Nobody knows where the Garden of Eden was located. Nobody has found the Garden of Eden. Any report that claims otherwise is simply bogus.

We read about the Garden of Eden in Genesis 2:8-14:

The first problem in locating the Garden is “in the east.” East of what? East from where? The phrase is too vague to give us any good information. Probably east of Israel, but how far east? Is that the eastern part of Israel? Is that somewhere in Jordan? Saudi Arabia? Iraq? India? Nobody knows.

We do have more clues, though. A river flowed out of the Garden. We don’t know the name or location of that river, but we do know that it broke into four different rivers or streams after leaving the Garden:

1. The Pishon
2. The Gihon
3. The Tigris
4. The Euphrates

The Pishon

The Pishon has never been identified. Some have suggested that it wasn’t a large river, but a smaller stream. We do know that it wound through the entire land of Havilah, so it couldn’t have been very small. Unfortunately, we don’t know where Havilah was, either.

The Gihon

The Gihon has never been identified. Was it big? Small? We don’t know. We know where Cush is: today it’s known as Ethiopia. Many Ethiopians believe that the Gihon is the Abay River, also known as the Blue Nile. If they’re right, that information might be helpful. Of course, Ethiopia is a long, long way south from Israel.

The Tigris

We can locate a modern-day river known as the Tigris. It originates in Turkey, flows between Turkey and Syria, and into Iraq. Modern-day Baghdad sits next to the Tigris. Now, it’s possible that the modern-day Tigris and the ancient Tigris are the same river, but it’s not something we can simply assume to be true. Why? Because of the Great Flood. The land may have changed during the flood. If so, today’s Tigris may not be the one mentioned in Genesis 2.

Another clue is that the Tigris is mentioned one more time in the Bible: in Daniel 10:4:

On the twenty-fourth day of the first month, as I was standing on the bank of the great river, the Tigris, I looked up and there before me was a man dressed in linen, with a belt of fine gold from Uphaz around his waist. His body was like topaz, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and his voice like the sound of a multitude.

Daniel’s vision occurred while he was standing next to the Tigris. Where was Daniel at the time? He was a captive in Babylon, which is in modern-day Iraq.

The Euphrates

As with the Tigris, we also have a modern-day Euphrates. It seems likely that it’s the same as the ancient river, but it may not be. Today’s Euphrates, like the Tigris, flows from eastern Turkey through Syria and Iraq.

While we’re pretty certain that the Garden of Eden was in the middle east, probably somewhere east of Israel and probably in northern Iraq or in Turkey, that’s about as close as we can get. Tracking the exact location of the Garden is virtually impossible. We have no idea how large the Garden was, so we can only suggest an approximate location in a large area. Was the garden hundreds of miles across? Was it the size of a football field? Was it shaped like a square, or was it long and skinny like many towns located along rivers? We simply don’t have that information.

Thanks for the question, Lee!

Join the Discussion...Comment!

It’s okay for Christians to eat pork. Why wouldn’t it be okay?

Some suggest that because the ancient Israelites were forbidden by God to eat pork, Christians are to avoid pork as well. That this is nonsense should be obvious to everyone, as Christians are not Israelites. Unfortunately, many preachers and teachers are teaching nonsense.

It seems that in the beginning, people only ate plants. After the great flood, God said this in Genesis 9:3:

Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.

So pigs were definitely on the menu. The command to not eat pork came later, and is recorded in Leviticus 11:7-8:

“…the pig, though it has a divided hoof, does not chew the cud; it is unclean for you. You must not eat their meat or touch their carcasses…”

That’s pretty clear. Let’s make sure we’re reading this verse in its original context…to whom was this instruction given? Go back a few verses to verse 1:

“The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Say to the Israelites…””

That’s very clear. God told Moses and Aaron to pass the word to the Israelites about not eating pork (and other things). Noah and his family were allowed to eat pork, so there’s obviously nothing wrong with using them as food. God had a specific reason for telling the ancient Israelites to not eat pork, but it wasn’t because pigs are bad. Christians are not under the Mosaic Law, and have never been under the Mosaic Law. God didn’t tell the Chinese to avoid pork. He didn’t give these instructions to Babylonians, or Ethiopians, or Canadians. These instructions were given as part of a covenant (agreement) between God and the ancient Israelites. They have never applied to anyone else.

