one revelation has specifically answered this question, but I think an answer is at least suggested in the revealed canon of scripture. My understanding of the need for transgression in the Fall stems from scriptures dealing with the resurrection. In the heavenly councils t...