A: Remember, the Bible ‘NEVER’ said that God destroyed the ‘Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil,’ but that He ‘DROVE’ Adam and Eve out of the Garden and set an Angel with flames of fire to watch over it!
I fall into the ‘school of thought’ of those scholars that believe, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil that ‘did’ exist in the Garden of Eden, was ‘symbolic’ [and I will explain that shortly, but I wanted to take a minute to talk about the entire Garden of Eden, being symbolic of the City – New Jerusalem, that’s mentioned in Revelation 3:12 and Chapter 21]; and I too believe [young lady], that the Tree that set in the Garden represented for Adam, the choice between submitting to God’s law or acting independently without the influence or distortion of God: in other words, pursuing his own agenda, whether right or wrong…in other words, judging for himself what are good and evil. Their sinful acts illustrated immaturity, causing them to reach for a ‘God substitute’ that they obviously weren’t ready for, because of disobedience.
Conclusion of the matter: God’s plan was to learn them the way of obedience, via the tests that He put before them, in Genesis. The plan was for Adam and Eve to be the God-man and God-woman in the earth, judging between good and evil, and the test that He presented with the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, was the circumstance/occasion for Him to train the couple. [Remember: EVERYTHING that God created in the Garden of Eden was “GOOD” … that includes this Tree. The fault for man’s fall lies with the decision that Adam and Eve made.]