The Mitzva to Eat of the Fruit of Eden

Approximately two years before his death, the Ḥafetz Ḥayyim published his final work, Sefer haMitzvot haKatzar, a listing of the 271 mitzvot that are applicable today. In the preface to the English - Hebrew edition [the Concise Book of Mitzvot, (Feldheim, 1990)], Rabbi Ben Zion Sobel quotes the Ḥafetz Ḥayyim [Mishna Berura 60:10]:

Unless one performs a Torah-ordained mitzva with conscious intent, he has not fulfilled his duty, and must perform it a second time with the proper intent.

Without the intention of doing God's will, the act performed may not be considered a mitzva.

Meshech Ḥochma understands the verse in our parasha:

And the Lord God commanded Adam saying: of all the trees of the garden you may eat freely [Genesis 2:16]

to be an imperative (this understanding is not conveyed by the English translation). God did not allow man to eat of the fruits of the Garden of Eden (except for the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge), rather He commanded him to benefit from them. Indeed, Meshech Ḥochma notes, the Talmud Yerushalmi [end of Kiddushin] states that man will have to give a reckoning to God for having abstained from benefiting from the good things which He provided in this world.

Preceding her sin, Ḥava refuted the serpent’s claim that God had forbidden eating the fruit of all trees of the Garden of Eden by stating: “Of the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat.” Genesis 3:2

Ḥava failed to state that she and Adam ate of the fruit in fulfillment of God’s mitzva. Therefore, says Meshech Ḥochma, Ḥava was not rewarded for having done God’s will. Meshech Ḥochma suggests that had Ḥava eaten of the fruit as a mitzva, it may have protected her against violating God’s prohibition of eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge!

Returning to the Ḥafetz Ḥayyim, he commented:

How pitiful it is that one who may have exerted himself to do all that the Torah requires of him will nevertheless find himself unrewarded for it in the World to Come because his motivation was not the proper one.