Map of Genesis' Eden in which God planted His Garden
Part 2
05 November 2006
Updates and Revisions through 05 June 2008
Although I have suggested that Mari on the Euphrates is the most likely location for Genesis' Garden of Eden because it is watered by a single stream that later becomes four streams, this site does _not_ possess all the motifs associated with Yahweh's Garden. These motifs are associated in Mesopotamian myths with "other" sites, which are enumerated below:
(1) Eridu, (2) Nippur, (3) A watering hole in the edin near Uruk where Enkidu (Adam's prototype) met Shamhat (Eve's prototype) in the Epic of Gilgamesh, (4) Uruk, (5) Dilmun, (6) Mari, (7) Ur of the Chaldees, (8) Sippar, (9) Anu's Heavenly abode, (10) Lebanese Cedar Mountain.
(1) Eridu
Eridu is ranked "first" as it has several important motifs associated with Genesis' Garden in Eden account. Man is created here of its clay at the instigation of the Sumerian god Enki (Akkadian: Ea) because the Igigi gods are in revolt over their hard work building irrigation ditches for his city-garden and man replaces them as garden laborers (recast as Adam as a gardener rebelling against God and being removed from God's garden). It is here that Ea/Enki warns a man (Adapa) "not to eat" the "bread of death" or he will die, presaging God's warning to Adam "not to eat" of the tree of knowledge of good and evil or he will die. Eridu's god warns one man (variously called Ziusudra, Atrahasis or Utnapishtim of Shuruppak in Sumer) to build a boat to save the seed of man and animalkind because a flood is to be sent by the gods to destroy all life, this presages God's warning to Noah. Eridu's god changes the one language of the world into a babel of many tongues to spite his brother-god Enlil of Nippur, this presages God's changing one language of the world into many tongues with the tower of Babel episode. The god of Eridu plants a garden and it is famed for two fabulous trees a kiskanu and mes tree (presaging Eden's two fabulous trees). This god bears the Sumerian epithet ushumgal, meaning "great serpent-dragon," so he has the power of human speech and legs to walk with. He seeks to deny man immortal life via lies and half-truths (Ea/Enki being recast as Eden's Serpent as well as Eden's God, Yahweh-Elohim).
(2) Nippur
Man is created of Nippur's clay to replace the Igigi gods who rebel against the burdensome toil digging irrigation ditches for Enlil's city-garden. The motif of gardeners (the Igigi) rebelling against their god (Enlil) appears here (as well as at Eridu against Enki/Ea), they are removed from the city-garden for this act of rebellion (recast as Adam the gardener rebelling against his God and being removed from his God's garden, like the Igigi). A clay tablet found at Nippur mentions a city gate called abul edin-na "edin gate" and Genesis suggests the Garden in Eden has an "entrance" (a gate?) guarded by Cherubim. Some gardens were within the city walls at Nippur and thus would be accessed via a gate or entrance in the city wall (perhaps Nippur's abul edin-na was recast as the "entrance" to the Garden in Eden?). Enlil of Nippur is identified as the chief instigator behind the decision to send a flood to destroy mankind for violating his rest with their clamor (recast as God sending Noah's Flood to destroy mankind). On the seventh day of the Flood all mankind has been destroyed except a few on a boat built by Ziusudra of Shuruppak. The silence prevailing on the earth on the seventh day "allows _all_ the gods to rest" for man's clamor or noise is gone now (recast as God _resting on the seventh day_ after "creating" a world instead of "destroying" a world as done by Enlil with the Flood). Eden's serpent in Christian myths seeks man's destruction. Enlil sought the destruction of all of mankind with the Flood and he bore the Sumerian epithet ushumgal, "great serpent dragon." So, like Enki (Ea) of Eridu, he too is associated with man's creation and his death. That is to say two Sumerian gods Enlil (Akkadian/Babylonian: Ellil) and Enki (Akkadian/Babylonian: Ea) have been fused together to become not only the God Yahweh-Elohim in the Garden of Eden but also Eden's Serpent (Enlil and Enki _both_ bore the Sumerian epithet ushumgal "great serpent-dragon").
(3) Watering hole in the edin
At this location, a three days journey into the edin wilderness from Uruk, Shamhat meets Enkidu (both are prototypes of Eve and Adam). Naked Enkidu is separated from his herbivore animal companions (gazelles) when he espies a naked Shamhat and has sex with her (recast as a naked Eve supplanting naked Adam's herbivore animal companions). He learns it is wrong to be naked when she shares her clothes with him and clothed they both leave edin's watering hole (recast as Adam and Eve discovering they are naked and clothing themselves before leaving Eden). We are told the watering hole's water was Enkidu's and the animals "heart's DELIGHT." I understand this motif was recast as Hebrew `eden meaning "delight." Enkidu in the Epic of Gilgamesh when he appears at the watering hole is called "the man of edin," the Sumerian logogram (EDIN/EDEN) being used by the Akkadian scribe in _lieu of_ the Akkadian word seru for steppe. Shamhat urges Enkidu to eat food he balks at initially offered him in the edin by shepherds, he submits to her will and eats it (recast as Eve urging Adam to eat forbidden food in Eden). Enkidu later curses Shamhat, blaming her for his misfortunes (recast as God cursing Eve). Enkidu and Shamhat eventually die being mortals after having left the edin to dwell at Uruk (recast as Adam and Eve dying after their having left Eden).
