Please consider this:

You can argue endlessly about how Adam and Eve populated the world. Was everybody related. But that was a long time ago and no one alive today was there. However, there is evidence that is here today that bears on the story of Adam and Eve as revealed in the Bible.

If all mankind came from Adam and Eve then all humans would have an identical genetic makeup. This is because Eve was created out of Adam’s rib. Even if Eve were of a different genetic makeup the entire human race would have come from two sets of genes. The genetic variability within the human species (kind) today would be essentially ZERO. Everybody would essentially be like identical twins.

All humans, all over the world today, would suffer the same problem of a lack of genetic variability that the Cheetah does today. The genes of Cheetahs are so similar, one to another, that when skin grafts between non-related Cheetahs are made there is no rejection of the donor skin. Cheetahs experienced a near extinction about 10,000 years ago (down to perhaps less than ten individuals). Today they have almost no genetic variability within the species because of that near extinction.

Yet, this is not what is found in humans. That is because humans were never produced from just two individuals, 6,000 years ago. There was never a unique creative act.

A similar problem would have occurred if there had been a flood where all humankind was reduced to just six individuals, 4,300 years ago. There never was a general flood that caused all life to perish except for two of a kind of every animal and just six humans. The wide variety of genes of humans and the wide variety of genes of all the animals in the world attest to that fact.

It is obvious that the story of creation and the story of Noah’s ark are wonderful stories – but just stories. They never happened. The very genes inside you and me declare that fact. That does not reduce the importance of the two stories for they are beautiful stories of God’s love for us and of his justice and regret. They are just not accurate, but they are not supposed to be. The Bible is about God’s love and about how to live a righteous life and achieve everlasting life. Don’t dishonor God by using and interpreting his written word incorrectly.

1 the tree of life.

those verses do indeed speak of the other tree….

very soon after that , you read the age of Adam…. perhaps he already got into that tree?…

it’s not until later that the ability to live that long is taken away from Man…..

but, hey… gotta get those begats to add up right somehow, yes?

was there another tree that God did not directly forbid them from eating from, but would have been upset if they did?

There was only the one – the tree of life, in the center of the garden.

At least, every scholar of Genesis I’ve read considers them to be the same tree. If there was another tree, its inconsequential and I’m not sure why it’d even be mentioned.

It was only one tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and bad

2 Trees… 2 Gardens… 2 of everything to sort out

But let us consider what’s greatest of 3 things,
not just what’s great or greater of 2 things,
such as great tribulation or greater damnation.
For us of us-ward is neither of them vs them.

Only the greatest of 3 things is what never fails.