What, then, is the crime for which the serpent Ahriman thus makes bitter expiation? In what way has he spoiled Ormuzd's last and most wonderful creation? He has introduced the sense of sin: the man and the woman are afraid, and hide themselves from their Lord whom they have offended. Yet he has been not altogether a deceiving serpent. In one respect he had spoken profound truth. The man and the woman have become as gods. In the Hebrew story Jehovah says, "Behold the man is become as one of us;" that is to say, one of the Elohim or heavenly host, who know the good and the evil. Man has apparently become a creature against whom precautions need to be taken. It is hinted that by eating of the other tree and acquiring immortal life he would achieve some result not in accordance with Jehovah's will, yet which it would then be too late to prevent. Accordingly, any such proceedings are forestalled by driving the man and woman from the garden, and placing sentinels there with a fiery sword which turns hither and thither to warn off all who would tread the path that leads to the tree of life. The anthropomorphism of the story is as vivid as in those Homeric scenes in which gods and men contend with one another in battle. It is plainly indicated that Jehovah's wrath is kindled at man's presumption in meddling with what belongs only to the Elohim; man is punished for his arrogance in the same spirit as when, later on, he gives his daughters in marriage to the sons of the Elohim and brings on a deluge, or when he strives to build a tower that will reach to heaven and is visited with a confusion of tongues. So here in Eden he has come to know too much, and Ahriman's heinous crime has consisted in helping him to this interdicted knowledge.