(4) Uruk
The Sumerian goddess Inanna (Akkadian/Babylonian: Ishtar) the patron goddess of whores and prostitutes and Shamhat dwells at Uruk. She is called in Sumerian nin edin-na, "the lady of edin." She eats of cedar tree (consuming its pine nuts) to acquire "knowledge" to enable her to have sex with her husband Dumuzi (recast as Eve and Adam eating of tree to acquire knowledge, then Adam's "knowing" Eve, having "sex" with her). She has her husband Dumuzi (biblical: Tammuz) slain under a "great apple tree" in the edin of Kulaba (Uruk) and carried off to Hell by demons as her surrogate. He is briefly changed by Utu into a snake to escape his bonds, his hands and feet having been tied to sticks with ropes. Utu (his brother-in-law and a sun god) hears his plea and changes his hands into "snake hands" and feet into "snake feet" allowing him to slither out of his bonds. Dumuzi also bore the Sumerian epithet ushumgal meaning "great serpent-dragon" (actually his and Inanna's Sumerian epithet is ama-ushumgal-anna, "the mother is a great serpent dragon of heaven") so he has the power to walk and talk in human and serpent form while under the great apple tree of the edin of Kulaba near Uruk. This has probably been recast as Eden's serpent losing its feet. Dumuzi in the Adapa and the Southwind myth offered Adapa the "bread of life" which would have given him immortality and Eden's serpent told Eve she would not die. So Dumuzi the ushumgal the "great serpent-dragon" offered _contra_ Ea's orders, food to Adapa (mankind) giving him immortality instead of death. That is to say Dumuzi of Uruk's edin is another pre-biblical prototype of the Garden of Eden's Serpent. Dumuzi who is a shepherd of the edin and associated with an apple-tree garden of edin is also another pre-biblical prototype of Adam along with Enkidu and Adapa. Enkidu was created of clay by the goddess Aruru and placed in the Sumerian edin _near_ Uruk to confront Gilgamesh. I am in agreement with scholars (Jastrow, Skinner, Graves and Patai) that Enkidu has been recast as Adam and Shamaht of Uruk has been recast as Eve. Why is Adam made of "dust" when Enkidu was made of clay? I note that cuneiform letters from various princes in Canaan directed to Pharaoh Akhenaton in Egypt (circa 1350-1334 B.C.) address him as the Sun-god and compare themselves self-effacingly as his humble servants or slaves, "_the _DUST_ under his sandals." I suspect that the Hebrews assimilated to some degree Canaanite concepts and figures of speech via their intermarriages with the Canaanites (cf. Judges 3:5-6) and thus the notion that man _is nothing but dust_ under Pharaoh's sandals became Adam being made of dust (Ge 3:19) contra the Mesopotamian notion he (Enkidu) was made of clay (However, Isaiah 64:8 speaks of man being clay, not dust, formed by God the potter: "Yet O Lord, thou art our Father; and we are the clay, and thou art our potter...")
As noted earlier (above) Enkidu and Shamhat eventually leave the edin to meet Gilgamesh at Uruk . Of interest here is a transliteration revealing that the plain or edin (edin-na) apparently _abuts the walls of Uruk_ (Sumerian: Unug), rendered below by Langdon (Professor of Assyriology, Oxford) as biblical "Erech" appearing in Genesis (Ge 10:10):
"...bad Unug-ga gu-gu-na-dim edin-na ge-ni-lalal..."
"may the wall of Erech be loftily built, and the (nether) plain may it join upon..."
(vol. 1. p. 5. Line 14. Stephen Herbert Langdon. The H. Weld-Blundel Collection in the Ashmolean Museum. Volume One, Sumerian and Semitic Religious and Historical Texts. Oxford. United Kingdom. 1923)
(5) Dilmun
Considered by some as a possible Sumerian prototype of the Garden of Eden. It is generally associated today with the islands of Bahrain and Failaka in the Arabian Gulf (Persian Gulf). I understand that it is at Tell al Lahm 20 miles east of Ur and Eridu where the mouths of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers were in antiquity. Today these rivers' mouths are at Qurnah some 90 miles east of Ur and Eridu. Eridu and Ur were on the "shore of a sea" (actually a vast shallow freshwater lake or marshland fed by the Tigris and Euphrates. Note: Hebrew yam means "sea" and can apply to a _freshwater lake_ like the "Sea of Galilee" as well as a body of saltwater like the Yam Suph, the Gulf of Aqaba where Solomon's seaport of Ezion Geber was located, and the Mediterranean Sea called in the Bible "the great sea" forming a part of ancient Israel's west border) in Mesopotamian texts which has now receded to the modern Hawr al Hammar Lagoon west of Qurnah. A man and wife enjoy immortality in Dilmun according to the myths (Adam and Eve were to enjoy immortality too). Please click here for why Dilmun cannot be the islands of Bahrain and Failaka. Dilmun according to ancient texts lay "at the mouth of the rivers" generally understood to be the Euphrates and Tigris near Ur and Eridu in the 5th-2nd millenniums B.C.