That’s not all, though. These instructions no longer apply to Jews, either. How do we know this? Because we read it clearly in several New Testament passages. Look at Mark 7:14-19. Take note of the last part:

Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them.” After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable. “Are you so dull?” he asked. “Don’t you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? For it doesn’t go into their heart but into their stomach, and then out of the body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean.)

That’s abundantly clear. Jesus – the Son of God, a Jew, and a man who never sinned – declared all foods clean. This was obviously a difficult idea for His disciples, whose culture had forbidden pork for around 1500 years. Simon Peter needed a bit more convincing, which we see in Acts 10. He was given a vision by God, in which he saw all kinds of animals…including those formerly considered unclean. God told him to eat, and Peter refused, saying that he had never eaten anything unclean. God’s response? Do not call anything impure that God has made clean. This was a two-fold message for Peter. The first and most obvious part of the message is that Peter could eat whatever he wanted, which was a change from the laws of Judaism. The second part of the message is that there is no difference in God’s eyes between Jews and non-Jews. Peter was supposed to go and preach the gospel to Cornelius, and God was preparing him to see that non-Jews could receive the gospel and be saved, just as Jews could.

One more passage: 1 Timothy 4:1-5. The apostle Paul is teaching Timothy, a young pastor, telling him to make sure to point out the errors of false teachers. He gave Timothy a few examples, including instructions about food:

The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron. They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth. For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.

There have always been people, like those in the Hebrew Roots movement, who work to convince others that they should obey the Mosaic Law. They are wrong. The only people who were ever expected to follow those laws were ancient Israelites. Those laws never applied to anyone else. Now that Jesus has come and made a New Covenant with everyone, the Mosaic Law has been fulfilled and has become obsolete. As we can see from the verses above, Jesus (a Jew) taught Peter (a Jew) and Paul (a Jew) that pork could be eaten, declaring all foods clean. Anyone who says otherwise is contradicting Jesus. That’s something I’m unwilling to do.

God says that it’s okay to eat pork. One might have personal reasons for not eating pork, of course. We’re free to eat pork, but that doesn’t mean we must. It means that those who teach that God prohibits His people from eating pork are teaching contrary to Scripture.

Some believe they can win God’s favor and gain eternal life by following the laws of the Old Testament. Among these are groups like those in the Hebrew Roots movement, some Seventh-Day Adventists, and so on…but this is a misunderstanding. We are not saved by following the law, but by the grace of God through faith.

Join the Discussion...Comment!

Bob wants to know why we humans believe that, after we die, we would be sent to a place based on what we did when we lived. He wants proof that Heaven and Hell exist.

We have no proof that Heaven or Hell exist, of course. We have some evidence, but not proof like “2 x 2 = 4” kind of proof. That’s not to say that one shouldn’t believe in Heaven and Hell, of course…only that we can’t prove they exist by scientific methods. After all, as the saying goes: you can’t weigh a chicken with a yardstick. How would one go about proving that Heaven or Hell exist? Certainly not by mere observation. We can only suggest that they may exist using logic.

Some suggest that we ourselves are evidence for Heaven and Hell. We seem to have a built-in understanding that justice exists…that complaining about the bad things that happen means something, as if things are not as they should be. This appears to be more than simple personal preference. Nobody says simply, “I don’t care for injustice,” as if injustice is merely less preferable than justice. It’s more of a sense of the way things “ought” to be. From where we do get this “ought”? If justice exists, rather than only mindless and meaningless life and death in an automatic world, then someone outside of the world must provide it. If the demand for justice is a universal human trait, doesn’t that imply that God exists, and that we understand that He SHOULD make things right? It seems a reasonable conclusion.

