CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 2#

  1. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.

  2. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

  3. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.

MAN IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN#

  1. There are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens,

  2. and every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.

  3. But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.

  1. And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

  1. And LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.

  1. 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.

  1. And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads.

  2. The name of the first is Pison: that is it which compasseth the whole land of Hav’ilah, where there is gold;

  3. and the gold of that land is good: there is bdellium and the onyx stone.

  4. And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that compasseth the while land of Ethiopia.

  5. And the name of the third river is Hid’dekel: that is it which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphra’tes.

  6. And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and keep it.

  7. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

  1. but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

  1. And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a help meet for him.

  2. And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.

  3. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found a help meet for him.

  4. And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof.

  5. And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

  6. And Adam said, There is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.

  1. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

  2. And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not shamed.

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Fig. 1 A river flowed out of Eden and became four main branches, two of which are known with certainty: the Tigris, called Hiddekel in the Bible, and the Euphrates. The map above shows the present course of these two rivers. What is today called the Near East is in the center of this map and is bounded roughly by five bodies of water: the Mediterranean Sea, the Black Sea, the Caspian Sea, the Persian Gulf, and the Red Sea. Parentheses around these and certain other names on this map indicate names that through the centuries came to be used for these geographic features. Through generally barren – with mountains, hills, and deserts – the Near East contains a well-watered region from which arose the first great civilizations of the world. Because of its abundant vegetation and its shape, this region has been called the Fertile Crescent; it extends from the Persian Gulf, which is the mouth of the mouth of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, northwestward before curving south along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea toward the Nile Delta. A map of the Fertile Crescent, tracing the route of Abraham on his journey to Canaan, is on page xyz. In the mountains of Ararat (see above) Noah’s ark came to rest after the Flood. A location in these mountains traditionally associated with this event is shown on page xyz. A Google Earth file in KML format used to generate this figure can be downloaded here.#

And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden … And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads … And the name of the third river is Hid’dekel: that is which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphra’tes. – GENESIS 2:8,10,14

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