Professor Sayce (1887) on the mouth of the Euphrates being at Eridu (not today's Qurnah or Kornah):
"Along with this culture went the worship of Ea, the god of Eridu...the city stood at the mouth of the Euphrates and on the edge of the Persian Gulf." (p. 135. "The Gods of Babylonia." A. H. Sayce. The Hibbert Lectures, 1887, Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion as illustrated by the religion of the Ancient Babylonians. London & Oxford. Williams & Norgate. 1887, 1897, fourth edition. Reprint by Kessinger Publishers of Whitefish, Montana)
(6) Mari
A city on the Euphrates. A wall mural in its palace shows two sacred trees guarded by fabulous winged beasts, perhaps prototypes of the Cherubim? Deities hold water pots with four streams pouring forth perhaps recalling the four rivers of Eden? Ishtar (Sumerian: Inanna) invests Mari's king with rule in a scene. At Mari were found clay tablets mentioning people bearing the name yawi as a possible theophoric, perhaps recalling Yahweh-Elohim who planted Eden's garden? Beyond Mari the "river of edin," the Euphrates, becomes three or four streams upon entering the Lower Mesopotamian Flood plain near Sippar. Near Sippar the Tigris/Hiddekel joined these three streams during the 5th through 2nd millenniums B.C. according to some scholars. Thus we have Eden's four streams arising from one river. Please click here for the details and maps of the Tigris/Hiddekel being a part of the Euphrates river system.
(7) Ur
Ur of the Chaldees (Tell al Muqayyar, Mugheir, Mughayir) is where Abraham dwelt before moving to Haran and eventually to Canaan. Ur is famed for its clay tablets preserving a literature going back to Sumerian times. Perhaps Abraham as a polytheist at Ur was acquainted with this literature and later repudiated this system of belief with what he regarded as a revelation from God that there was only one deity? Many of Genesis' motifs may ultimately be traced to Abraham and Ur as inversions and recastings of Sumerian concepts and motifs. According to Sandars the Epic of Gilgamesh has been found at Ur:
"Important recent additions to the Gilgamesh material include a tablet from Ur, perhaps of the early eleventh century B.C., which contains another version of, and additions to, part of Tablet VII of the Ninevite recension describing the encounter between Shamash and Enkidu on the latter's deathbed."
(pp. 55-56. "Introduction." Nancy K. Sandars. The Epic of Gilgamesh. Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England. Penguin Books. 1960, 1969)
In 1963 Professors Robert Graves and Raphael Patai proposed that Genesis' Adam and Eve were in part, recasts of Enkidu and Shamhat from the Epic of Gilgamesh (cf. pp. 78-79 & 81. Robert Graves & Raphael Patai. Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis. New York. Doubleday & Co. 1963, 1964; Reprinted 1983 by Greenwich House). My research supports their proposal. Perhaps Abraham while at Ur became acquainted with the Epic of Gilgamesh while he was a polytheist, and recast Enkidu and Shamhat into Adam and Eve after breaking with polythesim and embracing monotheism?
(8) Sippar
Near this site the Tigris is believed to have merged with the Euphrates in the 6th-2nd millenniums B.C. The Euphrates subdivided generally into three (or four?) streams in antiquity, the merging of the Tigris at Sippar would give us the four streams from a river rising in Eden/Edin (the Euphrates).
Leick:
"Sippar lies some 20 kilometres south of Baghdad, where the courses of the Euphrates and Tigris come closest together...According to geo-archaeological surveys the rivers actually connected when the site was first inhabitated during the Uruk period...The city was situated along the Euphrates. The high content of sediment had the gradual effect of burying the older Tigris channels, pushing that river further to the east. At the same time, the raising of the river bed caused a shift of the Euphrates further westwards, which resulted in a steady separation of the twin rivers, leaving an area of land which could be cultivated...Sippar had access to both major streams and their side-arms." (p.167. "Sippar, a tale of two cities." Gwendolyn Leick. Mesopotamia, the Invention of the City. London, United Kingdom. Penguin Books. 2001, 2002)
(9) Anu's heavenly abode
where man (Adapa, a prototype of Adam) lost out on a chance to obtain immortality for himself and mankind by not eating the food which confer such a boon (reformatted as Adam failing to eat of the tree of life); Anu, Ningishzida and Dumuzi urge Adapa to eat the "bread of life" _contra_ the orders given Adapa by Ea/Enki, thus they play the role of Eden's serpent who urged Eve (and indirectly thereby Adam) to eat forbidden fruit.
(10) A Lebanese mountain
whose cedar trees were denied access to man in the Epic of Gilgamesh (the trees' guardian Huwawa being reformatted as the Cherubim).
My research suggests that "paradoxically" there are THREE EDENS and THREE NODS:
Eden 1:
Edin is the land of Sumer, the 'uncultivated land" about Sumer's cities and their city-gardens (circa the 5th-4th millenniums B.C.). To the degree that Mesopotamian myths have primeval man a naked wanderer of animal trails in the edin before the goddess Nintur has him build cities for the gods to dwell in, the Land of Nod, "the land of wanderers," is also the edin of Sumer.
Eden 2:
The late 4th millennium B.C. witnesses Sumerian trade colonies of the Late Uruk IV Period (circa 3300-3100 B.C.) being established at Habuba Kabira and Jebel Aruda near the Euphrates in Syria, so edin as a term _by extension_ from Sumer now embraces both Upper and Lower Mesopotamia. Because edin has been extended as a concept to Upper Mesopotamia via Sumerian colonies the "uncultivated" land about Habuba Kabira and Jebel Aruda would have been called in Sumerian the "edin." The edin in Mesopotamian myths is where naked man _wanders_ with wild animals for companions before being taken by the goddess Nintur to build the world's first city at Eridu. Ergo, the Upper Mesopotamian edin is also "the land of Nod," the "land of wanderers," by extension. Some scholars suggest Abraham is a contemporary of Hammurabi of Babylonia (Genesis' King Amraphel of Shinar) who reigned in the 18th century B.C. That is to say in Abraham's day edin embraced Upper and Lower Mesopotamia since the late 4th millennium B.C. Abraham dwells in "both edins" as a shepherd (1) at Ur of Chaldees in Lower Mesopotamia (formerly ancient Sumer) and at (2) Haran in Upper Mesopotamia (Mari is destroyed by Hammurabi).
