Disrupted Communion with God, i.e., the Fall. Adam and Eve and the story of Genesis is probably pretty familiar to all of us, but the implications in Orthodoxy theology are striking and quite a bit different from most Western, particularly protestant, thinking. We tend to view life before the Fall, i.e., as described in Genesis to be something of an unknowable mystery, idyllic, and lived in perfect union with God. Adam and Eve disobeying God opened the world up to the consequences of sin and death, but importantly without any personally inherited guilt of their sin as originated with Bl. Augustine of Hippo that became the Original Sin of Roman and protestant traditions. Forgiveness Sunday (Cheesefare), the last day before Lent begins is when we call to mind the Fall, and our inevitable fallen state; as Adam and Eve broke the fast commanded by God, we then begin the fast to prevent our (spiritual) death.
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