Finding Eden

"And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted and became into four heads. The name of the first is Pison: that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold; and the gold of that land is good: there is bdellium and the onyx stone. And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same it is that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia. And the name of the third river is Hiddekel: that is it which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphrates." (Genesis 2:10-14)

Our quest for today is to attempt to "find" the location of the Eden in which the Lord God made a garden (I say "attempt" because even the biblical scholars cannot agree on its location.) And as we ourselves are not biblical scholars, we will rely on the research of those who are; for example, 1) Strong's Concordance, 2) Holman's Bible Dictionary, 3) The Works of Josephus (not really scholarly as much as historical), and 4) Genesius's Lexicon, all of which might help us first identify the lands names in the passages above, and thus more easily identify the rivers, in the midst of which was located the Garden.

For example, Havilah has been determined by these scholars to be India. There are nine major rivers or river systems in India; but the two that scholars seem focused on in these passages are the Ganga (or Ganges) and the Indus. Scholars do not agree unanimously, but of these two the Indus seems to be most preferred as it is located furthest north in India giving it the closest proximity to the Garden of Eden area, as well as closet proximity to the area that the Hebrew nation inhabited. The Pison (or Pishon) was a river that "went out of Eden," perhaps denoting that its source was in the midst of the garden somewhere.

Before we go on to the next river however, we might note that in this area of India the bible states there was gold, bdellium (which scholars believe to be pearls) and onyx. I found it very interesting to discover that India does in fact have its own gold mines, but still it must import most of its gold as it is the highest consumer and importer of gold in the world. What a sad and telling contrast! Millions of people live in garbage heaps in India, while millions of others are busy buying gold, mostly of it as jewelry.

Moving on to Gihon, the name in Hebrew means "bursting forth," possibly denoting fountains or springs as a source. The location of the Gihon is easily established since Ethiopia is still known as Ethiopia today, and while scholars are not in unity on this, it might be what we know as the Nile.

The third river, Hiddekel, means "rapid" in Hebrew. Assyria (or Asshur) was a land that included Babylonia and Mesopotamia. Assyria and the Persian empire are linked biblically, and this area would include parts of modern Iran and Iraq. It is believed then that the river is the Tigres.

The fourth river is the Euphrates in Syria, and is the largest and longest river of western Asia. It rises from two chief sources in the Armenian mountains and flows into the Persian Gulf. Its name denotes "sweet water" or pleasant tasting water.

So, now that we (possibly) have the rivers identified and the land that is enclosed in the midst of them, where is the Garden of Eden? Well, it appears that it could be in Turkey, or Iran or Iraq, or that it emcompassed parts of all three.

But, the truth is that while we know it was here on earth at one point, it is no longer here, at least not as it once was. Yet we will see as we get further into Genesis that God did not destroy Eden.

When we get to that point in Genesis where we see the "closing" of the Garden of Eden, we will add further information to this subject and see what conclusions we arrive at.