Eden 3:
Genesis' Eden possesses a garden which is watered by one stream. After leaving the garden, this stream subdivides into four streams (according to Professors Abraham Yahuda [1934] and Umberto Cassuto [1944]). To "the east of Eden" (east of the Garden in Eden) lies the "land of Nod." That is to say Genesis' Eden's eastern border is the Land of Nod. I have identified Mari on the Euphrates as being watered by one stream that subdivides into four streams in the Lower Mesopotamian floodplain (where lay ancient Sumer, Akkad and Babylonia). Enoch, Genesis' first city in the land of Nod is apparently modeled in part after Sumer's first city, Eridug/Eridu (and perhaps fused with Unug/Uruk). So the "biblical" Eden and its garden is in Upper Mesopotamia (Mari) and the "land of Nod" lies in Lower Mesopotamia: ancient Sumer and its "first city," Eridu, probably fused with Unug, for it is this location that Enkidu and Shamhat (prototypes of Adam and Eve) head for upon leaving the edin, just as Genesis has man leaving Eden to dwell in the land of Nod at the world's first city Enoch.
Strong on Eden's meaning (James Strong. Strong's Exhuastive Concordance. "Hebrew and Chaldee Dictionary." Waco, Texas. Word Books. 1977):
5731 `Eden, the same as 5730 the region of Adam's home.
5730 `eden, `ednah from 5727 pleasure, delicate, delight.
5729 `Eden pleasure, a place in Mesopotamia: Eden.
5727 `adan to be soft or pleasant, to live voluptuously, delight oneself.
Professor George understands Enkidu's name means "Lord of the Pleasant Place." (cf. p. 223. "Enkidu." "Glossary of Proper Nouns." Andrew George. The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Babylonian Epic Poem and Other Texts in Akkadian and Sumerian. London. Penguin Books. 1999). If George is correct, I note that Eden is associated with "pleasure" (Strong 5730/5729) and the word "pleasant" (Strong 5727). Most Christians, Jews and Moslems would understand that Eden _is_ a "Pleasant Place." In 1898 Professor Jastrow proposed that Adam was in part modeled after Enkidu (cf. p. 476. Morris Jastrow, Jr. The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria. Boston. Ginn & Company. 1898) whom he called then Eabani, "made in the image of Ea" and in 1963 Professors Graves and Patai also proposed that Adam was modeled in part after Enkidu (cf. pp. 67, 78-79, 80-81. Robert Graves & Raphael Patai. Hebrew Myths, The Book of Genesis. Greenwich House. 1983 reprint of 1963, 1964 editions by Doubleday). Professor George's proposal that Enkidu means "Lord of the Pleasant Place" does align nicely with Eden being a "pleasant" place or a place of "pleasure" or place of "delight."
Hamilton on Eden meaning "delight" and "pleasure" (emphasis mine):
"Etymologically Hebrew `eden is often connected with Sumerian-Akkadian edinu, "plain, flatland, wilderness, prairie," a term used as a geographical designation for the plain between the Tigris and Euphrates in southern Mesopotamia...In 3:23 LXX paradeisou tes tryphes, "paradise of delight," seems to relate Hebrew `eden to the verb `adan, which occurs only once, and in the Hithpael stem- "to delight oneself" (Neh. 9:25), and to the related words `edna, "pleasure" (Gen. 18:12), and `adina, "pleasure seeker" (Isa. 47:8). There are other expressions throughout the OT for the garden of Eden, namely, "the garden of Yahweh" (Gen. 13:10; Isa. 51:3) and the "garden of God" (Ezek. 28:13; 31:9)."
(p. 161. Victor P. Hamilton. The Book of Genesis, Chapters 1-17. Vol. 1. William B. Eerdmans. 1990)
Note the _"delights"_ concept associated with Enkidu, the beasts and water, as well the "delights" offered by Shamhat to Enkidu (`eden can mean "delight" according to some scholars):
Professor George on the Hunter and Shamhat waiting for Enkidu's arrival to the watering-hole in the midst of the eden/edin (the steppe, or the wild); note also that Enkidu is said to possess reason and understanding after his exposure to the naked woman of eden/iedin, just as a naked Adam acquired reason and knowledge after his exposure to a naked Eve in Eden. I suspect the notion of a naked man and his wild animal companions "delighting" in water in eden/edin was recast by the Hebrews as a naked Adam and animal companions in a garden of Eden, "a garden of delights":
"...they waited by the water-hole,
then the herd came down to drink the water.
The game arrived, their hearts delighting in water,
and Enkidu also, born in the uplands.
With the gazelles he grazed on grasses,
joining the throng with the game at the water-hole,
his heart delighting with the beasts in the water:
then Shamhat saw him, the child of nature,
the savage man from the midst of the wild.
...she spread her clothing and he lay upon her.
...his passion caressed and embraced her.
For six days and seven nights
Enkidu was erect, as he coupled with Shamhat.
When with her delights he was fully sated,
he turned his gaze to his herd.
The gazelles saw Enkidu, they started to run,
the beasts of the field shied away from his presence.
