The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise (1823-27)

John Martin’s The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise (1823-27) hangs at Newcastle’s Laing Gallery. The height of its position and the shiny glass covering its frontage renders the taking of photographs a largely futile exercise. Nevertheless, Martin's showing our ancestors’ utter dejection and loneliness as they exit Eden is unmissable. Unlike their contemporary descendants, they understood what they had lost, the height from which they had fallen, and the joys and riches they had been forced to leave behind. Departing from so beautiful a place for a corrupted and dangerous world in which they would have to grow their food and warm their bodies was nothing compared to the loss of intimate friendship with the Creator.

Thankfully, that same Creator became a man, a second Adam, to undo and reverse the effects of the first Adam's fall and exile. In Christ, Eden is available again to the progeny of Adam.

O loving wisdom of our God!
When all was sin and shame,
a second Adam to the fight
and to the rescue came.

O wisest love! that flesh and blood,
which did in Adam fail,
should strive afresh against the foe,
should strive, and should prevail.

-JN