Gan ʿEḏen (the Garden of Eden) was the biblical "garden of God" in which Adam and Eve, the 1st humans, resided until they disobeyed God by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. In "Genesis" 2: 10-14 it was associated with 4 rivers: "And a river departed from Eden to water the garden, and from there it divided and became four tributaries. The name of the first is Pishon, which is the circumnavigator of the land of Havilah where there is gold. And the gold of this land is good; there are bdellium and cornelian stone. And the name of the second river is Gihon, which is the circumnavigator of the land of Cush. And the name of the third is Chidekel, which is that which goes to the east of Ashur; and the fourth river is Phirat." Titus Flavius Josephus identified Pishon as the river called Ganges by the Greeks and Gihon as the Nile, Chidekel is the Tigris], and Phirat is the Euphrates. Cush is usually identified as Ethiopia, but perhaps was Cossaea, a Greek name for the land of the Kassites (the Gatzu, who controlled Babylonia from ca. 1531 BCE until ca. 1155 BCE). "Eden" is perhaps related to an Aramaic root word meaning "fruitful, well-watered" or a Hebrew word for "pleasure." (The 17th-century Douay–Rheims translation of the Old Testament into English referred to "a paradise of pleasure" in Genesis 2:8 rather than "a garden of Eden" as in other translations.) In the 6th century BCE, Ezekiel described the king of Tyre as the "seal of perfection" who was installed as an angelic guardian of the garden but was expelled due to his wickedness and violence. The Talmud and the Kabbalah describe an earthly garden of abundant fertility and luxuriant vegetation (the "lower Gan Eden") and a celestial one inhabited by righteous, immortal souls (the "higher Gan Eden"). Modern Jewish eschatology holds that history will complete itself when mankind returns to the garden. Muslims regard the garden as the 4th layer of Heaven, which was not necessarily the abode of Adam; the "jannāt ʿadni" ("Gardens of Perpetual Residence") are the destination of the righteous.
Gan ʿEḏen (the Garden of Eden) was the biblical "garden of God" in which Adam and Eve, the 1st humans, resided until they disobeyed God by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. In "Genesis" 2: 10-14 it was associated with 4 rivers: "And a river departed from Eden to water the garden, and from there it divided and became four tributaries. The name of the first is Pishon, which is the circumnavigator of the land of Havilah where there is gold. And the gold of this land is good; there are bdellium and cornelian stone. And the name of the second river is Gihon, which is the circumnavigator of the land of Cush. And the name of the third is Chidekel, which is that which goes to the east of Ashur; and the fourth river is Phirat." Titus Flavius Josephus identified Pishon as the river called Ganges by the Greeks and Gihon as the Nile, Chidekel is the Tigris], and Phirat is the Euphrates. Cush is usually identified as Ethiopia, but perhaps was Cossaea, a Greek name for the land of the Kassites (the Gatzu, who controlled Babylonia from ca. 1531 BCE until ca. 1155 BCE). "Eden" is perhaps related to an Aramaic root word meaning "fruitful, well-watered" or a Hebrew word for "pleasure." (The 17th-century Douay–Rheims translation of the Old Testament into English referred to "a paradise of pleasure" in Genesis 2:8 rather than "a garden of Eden" as in other translations.) In the 6th century BCE, Ezekiel described the king of Tyre as the "seal of perfection" who was installed as an angelic guardian of the garden but was expelled due to his wickedness and violence. The Talmud and the Kabbalah describe an earthly garden of abundant fertility and luxuriant vegetation (the "lower Gan Eden") and a celestial one inhabited by righteous, immortal souls (the "higher Gan Eden"). Modern Jewish eschatology holds that history will complete itself when mankind returns to the garden. Muslims regard the garden as the 4th layer of Heaven, which was not necessarily the abode of Adam; the "jannāt ʿadni" ("Gardens of Perpetual Residence") are the destination of the righteous.
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