Enkidu had defiled his body so pure,
his legs stood still, though his herd was in motion.
Enkidu was weakened, could not run as before,
but now he had reason, and wide understanding."
(pp. 7-8. Andrew George. The Epic of Gilgamesh. London. Penguin Books. 1999, 2000, 2003)
Please click here for maps of the Garden of Eden by Professor Friedrich Delitzsch (1881), William Willcocks (1919), and Manfred Dietrich (2002).
Please click here for the pre-biblical origins of Eden's Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life.
Please click here for pictures of Adam and Eve as Enkidu and Shamhat and Dumuzi and Inanna.
Please click here for pictures of Inanna and Dumuzi and the famous so-called "Adam, Eve, and Serpent Cylinder Seal."
Please click here for a picture of Adapa as a Merman (Fish-man) and Christ as Jonah in the Fish ("Whale").
Please click here for pictures of the deities that would later become the Cherubim guarding the Tree of Life.
Please click here for the Parallels between Enkidu and Adam in a "two column" side-by-side format.
Please click here for the Parallels between Shamhat and Eve in a "two column" side-by-side format.
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This research on the pre-biblical origins of Eden and its garden has noted that professional scholars are in disagreement with each other. Some have suggested Genesis' Eden is ultimately derived from Sumerian Edin, others object. The reason for their objection is primarily three reasons:
(1) Genesis' Eden has an ayin accent or phoneme /`/: `eden whereas Sumerian edin does not.
(2) Biblical Eden appears to be derived from `dn, a root meaning "delight, enjoy, lushness, or a place well-watered" whereas Sumerian edin means "back" and refers to the "backland" or uncultivated steppe, sometimes rendered as the wilderness, the wilds, desert, or fertile plain depending on the scholar.
(3) The argument has been made that the Akkadian (Babylonian) word edinu appears only _once_ in a syllabary and hence its survival down through the ages to become the biblical `eden is rejected by some scholars. Please click here for A. R. Millard's article on the "Etymology of Eden" (1984) and why some scholars reject Sumerian edin or Akkadian edinu being what `eden was derived from.
Professor Sayce on Eden (1898), note: today Zeru is rendered variously as Seru, Seri, Tseru, Ce:ru by modern Assyriologists:
"Eden means delight in Hebrew...The cuneiform inscriptions have, however, cleared up the geography of the garden of Eden. The Sumerian name of the 'plain' of Babylonia was Edin, which was adopted by the Semites under the form of Edinu. Its Assyrian equivalent was Zeru, corresponding to the Arabic Zor, the name still applied to the 'depression' between the Tigris and Euphrates."
(p. 643. Vol. 1. A. H. Sayce. "Eden." in James Hastings, editor, A Dictionary of the Bible, Dealing with its Language, Literature, and Contents Including the Biblical Theology. Edinburgh, Scotland. T. & T. Clark. 1898. Reprinted 1988 by Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts)
Professor Millard (1984) on Eden's contested etymology (Emphasis mine):
"Current scholarship offers two explanations for "Eden"...One seeks the origin of the name in an Akkadian word borrowed from Sumerian, the other in the Semitic stem `dn, "abundant, lush". A reconsideration of the arguments and some newly available evidence presented here, strongly favouring the latter explanation over the former.
1. Eden an Akkadian word
The derivation of Eden from a Babylonian source arose after the recovery of part of a cuneiform tablet from Nineveh. This tablet contains a list of Sumerian word-signs in its central column, phoenetic renderings in the left hand column, and Akkadian equivalents in the right column, The list, known to-day as syllabary b, was apparently compiled late in the second millennium B.C., or early in the first. One entry (line 104) reads e-di-in: edin: e-di-nu, the next e-di-in: edin: se-e-ru. There is abundant evidence to show that edin was the normal Sumerian word for "steppe, plain", and for the second Akkadian equivalent, seru, in the same meaning. Friedrich Delitzsch, who knew of the text before its official publication, claimed the first Akkadian equivalent was identical with the Hebrew name. In his Wo lag das Paradies? Leipzig, 1881, pp. 4, 6, 79 f., he asserted that Hebrew `eden was not connected with words for "delight" from the base `dn, nor with the Aramean place-name Bit-Adini, but with this Sumero-Akkadian term...this example was widely accepted...A. H. Sayce wrote "The cuneiform inscriptions have, however, cleared up the greography of the garden of Eden. The Sumerian name of the plain of Babylonia was Edin, which was adopted by the Semites under the form Edinu." ...Some authorities were cautious about the relationship...E.A. Spieser wrote "Eden. Hebrew `eden, Akkadian edinu, based on Sumerian eden 'plain, steppe'...this word is rare in Akkadian but exceedingly common in Sumerian thus certifying the ultimate source as very ancient indeed (Genesis [Garden City, 1964], pp. 16, 19).
Attractive as this derivation seems, it faces major objections. One, restated by Claus Westermann, deserves attention. The Sumerian word begins with a simple /e/. That language has no /`/, and there is no ground for supposing one stood as the initial of the word in Akkadian, as it does in Hebrew.
