What is the specific meaning of “die” in Genesis 2?

Question

Genesis 2:16-17 (NIV):

¹⁶And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; ¹⁷but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”

KJV says:

for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

It seems clear that Adam and Eve did not die on the day they ate from the tree. And even without the word "day" there, it seems they didn't die "when" they ate from the tree, either, but many many years later.

What gives?

Answer 1

The death promised and that Adam experienced the moment he chose to sin was not a ceasing to exist or a physical stopping to breathe, it was a separation: a rending apart of two things that were once closely joined. On the day that Adam ate the fruit, he died¹. He was separated from God. The fellowship between them was broken.

The reverse of this death happens when we are 'born again'. The fellowship is restored, and we are born into new life -- the power of the cross is that it reverses death!

The alternative, for those who are not born again into a new life, is that they will experience a 'second death'. This is partly a contrast between physical and spiritual death. It happens sequentially after physical death (making it second) but is also the point at which spiritual separation becomes permanent (having died once with Adam, they will be judged to permanent death). The reverse is true for believers: we will be raised into life even though we die.

This is an important doctrine to understand in light of many popular culture understandings of death as some kind of annihilation or ceasing to exist. Never in Scripture do we find an indications that any humans well cease to exist, but we do find lots of information about the change in our relationship before God.

This understanding of death as a separation or rending apart of two things once joined is also the sense of 'death' that Romans and 1st Peter use when they speak of believers being dead to sin. We are no longer bound to it as a slave is to his master. Believers relationship with sin has been severed and we have been cleaved to a new master.

When we physically die, our spirits are separated from the bodies that we have been one with². Our bodies don't cease to exist nor do our spirits, but they part ways³. Our bodies then decay and return to dust, but even the material in this world doesn't cease to exist. Our spirits meanwhile continue, either in eternal life (unity with Christ) or eternal death (separation from Him).

1. Genesis 2:17 (ESV)
   but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat1 of it you shall surely die.”

2. Genesis 35:18 (ESV)
   And as her soul was departing (for she was dying), she called his name Ben-oni; but his father called him Benjamin.
   James 2:26 (ESV)
   For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.

3. Ecclesiastes 12:7 (ESV)
   and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.

Answer 2

That is talking about physical death because when Adam disobeyed, God in his mercy had to cut him off from the tree of life so he would not live forever in his sin Genesis 3:22-24 (KJV).

²²And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:

²³Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. ²⁴So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.

God DID in fact cut him off from the tree of life that day, so Adam did start to die.

Answer 3

Perhaps a more superficial answer might be that if one day for God is 1,000 years for man, and Adam lived to be 930 years old (Genesis 5:5), then Adam really did die on the same "day".

2 Peter 3:8 (KJV)

But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

Also Psalms 90:4

For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.