[Huldah]

We began life in the Garden of Eden as vegetarians--animals also. Genesis 1:29-30 And we were told to go forth and REPLENISH and SUBDUE the earth--ie-TAME IT. How could we subdue the earth? With maternal instinct--Love. When we were told to not eat of the tree of knowledge that in that day we would surely die--Was that tree the knowledge that meat was good to eat--did this start our way of blood lust? Did we kill an animal for food and then God clothed us in the skin of the animal we killed? In Genesis 2:9 it says that we could eat of every tree FOR FOOD but not eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. I think that God Himself is the tree of life and in the day that He came and walked among men as Jesus--He forgave us and told us to eat meat, knowing that we were ignorant of the charge/sin. God says that He is all life. Colossians 1:15. Did He begin us with the knowledge that to eat of Him was a sin?
God often describes trees as things that give life or knowledge and branches as things that bear fruit. Jesus was described as a branch or vine.
After getting kicked out of Eden, man and woman developed very different personalities. Men were the hunters/predators and women were the ones with the maternal instincts. It seems as if man and woman have since that time often been at odds, with women trying to subdue the man and man trying to become more loving and family oriented. Women giving birth and loving sons to often watch them grow up to go to war and fight and die. Genesis 3:16. Until recent days the serial killers were all men.Most abusers have been men. Is this hunter instinct something that has been more of a problem for men to overcome? Is this the curse that God placed upon us---to overcome the blood lust and the desire to kill, harm and maim with the maternal instinct to nurture? Did God place a wedge between man and woman until they accepted Him first and each other second? I know that in recent times man is just as maternal towards their children as women and some are more so, with women sometimes developing a more killer instinct.
Did we all begin with only a maternal instinct--one of love and nurturing only to become predators and prey?
Did Eve disobey God because she worshipped her man more than God and wanted him to be as a God in knowledge? In this Eve would have recieved the greater punishment. Men used to grow up and disappear for years to fight and die in the quest to conquer each other.
The only difference I could find between Eden before and after was that before everything was vegetarian/Herbavore and after--Carnivore. It's as if we were thrown into hell and the Earth was flipped backwards.
I know some of you will try to kill me because of this thread--shoot.

[2COR12:9]

I lean towards the original intention of God was not to use animals for food, and what I see of God in Christ He does not advocate violence.
I see a picture of God in the OT condoning violence to accommodate our stubbornness and to deal with the condition of society in that day, though in Christ is the reality of God and the OT is only a shadow of what was to come as representing who God was to the fullest which is Christ. We see that God is loving and sacrificial, and I believe this was only His true intentions for animals as sacrificial as a shadow of what we would see in Christ. I believe in the garden we see the first evidence of sacrifice that the animal's life was given to clothe them, and also shadows the mercy to us even though we have sinned, and the clothing God will clothes us with in Christ. God has always accommodated us throughout time, and allowed things which was not His true intent for us. Such as Christ when he addresses divorce and says it was given by Moses because your hearts were hard. Or that Solomon had many wives, which God allowed but His intention was for one man and one woman to be united. So it's possible God simply accommodates our desire to eat flesh though this may not have been His intent for us to kill solely for food. It surely is not stated as his intent in the creation story, only plant eating is implied. Though I can not in good faith state that He forbids us to eat meat but only it may have not been His original intent.