When did God give man Free Will?

[marylandblue]

117. Like I said, ALL hebrew names in the Bible have symbolic meanings

Often, the Bible tells you so. Eve (Hebrew Chava) does indeed seem to have the same root as life, and the Bible says she "is the mother of all life," but this could be a later folk etymology. Prior to the monotheism of the Bible, God had a wife, Asherah, who was also called Chavat, similar to Chava, and so this could be a vestige of an earlier goddess worship, perhaps representing a demotion for her.

Of course the writer had to select names. What good storyteller does not give his character names? But without the original cultural context, how would know why those names were selected?

5,000 years from now, after our society is ruined, buried, and forgotten, imagine a future archeologist finds a newspaper article about the "the Washington Nationals." If that archeologist did not know where Washington DC was or that it was the national capitol, would he know why the team name was selected?

If he knew about "the National League" from other sources might he think the league was named after the team. Wouldn't he have a great topic for a scholarly journal, quite clever actually, but still have the connection totally wrong? He might be quite insistent on his interpretation, but would that make it any more true?