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Originally Posted by NoOne
Not sure if somebody else has already mentioned this, but the archetypes in the Fall of Man / Garden of Eden are pre-Christian and are shared across many cultures.
The tree of life is the Human Body's energetic system. This is even acknowledged in Cabbala.
Adam is the Male creative principle (Shiva in Hinduism)
Eve is the female Creative principle (Shakti in Hinduism)
The Serpent is Kundalini. It can give the gift of eternal life and / or infinite knowledge. It is symbolised by the apple, because it is the fruit that is most obviously of a toroid shape, another key to the mysteries of the Universe.
The fruit of the tree of eternal life / infinite knowledge refers to the same substance that is known as Nectar/Ambrosia to the Greeks and Soma/Amrita to the Hindus. Drinking of this is what gives the gods their immortality and unlimited knowledge. It is actually liquid light, which floods the brain upon illumination.
Those that are enlightened, drink of the Soma/Nectar constantly, giving them longevity, but chiefly, intuitive knowledge and a connection the divine. The Halo shown around saints signifies this illumination, resulting from the constant flow of Soma/Nectar into the brain.
The fall of man signifies man's fall from grace, from his previous divine state into that of gross matter. The serpent is shown wrapped around the tree of life facing downwards, which signifies the fall of the Kundalini from its exalted position of contact with the divine to "slithering in the dust".
The Gnostics would agree with this explanation, though the Roman church would vehemently deny it of course.
Sorry, if this was too esoteric, but explaining these concepts properly would require several books, this is a very simplistic attempt at arriving at a synthesis of the various facts available in different cultures and religious/spiritual traditions.
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I have heard the snake as kundalini idea before, the thing about that idea is that it is considered good for people to eat the fruit, and the bad old God is trying to deny people something that is good for their development. This perspective is opposite to the idea that people did wrong by disobeying God, and would have been better off not eating the fruit.
So ideally we need to specify what the fruit is an analogy for. Is kundalini knowledge of good and evil? If it fits fair enough, but if it doesn't then for me that idea can hold no water.
Personally I think kundalini is a wrong turning anyway, I don't think it can ever deliver true satisfaction of the spiritual drive, and somehow I have a hard time imagining Adam and Eve in the throes of a kundalini episode.