In addition to our cries for justice, we also seem to have a built-in hunger that this life can never fill. CS Lewis wrote about it this way:

If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.

He’s not alone in this observation, of course. Others have written similar things over the years. I would suggest (without proof, certainly) that every desire we have is evidence that God exists, and that there is a life after this life, and that we can find justice and fulfillment there. We get thirsty, so we drink. The problem is that we get thirsty again. There’s no reason, on the surface, to think that our cravings for food and water and sex have anything to do with some supreme being outside the universe…but we also crave truth, and beauty, and knowledge, and self-fulfillment. None of those things can be tested scientifically, and there’s no strictly physical explanation for them. That’s why Jesus said that He would provide living water that would finally satisfy our thirst once and for all. It’s a metaphor, clearly…but the implication of the metaphor is that our ‘thirsts’ are something we can’t satisfy on our own. We need someone to provide that fulfillment, and Jesus is that someone. That also seems like a reasonable conclusion.

What do you think? Is it possible that hunger, thirst, our sex drive, loneliness, and our desire for beauty and self-actualization have their ultimate fulfillment in God?

As for why we believe there’s an afterlife, and why our actions here might affect it, I couldn’t say. Certainly I’ve seen no rational materialistic explanation for it. Maybe it’s because it’s true, and that God creates all of us with some rudimentary understanding that our actions have consequences, that justice will one day be done, and that all of our hungers might finally be fulfilled. I like the question.

Thanks for asking, Bob.

Join the Discussion...Comment!

Please let me know if I’ve missed any prophets.

List of prophets in the Bible

Old Testament
Abraham	Genesis 20:7
Moses	Deuteronomy 34:10, Hosea 12:13
Miriam	Exodus 15:20
Aaron	Exodus 7:1
“A prophet”	Judges 6:8
Deborah	Judges 4:4
Samuel	1 Samuel 3:20, 9:9
Gad	1 Samuel 22:5, 2 Samuel 12:25, 2 Chronicles 29:25
Nathan	2 Samuel 7:2, Ps. 51, 2 Samuel 12:24, 1 Kings 1, 2 Chronicles 29:25
Ahijah	1 Kings 11:29, 1 Kings 14
Old Prophet in Bethel	1 Kings 13
Man of God from Judah	1 Kings 13
Jehu	1 Kings 16
Balaam	2 Peter 2:16
Elijah	1 Kings 18, 1 Kings 21, 2 Chronicles 21:12
Prophets of Baal	1 Kings 18
Elisha	1 Kings 19:15, 2 Kings 3-7
“A Prophet”	1 Kings 20:12
Micaiah	1 Kings 22
Zedekiah and 400 false prophets in the courts of King Jehosaphat	1 Kings 22
At least 100 “Sons of the Prophets”	1 Samuel 10, 19:20, 1 Kings 18:4, 2 Kings 1-5, 9
Jonah	Jonah, 2 Kings 14:23
Isaiah	2 Kings 19 & 20
Shemaiah	2 Chronicles 12:15
Iddo	2 Chronicles 12:15
Zachariah ben-Iddo	Ezekiel 5:1, Zechariah 1:1
Azariah	2 Chronicles 15 & 28:9
Jehaziel	2 Chronicles 20:14
Zachariah ben-Jehoida	2 Chronicles 24:19
“A prophet”	2 Chronicles 25:15
Hulda	2 Chronicles 34:22, 2 Kings 22:14
Jeremiah	2 Chronicles 36:12, Jeremiah 1:5, 26:7, Jeremiah 29
Haggai	Ezra 5:1, 6:14, Haggai 1:1
Noadiah – false prophetess	Nehemiah 6:14
“The Prophetess” – Isaiah’s Wife?	Isaiah 8:1ff
Hannaniah and other false prophets	Jeremiah 26:11, Jeremiah 28
Shemaiah – false prophet	Jeremiah 29:27
New Testament
John the Baptist	Matthew 11:9
Jesus	Matthew 13:57, Luke 1:76, Luke 24:19
Zacharias	Luke 1:67
Anna	Luke 2:36
Agabus and other prophets from Jerusalem	Acts 11:27, 13:1, 21:9
Bar-Jesus (Elymas) – false prophet	Acts 13:6
Judas	Acts 15:32
Silas	Acts 15:32
“The Holy Prophets”	Ephesians 3:5
Cretan prophet	Titus 1:12
Jezebel – false prophetess	Revelation 2:20
2 Apocalyptic prophets	Revelation 11:3-10
The False Prophet	Revelation 16:13, 19:20

