Makes me think of "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn. This book interprets the "Garden of Eden" as a metaphor for the hunter/gather phase. The "tree of knowledge of good

Makes me think of "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn. This book interprets the "Garden of Eden" as a metaphor for the hunter/gather phase. The "tree of knowledge of good and evil" is symbolic of the choice of a population to settle down on one spot and develop agriculture instead of staying on the move. The amount of controlled agriculturally productive land correlates to more food to raise a larger army which in turn can be used to forcefully acquire more land. I specifically remember a sentence from the book, to paraphrase: "The hungry lion does not kill the entire herd of antelope, but rather takes what it needs and the herd replenishes." To quote Ayn Rand (channeled through her character Dominique): "Religion is class exploitation." From the article: "Hunter-gatherers have little or no stored food, and no concentrated food sources, like an orchard or a herd of cows: they live off the wild plants and animals they obtain each day. Therefore, there can be no kings, no class of social parasites who grow fat on food seized from others. Only in a farming population could a healthy, non-producing elite set itself above the disease-ridden masses."