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JOHN - If Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat from the Tree of Life after the fall, could they have eaten from it before the fall? And, if so why would there not be any consequences?
JOEL - They were already immortal before the fall and could have lived forever in that state, so partaking of the tree of life during that time would not have any different effect on them.
Genesis 2:16-17 says:
"And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it:"
So I guess it's possible they could have eaten from it, but the scriptures do not say they actually did.
It was the the tree of knowledge of good and evil that they were not allowed to eat from in their immortal state. Once they did eat of that tree and became mortal they could not eat of the tree of life, because they would have lived forever in their fallen state.
We have to keep in mind that it's hard to know what is literal and what is figuative when it comes to Adam and Eve and what happened in the Garden.
Elder Bruce R. McConkie said about the trees, "the account is speaking figuratively. What is meant by partaking of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is that our first parents complied with whatever laws were involved so that their bodies would change from their state of paradisiacal immortality to a state of natural mortality." ("Christ and the Creation," Ensign, June 1982, p. 15).
Adam and Eve were real and the fall of man and it's consequences were real, but the trees, an actual serpent, Eve being created from Adam's rib, etc. should all most likely be taken figuratively.
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