Add to the List

Join the Discussion...Comment! 2 Comments

A lot of people have written and asked for a list of the meanings of the names of people in the Bible. Most of them come from readers of Name Changes in the Bible, one of the most popular GodWords articles. So: you asked for it, you’ve got it. Keep in mind that many names found in the Bible are not translated in the Bible, and that we often rely on translations of the name from other sources.

This list is, of course, incomplete. I mean, just look at how short it is. We’re just getting started. If you can add a name and meaning to it, just use the form at the bottom of the page and let me know.

Click column headers to sort

Name meanings in the Bible

Name	Language	Meaning	Notes
Abba	Chaldee	Father	In the Bible, Abba is a name applied to God three times, all in the New Testament.
Abda	Hebrew	Servant of Jehovah	There are two Abdas in the Bible: The father of Adoniram The son of Shammua
Abel	Hebrew	Breath	The second son of Adam and Eve, Abel’s name may reflect the shortness of his life.
Daniel	Hebrew	My judge is God	There are three Daniels in the Bible: Daniel the Prophet The second son of King David and Abigail, also known as Kileab A leader of the Jews and descendant of Ithamar who returned from Babylon with Ezra
Elijah	Hebrew	My God is Yahweh	There are four Elijahs in the Bible: Elijah the Prophet The The son of Jeroham and a clan leader A man who married and divorced a foreign wife Another man who married and divorced a foreign wife
Elisha	Hebrew	My God is Yahweh	This is the same name as Elijah.
Enoch	Hebrew	Dedicated	There are two Enochs in the Bible: The son of Cain The father of Methusaleh, descendant of Seth, who did not die
Hosea	Hebrew	Yahweh is salvation	Hosea is a Hebrew name, a variant form of Hoshe’a, which was Joshua’s name before Moses changed it.
Jesus	16 Languages	Yahweh is salvation	Jesus is a transliteration of Iesous, which is a Greek form of the Aramaic Yeshu’a, which is a shortened form of Yehoshu’a. This is the same name as Joshua.
Joshua	Hebrew	Yahweh is salvation	Joshua is the same name as Hosea and Jesus.
Jotham	Hebrew	Yahweh is perfect	There are three Jothams in the Bible: The king of Judah, son of Uzziah The son of Caleb and Jahdai The son of Gideon
Nehemiah	Hebrew	Yahweh Comforts	There are three Nehemiahs in the Bible: Cupbearer to Artaxerxes, king of Persia. Governor of Judea, son of Hakaliah, for whom the biblical book Nehemiah is named, who led the Israelites back from exile in Babylon Son of Azbuk, a district governor who helped the exiles rebuild Jerusalem Another of the exiles returning to Jerusalem
Simeon	Hebrew	To hear	There are three Simeons in the Bible: The second son of Jacob and Leah and head of one of Israel’s 12 tribes A devout man who blessed Jesus as a child Simeon Niger, a prophet and teacher who helped ordain Saul and Barnabas
Simon	Greek	To hear	Simon is the Greek rendering of the Hebrew name Shimon or Simeon. There are nine Simons in the Bible. They are described differently in Scripture, to tell them apart: Simon Peter, one of Jesus’ 12 disciples Jesus’ brother A Pharisee Simon the Zealot, another of Jesus’ apostles Simon the Leper, who owned the home where a woman anointed Jesus’ feet Simon Iscariot, father of Judas Iscariot Simon the Cyrene, who was forced to carry Jesus’ cross Simon the Sorcerer Simon the Tanner

Add to the List

Join the Discussion...Comment!