The second objection arises from the history of the word in Babylonia. Speiser rightly observes that it is exceedingly common" in Sumerian. In Akkadian, on the other hand, its occurrence is limited to the single entry in Syllabary b cited above. Wherever "steppe" is to be expressed in Akkadian, and wherever there are Akkadian renderings of Sumerian compositions using edin the word normally found is seru, edinu never appears. This could be an accident, Akkadian texts containing edinu having escaped recovery. Yet given that seru so often translates edin, and that there are several known synonyms of seru in Akkadian, it seems safe to conclude that edinu was not a word current in Akkadian, but simply a learned scribal transcription of the Sumerian word-sign in the Syllabary. Again, a learned Hebrew scribe might have borrowed an extremely rare word from Babylonian because it could allow a popular etymology, but it can hardly be considered very likely, and is not the case with other Akkadian loan-words in Biblical Hebrew. The number of ancient readers who could have understood such ingenuity would not have been large.
Both the problem of the initial phoneme and the absence of edinu from any Akkadian text except one lexical list militate against the derivation of Hebrew `eden from an East Semitic and ultimately Sumerian word.
2. Eden a West Semitic word
Biblical Hebrew knows several words with `dn as their base and the common idea of "pleasure, luxury". Traditionally, Eden is linked with them...Those who prefer the Babylonian explanation assume with Speiser that the foreign word "came to be associated, naturally enough, with the homonymous but unrelated noun for 'enjoyment' ", while Skinner affirmed "There is no probability that the proper name was actually coined in this sense."...
(pp. 104-105. A. R. Millard. "The Etymology of Eden." in Vetus Testamentum. Vol. 34. Fasc. 1. Jan. 1984. pp. 103-106)
My vote has been cast with those scholars advocating edin is what is behind Genesis' Eden. I have given my reasons in this article:
(1) I understand that Eden (`eden) is a _deliberate misspelling_ of edin, intended to thereby _refute, deny and challenge_ the Mesopotamian presentation of man's origins and his relationship with his creator(s). Eden (`eden) meaning "delight" is an echo or reflection of naked Enkidu's and his herbivore animal companions' _delight_ in the water at the watering hole where he meets and is "undone" by a naked woman, Shamhat.
(2) I understand that motifs associated with the edin such as man's (Enkidu's) being naked, unaware it is wrong to be naked, wandering the edin with herbivore gazelles, he eating grass, have been recast as Adam and his animal companions in Eden being herbivores.
(3) I understand that the motif of a "fall" for Adam and his giving up animal companionship for a naked woman, Eve, in Eden is met with Enkidu's encounter with Shamhat in the edin.
(4) I understand that Eve's persuading Adam to eat forbidden food is a recast of Shamhat persuading Enkidu to eat bread at the shepherd's camp in the edin. After eating he is presented a robe to put on (recast as Adam eating then clothing himself).
(5) I understand that Enkidu's blaming Shamhat for his loss of innocence and impending death and cursing her were recast as Yahweh-Elohim cursing Eve for persuading Adam to eat the forbidden fruit.
(6) I understand that motifs of a lost chance for man (Adam) to obtain immortality in Eden, appears to be reflected in Enkidu and Gilgamesh who both lived for a time in the edin, who both sought unsuccessfully to avoid the lot of all men: death.
(7) Genesis' Eden is presented as the name of physical location or region that God's garden is located within. After making his garden, man is placed in it to care for it. Sumerian edin is a term applied to uncultivated land. The gods created cities and city-gardens to provide food for themselves _before_ man's creation. Later, man is created to care for their gardens. The Gods' city-gardens are surrounded by uncultivated land called the edin. That is to say the gods' city gardens are _in_ the midst of the edin. So, Yahweh plants a garden _in_ 'eden and places man in it to care for it, whereas the Mesopotamian myths have the gods creating city-gardens _in_ the midst of the edin (uncultivated land).
Professor Kitchen made an important observation regarding Eden and its garden, that Eden is a region in which lies God's garden, it is better to say a "garden _in_ Eden" rather than a "garden _of_ Eden":
"Then, in 2:38, we enter the ever intriquing "Garden of Eden." Very strictly, it is not "the garden of Eden' at all, but "a garden in Eden." It has to be grasped very clearly that the garden was simply a limited area within a larger area "Eden," and two are not identical, or of equal area. A realization of this simple but much neglected facts opens the way to a proper understanding of the geography of Eden and its environment. Thus, out of "greater Eden," a river flowed into the garden (2:10), "to water the garden"; and at that point ("there" in Hebrew, sham) it was divided into four "heads."
(p. 428. "In Eden." K. A. Kitchen. On the Reliability of the Old Testament. Grand Rapids, Michigan & Cambridge, United Kingdom. William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. 2003)
(8) Some scholars' objection to edin becoming `eden is that in its Akkadian form of edinu it appears only _once_ in a syllabary suggesting to them that it is a "rare" word which would not survive a transmission down through the ages to become the biblical `eden through borrowing. _CONTRA_ this argument, I have come to understand from two professional scholars and trained Assyriologists, Robert M. Whiting PhD of Helsinki, Finland and Professor Andrew George of London, England, that EDIN was preserved as a Sumerian logogram which was _commonly_ used in place of the Akkadian word seri, seru, tseru in all kinds of compositions.
EDIN survived _not_ as a "rare" Akkadian _edinu_ but as the Sumerian logogram EDIN which according to Professor Andrew George is _very commonly_ encountered as a 'mechanical' substitute for seri, seru, tseru in numerous Akkadian texts down through the ages.
I want to point out here to the reader _A CONTRADICTION_, Millard (above) argues that Sumerian EDIN _is _replaced_ in Akkadian by the Akkadian word SERU_, but Professor George has informed me that it was quite common for Akkadian scribes _TO REPLACE AKKADIAN SERU WITH THE SUMERIAN LOGOGRAM EDIN_, just the opposite of Millard's argument!
