EDEN

Arabic ʿAdn ( عدن‎ ), which al-Baiẓāwī says means “a fixed abode.” The Hebrew ‏עֵדֶן‎ is generally understood by Hebrew scholars to mean “pleasure” or “delight.” The word ʿAdn is not used in the Qurʾān for the residence of our first parents, the term used being al-jannah , “the garden”; although the Muslim Commentators are agreed in calling it the Jannatu ʿAdn , or “Garden of Eden.” The expre ions, Jannatu ʿAdn , “the Garden of Eden,” and Jannātu ʿAdn , “the Gardens of Eden,” occur ten times in the Qurʾān, but in each case they are used for the fourth heaven, or stage, of celestial bli . [ PARADISE .] According to the Qurʾān, it seems clear that Jannatu ʿAdn is considered to be a place in heaven , and not a terrestrial paradise, and hence a difficulty arises as to the locality of that Eden from which Adam fell. Is it the same place as the fourth abode of celestial bli ? or, was it a garden situated in some part of earth? Al-Baiẓāwī says that some people have thought this Eden was situated in the country of the Philistines, or between Fāris and Kirmān. But, he adds, the Garden of Eden is the Dāru ʾs̤-S̤awāb , or “the House of Recompense,” which is a stage in the paradise of the heavens; and that when Adam and Eve were cast out of Paradise, Adam fell on the isle of Ceylon, or Sarandīb , and Eve near Jiddah in Arabia; and after a separation of 200 years, Adam was, on his repentance, conducted by the Angel Gabriel to a mountain near Makkah, where he knew his wife Eve, the mountain being thence named ʿArafah ( i.e . “the place of recognition ” ); and that he afterwards retired with her to Ceylon, where they continued to propagate their species. Muḥammad T̤āhir ( Majmaʿu ʾl-Biḥār , p. 225), in remarking upon the fact that in the Traditions the rivers Jaihūn and Jaihān are said to be rivers in “the garden ” ( al-Jannah ), says the terms are figurative, and mean that the faith extended to those regions and made them rivers of paradise. And in another place ( idem , p. 164) the same author says the four rivers Saiḥān (Jaxartes), Jaihān (Jihon), Furāt (Euphrates), and Nil (Nile), are the rivers of Paradise, and that the rivers Saiḥān and Jaihān are not the same as Jaihūn and Jaihān, but that these four rivers already mentioned originally came from Paradise to this earth of ours.