Claim. The prohibition on eating the fruit (Genesis 2:17) is read as a commandment about the sanctity of the sexual relationship that binds all people, before and after marriage, perpetually — making chastity and conjugal fidelity supreme directives in the education of norm.
Elaboration. Lee makes the strong exegetical move characteristic of Unification theology: the tree of the knowledge of good and evil represents the sexual relationship, and God’s commandment “of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat” (Genesis 2:17) means that the sexual relationship is sacred and must never be violated (An Education for the Perfection of the Family).
The scope is universal and perpetual. “That commandment was intended not only for Adam and Eve, but for everyone, and it still maintains its validity today. This commandment is a supreme directive which will continue to be valid in the future as well.” Before marriage, this means no sexual relations. After marriage, this means “husband and wife can never, under any circumstances, have an illicit sexual relationship, that is, a sexual relationship with any person other than their spouse.”
This frames the education of norm around chastity and conjugal fidelity as non-negotiable structural commitments, not as cultural preferences or contextual ethics. Lee’s reasoning is consistent with the broader Unification doctrine that the fall was sexual in nature — Eve’s relationship with Lucifer and Adam’s premature relationship with Eve constituted the original violation — so the educational reconstruction of the family hinges on restoring the inviolability of the sexual norm.
The pedagogical implication is that the “sanctity and mystery of the sexual relationship should be communicated with special care.” This is education of norm at its most consequential, because the human fall itself was a failure to observe a sexual norm.
The position collides directly with progressive sexual ethics, contemporary democratic individualism (which Lee critiques in section V for relativizing values), and with much modern Christian theology that does not read Genesis 2:17 sexually. Worth a thread on the exegetical case for the sexual reading of the fruit once a counter atomic exists. The claim is foundational for Unification practice around the blessing and conjugal fidelity post-Blessing.
See also. sexual-order-as-core-of-ethics, fall-reverses-spirit-physical-mind-order, character-perfection-must-precede-marriage