It is true that when modern Assyriologists see the Sumerian logogram EDIN in an Akkadian composition they "read" it as seru.
Millard _is_ a competently trained Assyriologist, so I have no doubt that at times Sumerian edin _is_ replaced by Akkadian seru in some translations. But, had Millard noted in his article that the Sumerian logogram (EDIN) at times _is used in lieu of_ Akkadian seru, the "mystery" of how Hebrew `eden came to be derived from EDIN and _not_ edinu_, would have been "cleared up" long ago!
My "modest contribution" here to the above insights of these Professors is to note that Genesis' Adam and Eve not only appear to be _recasts_ of Enkidu and Shamhat (as noted by Jastrow in 1898 and Graves and Patai in 1963), but that the very word Eden (Hebrew `eden) appears to have been preserved in the Epic of of Gilgamesh as the Sumerian Logogram EDEN (EDIN) it being used at times in _lieu_ of the Akkadian word seri, seru or tseru.
Kramer (1986) on Sumerian logograms being used by Assyrian men of letters:
"The ancient Assyrian men of letters, when inscribing their various compendia such as omens or incantations, would often utilize Sumerian logograms to represent Assyrian words, just as, for example, we write etc. (the Latin et cetera) but usually pronounce it as "and so forth." It was my task to go through the transliterations and translations of these documents prepared by senior scholars from America and abroad, to examine carefully their renderings of the Sumerian logograms into Assyrian, and to note on these cards, making sure of their consistency and accuracy before they were utilized in any passage quoted in the dictionary."
(p. 36. "Arno Poebel and Sumerian Grammar." Samuel Noah Kramer. In the World of Sumer, An Autobiography. Detroit. Wayne State University Press. 1986)
The issue is, did the Akkadian scribe "read" the Sumerian logogram as eden/edin or did he read it as seru? Was he "unaware" that the Sumerian logogram edin was not to be read as eden but as seru? How did a Jew at Jerusalem come to know of this "esoteric scribal information," that a Sumerian logogram eden was being used instead of writing out seru in cuneiform? Were Jews able to read Akkadian and the Sumerian logograms that that script used?
The answer to the foregoing questions may lie with the Bible's statement that the Jebusites of Jerusalem intermarried with Jews (cf. Judges 3:5). King David is portrayed capturing Jerusalem and later buying a threshing floor of a Jebusite for the Temple to be erected by Solomon, so it is possible that literate Jebusites existed in David's days to pass this esoteric information on. The Amarna letters from Jerusalem to Pharaoh Akhenaton reveal that some of Jerusalem's residents were literate men trained in cuneiform Akkadian words. I suspect the marriages between Jebusites and Jews at Jerusalem may have made possible the knowledge of a naked man who was undone by a naked woman in eden/edin (Enkidu and Shamhat). In other words this eden/edin logogram may have been orally presented by a literate Jebusite grandparent perhaps as a children's bedtime story (?) to his Jewish grandchildren (perhaps in David's days?) and these children (or perhaps Jewish sons-in-law of Jebusite fathers-in-law or Jewish daughters-in-law of Jebusite fathers-in-law?) hearing the word eden/edin associated it with the Hebrew `eden. In other words, perhaps the Sumerian eden/edin came by homonymic or homophonic confusion to be equated with Hebrew `eden, "a place of delight," or "a place well watered and lush."
Judges 3:5 RSV
"So the people of Israel dwelt among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the JEBUSITES; and they took their daughters to themselves for wives, and their own daughters they gave to their sons; and they served their gods."
David's capture of "Jebusite" Jerusalem:
2 Samuel 5:6 RSV
"And the king and his men went to Jerusalem against the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land, who said to David, "You will not come in here, bcause the blind and the lame will ward you off" thinking, "David cannot come in here." Nevertheless David took the stronghold of zion, that is, the city of David."
Professor Millard in his study on the etymological origins of Eden (Hebrew `eden) noted in passing that those scholars who thought it was descended from the "rare" Akkadian edinu, that the basis of this relationship was that two words although not spelled identically (there being no ayin phoneme /`/ for edin or edinu as in Hebrew `eden), they did appear to superficially look somewhat similar but had different meanings in the two languages. This "similar" word appearance is technically called a homonym. It has been suggested that a Hebrew or Jew may have heard eden/edin and equated it with Hebrew `eden via either assonance or a homonymic or possibly a homophonic basis. I have no problem with this suggestion, it seems plausible.
Webster on assonance:
"assonance. a noun. resemblance in spoken sound."
(p. 41. "assonance." Albert & Loy Morehead, editors. Webster Handy College Dictionary. 1981. New American Library. A Signet Book. New York)
Webster's dictionary defines a homonym:
"hom'o.nym. a noun. a word like another in sound and (often) spelling, but different in meaning, as in bear (carry) and bear (a mammal)."
(p. 260. "homonym." Albert & Loy Morehead, editors. Webster Handy College Dictionary. 1981. New American Library. A Signet Book. New York)
Webster's dictionary on homophones (Please Note: English eden in Hebrew is spelled `eden, ayin /`/ does not appear in the Sumerian word edin/eden, hence the reason some scholars object to `eden being derived from edin/eden because of these two words are different in meaning and spelling):
"hom'o.phone. a word pronounced like another but different in meaning and spelling, as too and two."