While Christianity began in first-century Israel, it quickly spread around the known world. Today, there are approximately 2,180,000,000 Christians living in every country in the world. Around 6,500 languages are spoken in the world today.

One of the most popular articles on GodWords is What Does Jesus Mean?. The article gets a lot of comments requesting the meaning of Bible names, so I thought it was time to begin a list of Jesus’ name in different languages. This list will probably never be complete, but people have been asking for it anyway.

If you speak in languages other than English and have an addition or correction, please send me a message using the form at the bottom of this page.

Click on column headers to sort

Jesus in every language

Language	Jesus’ Name
Afrikaans	Jesus
Albanian	Jezu
Amharic	የሱስ
Arabic	يسوع
Armenian	Հիսուսը
Azerbaijani	İsa
Basque	Jesus
Belarusian	Ісус
Bengali	যীশু
Bosnian	Isuse
Bulgarian	Исус
Catalan	Jesus
Cebuano	Jesus
Cherokee	Tsisa
Chichewa	Yesu
Chinese (Simplified)	耶稣
Chinese (Traditional)	耶穌
Corsican	Ghjesù
Croatian	Isus
Czech	Ježíš
Danish	Jesus
Dutch	Jezus
English	Jesus
Esperanto	Jesuo
Estonian	Jeesus
Filipino	Jesus or Hesus
Finnish	Jeesus
French	Jesus
Frisian	Jezus
Galician	Xesús
Georgian	იესო
German	Jesus
Greek	Ιησούς
Gujarati	ઇસુ
Haitian Creole	Jezi
Hausa	Yesu
Hawaiian	Iesu
Hebrew	ישוע
Hindi	यीशु
Hmong	Yexus
Hungarian	Jezus
Icelandic	Jesus
Igbo	Jesus
Indonesian	Yesus
Irish	Íosa
Italian	Gesù
Japanese	イエス
Javanese	Gusti Yesus
Kannada	ಜೀಸಸ್
Kazakh	Иса
Khmer	ព្រះយេស៊ូវ
Korean	예수
Kurdish (Kurmanji)	Îsa
Kyrgyz	Ыйса
Lao	ພຣະເຢຊູ
Latin	Iesus
Latvian	Jezus
Lithuanian	Jezus
Luxembourgish	Jesus
Macedonian	Исус
Malagasy	Jesosy
Malay	Yesus
Malayalam	യേശു
Maltese	Ġes
Maori	Ihu
Marathi	येशू
Mongolian	Ecyc
Myanmar	y shayu s nyya
Nepali	येशू
Norwegian	Jesus
Pashto	عیسي
Persian	عیسی
Polish	Jezus
Portuguese	Jesus
Punjabi	ਯਿਸੂ
Romanian	Iisus
Russian	Иисус
Samoan	Iesu
Scots Gaelic	Íosa
Serbian	Исусе
Sesotho	Jesu
Shona	Jesu
Sindhi	عيسي
Sinhala	යේසුස් වහන්සේ
Slovak	Ježíš
Slovenian	Jezus
Somali	Ciise
Spanish	Jesus
Sundanese	Yesus
Swahili	Jesu
Swedish	Jesus
Tajik	Исо
Tamil	இயேசு கிறிஸ்து (Yesu Christu)
Telugu	యేసు
Thai	พระเยซู
Turkish	Îsa
Ukrainian	Ісусе
Urdu	یسوع
Uzbek	Iso
Vietnamese	Chúa Giêsu
Welsh	Iesu
Xhosa	UYesu
Yoruba	Jesu
Zulu	UJesu

Suggest an Addition

Join the Discussion...Comment! 2 Comments

At the beginning of the Bible we see an account of the creation of the universe. Here is the order of creation as outlined in the first chapter of Genesis:

There’s more to the story, of course. Genesis 1 isn’t simply an account of creation, but the start of God’s relationship with us. He created us, and we were good. He loves us like a perfect father, and wants us to know Him.

Join the Discussion...Comment!