An Expedition to the Garden of Eden
The Location of the Garden of Eden
Chapter one of the Book of Genesis is a summary of the Natural history of our Universe. The current scientific understanding of the natural history of the Universe parallels the Biblical account so that there is no need to try to reconcile the differences. One may choose one, or the other, or both accounts in order to understand the background for chapter 2, which includes the description of the Garden of Eden and allows us to find Eden both geographically and theologically.
Chapter two of the Book of Genesis relates how God formed Adam from the dust of the ground and placed him in the Garden of Eden, which God himself planted. God planted a tree as the centerpiece of the Garden and called it “the Tree of Life”, which bestowed eternal life on those who lived on its fruit. This Tree reflected the very purpose of the Garden which was to provide an idyllic location for God to enjoy and love his creation and for Adam and Eve to know and love their Creator forever. To be meaningful, love for God had to be a personal choice and God placed the self centered option of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden as well as the Tree of life. Clearly these two trees were not biological but rather allegorical for Man’s choice to walk by faith with God as Adam and Eve and Enoch and Noah and Abraham and Moses did, or to go their own way.
Chapter three relates the history of how Adam and Eve, although they had been walking with God, ate from the tree that represented the self centered option, which God had cautioned them against, instead of the Tree of Life. For this reason they were driven from the Garden and cherubim and a flaming sword were placed at the east entrance to guard the way to the tree of Life.
The Author of Genesis wanted us to understand that the account in these chapters was history and not legend so he described its location precisely. He said the Garden was in the east between the Two Rivers, that is Mesopotamia, or in the Septuagint, Anatolia, a region which holds these same names to this day. It also describes Eden as on a mountain, which was at the headwaters of four rivers. The rivers were the Pishon, the Gihon, the Hiddekel (the Dicle or Tigris) and the Perat (Euphrates). The Hiddekel and Euphrates are well known to this day and define Mesopotamia. The Pishon and the Gihon carry different names today, but the biblical account indicates that the Pishon river ran through the land of Havilah and the Gihon river ran along the border of the land of Cush. It reveals Havilah’s location because coming from Egypt it is before you reach Assyria and the Tigris. It also shows that Havilah and his brother Ophir, the gold miner, lived from Mount Mesha (Masia) a mountain of Mesopotamia in the direction of Sephar (Sippar) The city of Sippar lies to the southeast along the Euphrates. Cush is known, because shortly after the time Moses wrote Genesis, using only post diluvian geographic references, the Cushite King Cushan-Rishathaim ruled Aram Naharaim and was defeated by Caleb’s nephew Othniel. It is the same place where Jacob met Rachael and Leah. The river which flowed through Havilah was the Pishon, which is now called the Khabur. Its origin is on mount Masia and flows southeast towards Sippar. The river which flows around Cush is called the Habur it also originates on Mount Masia as both the Karahisarcayi Creek and the Harami Creek. There is, what is now an intermittent stream, which flows along the crest of Mount Masia for about 10 kilometers to the southern end of Masia near the origin of the other three rivers of Eden. It is the Eden River, but from millennia of erosion it currently flows only to the Tigris. In 1888 Paul Sintenis discovered the Masia Iris on the western slopes of Mount Masia which is now called the Karaca Dag. At that same location researchers from the Max Planck institute in Germany located the primitive origin of many varieties of modern wheat, which is called Einkorn. This is the location, to which Adam and Eve would have fled from the fiery sword and being the first biblically recorded farmers it assures us that the biblical account of their lives is historically accurate.
Sennacherib king of Assyria declared to King Hezekiah that his ancestors the Assyrians had conquered the Children of Eden at Telassar. Telassar (later named Constantia) is the modern city of Viransehir lying just south of Mount Masia near the Khabur River according to both Maunsell’s Ethnographic map and the Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, both of which further confirm the location of the Garden of Eden. Fifteen kilometers east of Masia at the entrance to the mountain on the Diyarbakir/Viransehir highway is a volcanic cone. It was described by the Prophet Ezekiel as he looked to the north from the Silk Road crossing of the Kevar (Khabur) river. His description, included a large cloud, with fire in the center, the color of amber, with lightning flashes and the sound of an army camp. He believed it to be cherubim and it is at the same location as the fiery sword and cherubim, that Adam and Eve observed, which guarded the way to the Tree of Life east of the Garden of Eden.
Ezekiel further records the visit to Eden by the King of Tyre who was appointed Cherubim/Guardian of Eden and walked among the stones of fire. All three of these events place the Garden of Eden on Mount Masia.
Abram and his brother Nahor came from Ur of the Chaldeans. Genesis 11:31 The Khabur basin is in the land of the Chaldeans Ezekiel 1:3 so Moses’ source of information regarding Eden was only a few generations from Abram who lived in that region and would have known its history and geography.
For Moses who recorded Genesis, physical reality and spiritual reality were not separate. The Tree of Life was how he expressed the close spiritual relationship, which Adam and Eve had, knowing God and walking with Him in the midst of the Garden of Eden. John the apostle wrote: “This is eternal life, that they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” This defines eternal life as a spiritual relationship, rather than a botanical tree. For Christians, Jesus went on to atone for man’s sin, reestablishing their loving relationship with God and restoring eternal life to those who believe.
A pilgrimage to Mount Masia is not necessary to obtain eternal life since one may know and love God and Jesus there in the Garden or anywhere even though, like Adam and Eve, at times we miss the mark of loving God with all our heart, all our soul and all our strength and our neighbor as ourselves.
1. Havilah is before you get to Syria on the Silk Road. Genesis 25:18
2. Havilah is from Mesha toward Sippar. Genesis 10:30
3. The river which flows through Havilah, the Pishon starts in Eden. Genesis 2:11
4 Ezekiel was looking north to a volcano from the Khabur. Ezekiel chapter one.
5. Adam and Eve were looking east to the same volcano. Genesis 3:24
6. The king of Tyre walked among the fiery stones of a volcano in Eden. Ezekiel 28:13,14
7 All three of the previous witnesses Adam,Ezekiel, and the King of Tyre called the volcano “Cherubim”. Ezekiel 28:14 Genesis 3:24 Genesis 10:15
8.Eden is on a mountain in Mesopotamia. Genesis 2:8 Ezekiel 28:13,14.
9.The four rivers of Eden are identifiable as Tigris, Euphrates, Khabur, and Habur. Genesis 2:13 Genesis 2:11
10.Cush is in Aram Nahariam. Judges 3:8
11.Einkorn identifies Adam as the first biblical farmer. Genesis 3:23
12.Viransehir is Telassar where the Children of Eden lived. Isaiah 37:12
13.Moses gave only post flood landmarks for the Garden of Eden so it couldn’t have been destroyed in the Flood of Noah. The king of Tyre went to Eden after the flood.
14. The Masia Iris identifies Karaca Dag as Masia so does Strabo geography Book XI Chapter XIV.
15. Harran is in Mesopotamia and called “the East”. Genesis 29:1,4.
16. Abram lived in the Khabur basin. Genesis 11:31 Ezekiel 1:3
Additional resources:
Maunsell’s ethnographic map of Turkey
J. A. Pearce Genesis of Collision Volcanism in Eastern Anatolia, Turkey 1990 page 155
Oxford dictionary of Byzantium “Constantina” page 497
New Map of Turkey Jean Baptiste D’Anville 1794