(p. 260. "homophone." Albert & Loy Morehead. Editors. The New Webster Handy College Dictionary. New York. A Signet Book. New American Library. 1981)
Professor Millard (1984):
"Biblical Hebrew knows several words with `dn as their base and the common idea of "pleasure, luxury". Traditionally, Eden is linked with them...Those who prefer the Babylonian explanation assume with Speiser that the foreign word "came to be associated, naturally enough, with the homonymous but unrelated noun for 'enjoyment' ..."
(p. 105. A. R. Millard. "The Etymology of Eden." in Vetus Testamentum. Vol. 34. Fasc. 1. Jan. 1984. pp. 103-106)
I have noticed that some modern scholars render Sumerian edin alternately as eden, which would make the "homonym association" even closer: eden and `eden (cf. below, Halloran's rendering of edin, eden). Note: Sumerian eden/edin means "back," as in a person's "back" and it is by analogy applied to the uncultivated and unirrigated land "backing" the irrigated land surrounding the Sumerian city-gardens or fields. That is to say, eden/edin is in a sense the "backlands," the "wilds," where roam wild animals and shepherds with their flocks. The Mesopotamian gods' city-gardens or irrigated fields then lie _in_ the eden/edin, or are surrounded by the eden/edin and receive their water from eden's (edin's) two streams, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
Halloran on Sumerian logograms:
"A logogram is a reading of a cuneiform sign which represents a word in the spoken language. Sumerian scribes invented the practice of writing in cuneiform on clay tablets sometime around 3400 B.C. in the Uruk/Warka region of southern Iraq. The language that they spoke, Sumerian, is known to us through a large body of texts and through bilingual cuneiform dictionaries of Sumerian and Akkadian, the language of their Semitic successors, to which Sumerian is not related. These bilingual dictionaries date from the Old Babylonian period (1800-1600 B.C.), by which time Sumerian had ceased to be spoken, except by the scribes. The earliest and most important words in Sumerian had their own cuneiform sign, whose origins were pictographic, making an initial repertoire of about a thousand signs or logograms." (John A. Halloran. Sumerian Lexicon. Version 3.0) http://www.sumerian.org/sumerian.pdf
Halloran on Sumerian logogram edin or eden:
edin, eden: noun: steppe, plain; grazing land between the two long rivers.
an-edin: high plain (high + steppe)
bar-edin-na: edge of the desert (side + steppe + genitival a (k) )
Professor E. A. Spieser (1964) rendered Sumerian edin as eden in his book on Genesis as noted by Professor Millard:
"E. A. Spieser wrote "Eden. Hebrew `eden, Akkadian edinu, based on Sumerian eden 'plain, steppe'...this word is rare in Akkadian but exceedingly common in Sumerian thus certifying the ultimate source as very ancient indeed (Genesis [Garden City, 1964], pp. 16, 19)."
(cf. A. R. Millard. "The Etymology of Eden." in Vetus Testamentum. Vol. 34. Fasc. 1. Jan. 1984. pp. 103-106)
Wallace, in passing, also renders Sumerian edin as eden too:
"However, several objections have been raised. First, Genesis 2-3 refers to Eden in terms of a fertile garden or oasis. The transference to this meaning from a Sumerian word for "plain" or "steppe" is obscure. Secondly, while the word eden is common in Sumerian, the Akkadian equivalent edinu is attested only once...The usual Akkadian equivalent to Sumerian eden is seru. From available evidence it seems that edinu was an extremely rare word in Akkadian and it is not a likely candidate for further borrowing into biblical Hebrew. The craft of a narrator or scribe in adopting such a word would be lost to nearly all hearers or readers."
(p. 281. Vol. 2. Howard N. Wallace. "Eden, Garden of." David Noel Freedman. Editor. The Anchor Bible Dictionary. New York. Doubleday. 1992)
If you "want to see" the Sumerian logogram _EDIN_ (Spieser, Millard and Wallace's Sumerian _EDEN_) in the Epic of Gilgamesh you will have to access Professor George's on-line transliteration mentioned above (cf. also below, a few examples of EDIN/EDEN):
Andrew George is a Professor of Babylonian at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, London, England. He is the author of: The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic, Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts. Oxford University Press. Published 2003. 1176 pages with drawings and photos.
Further correspondence with Professor George reveals that the Akkadian scribe did not exclusively use the Sumerian logogram edin in _lieu_ of seri, he uses _both_ seri and edin interchangeably in different verses. So BOTH seri and edin are found in the Epic of Gilgamesh.
A modern example of a logogram used in English may help here. The number three can be spelled out using vowels and consonants but as a logogram it can also be written as a number: "3." I, myself, in various articles at this website frequently use numbers instead of spelling out the numbers with consonants and vowels as a "shorthand" system just like the Akkadian scribe, as for example: 250 instead of two-hundred-and-fifty.
A few examples of EDIN as a Sumerian logogram being used _in lieu of_ Akkadian seri, seru, tseru, meaning "steppe" or "plain" or "the wild" in the 12 clay tablets making up the Epic of Gilgamesh:
(The below transliterations are by Professor Andrew George. Please click here for the url the below were taken from)
Tablet 1:
102 P ii 36b fli-fla ik-ta-ri-i◊ it-ta-di ina EDI[N]
103 P ii 37a [ina EDI]N den-ki-dù ib-ta-ni qu-ra-du :
h ii 42 ina EDIN den-k[i-
132 P iii 11 [u·-te-li ina q®t¬-ia] bu-lam nam-ma·-·á-a ·á ED[IN]
