I hope I'm sticking to the topic of this thread, but here's my take on the awareness of sin:
I believe that when Adam and Eve were first created, they were already "sinners" in the technical sense. In other words, they already "fell short" of God's glory (Romans 3:23). I say this because ANYTHING that God creates is by nature and default NOT EQUAL to Him. And one of the definitions of sin is "missing the mark". Therefore, Adam and Eve already "missed the mark" of God's perfect standard, even prior to the fall.
The thing was, though, is that they were not aware of this shortcoming prior to eating from the tree of knowledge of good & evil. The Scripture says that when they ate, their "eyes were opened" and they realized they were naked. Whereas prior to this, according to Scripture, they were naked yet "were not ashamed". Adam and Eve were "innocent" prior to the fall. But that doesn't necessarily mean that they were "sinless". It's just that God didn't impute sin to them or hold them accountable for it before they ate from the tree. That's one reason why He said that "in the day you eat of it, you shall surely die".
Once their eyes had been opened to good and evil, they were subject to God's perfect standard. But they couldn't keep it, which is why He warned them to not eat from the tree or else they would die. And this is why Christ had to come, to redeem mankind and to deal with sin completely.
$0.02
Interesting take but I have to say that I don't agree with this.
Purley based on
Genesis 1:26-27
26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
With regards to Romans
Romans 3:23
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
This does not say or indicate that they had already fallen short.
They hadn't already fallen when God made them.
They fell short when they fell foul of the following.
Genesis 2:9
9 And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Genesis 2:16-17
16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
We have the tree of life, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
They had the choice to eat of every tree in the garden.
Does that include the tree of Life?
They used their free will God had gave them to eat from the tree of evil.
That is when they fell short.
Then we find
Genesis 3:22-23
22 Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”— 23 therefore the Lord God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken.
As a result God drove them out of the garden before they could eat from the tree of life because if he did not then they would have remained in that sinful condition for ever.
I believe God knew they would sin, and as a result a plan was already in place to redeem mankind for those in Jesus.
His death, burial and resurrection.
As a result we eat from him who is the tree of life.