# What was the purpose of the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-purpose-of-the-tree-of-the-knowledge-of-good-and-evil/980405>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [February 26, 2023, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-purpose-of-the-tree-of-the-knowledge-of-good-and-evil/980405 "2023-02-26T19:56:58Z")\
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**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\
**Post date:** [February 27, 2023, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-purpose-of-the-tree-of-the-knowledge-of-good-and-evil/980405/73 "2023-02-27T23:47:43Z")

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I’ve eaten apples, and I’ve eaten pomegranates, and a bunch of other fruits, and none of them has ever imparted any sort of metaphysical knowledge on me. Clearly, the Forbidden Fruit wasn’t an apple or a pomegranate or whatever; it was a Tree-of-Knowledge-Fruit. That species is now presumably extinct, or (at best) extant only in an extremely small and inaccessible-to-humans range.

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