The Garden of Eden (Hebrew גַּן עֵדֶן, Gan ʿEdhen) is the biblical "garden of God", described most notably in the Book of Genesis (Genesis 2-3), but also mentioned, directly or indirectly, in Ezekiel, Isaiah and elsewhere in the Old Testament. In the past, the favoured derivation of the name "Eden" was from the Akkadian edinnu, itself derived from a Sumerian word meaning "plain" or "steppe", but it is now believed to be more closely related to an Aramaic root meaning "fruitful, well-watered."
The text of the Genesis garden-story is surrounded by uncertainties. Notable among them are: (1) whether the word "eden" means a steppe or plain, or instead means "delight" or some similar term; (2) whether the garden was in the east of Eden, or Eden itself was in the east, or whether "east" is not the correct word at all and the Hebrew means the garden was "of old"; (3) whether the river in Genesis 2:10 "follows from" or "rises in" Eden, and the relationship, if any, of the four rivers to each other; and (4) whether Cush, where one of the four rivers flows, means Ethiopia (in Africa) or Elam (just east of Mesopotamia).
The Eden of Genesis has been variously located at the headwaters of the Tigris and Euphrates in northern Iraq, in Africa, and in the Persian Gulf. The Eden in Ezekiel, however, is unequivocally located in Lebanon. For many medieval writers, the image of the Garden of Eden also creates a location for human love and sexuality, often associated with the classic and medieval trope of the locus amoenus.
Read more about Garden Of Eden: Location and Nature, From Eden To Paradise, In Jewish Eschatology, In Art
Famous quotes containing the words Garden Of Eden, garden of, garden and/or eden:
“The male has been persuaded to assume a certain onerous and disagreeable rôle with the promise of rewards—material and psychological. Women may in the first place even have put it into his head. BE A MAN! may have been, metaphorically, what Eve uttered at the critical moment in the Garden of Eden.”
—Wyndham Lewis (1882–1957)
“I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen:
A Chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.
And the gates of this Chapel were shut,
And ‘Thou shalt not’ writ over the door;”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“The garden flew round with the angel,
The angel flew round with the clouds,
And the clouds flew round and the clouds few round
And the clouds flew round with the clouds.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food: the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And a river went out of Eden to water the garden.”
—Bible: Hebrew Genesis 2:9-10.