Often unnoticed amidst Adam and Eve’s misadventures in the Garden of Eden is a curious topographical detail. Genesis’ second chapter devotes five verses to a river that emerges from humanity’s birthplace:
“A river issues from Eden to water the garden, and it then divides and becomes four branches. The name of the first is Pishon, the one that winds through the whole land of Havilah, where the gold is. The gold of that land is good; bdellium is there, and lapis lazuli. The name of the second river is Gihon, the one that winds through the whole land of Cush. The name of the third river is Tigris, the one that flows east of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.”
This extensive scriptural screentime stimulated interpreters throughout the ages to presume the four-part waterway possessed spiritual relevance beyond its simple physical existence.
To the 13th-century French Jewish sage known as the Radak, the river signified the streams of our mind, which he noted, “waters the garden,” a metaphor for our hearts. The four branches, he posited – based on Aristotle’s psychological and the Greek physician Galen’s biological writings – “signify the four ventricles of the brain, which host three faculties: imagination, cognition and memory.” The Torah utilizes the image of water to signify the brain, Radak wrote, because it is “watery, cool and moist. As for the references in the text to the names of the rivers, the direction of their flow and the areas that they encircle, these matters do not signify anything. Rather, because these are familiar rivers that are known by their names and locations, and they indeed flow from Eden, the Torah uses them for the allegory.”
For the 19th-century Ukrainian scholar known as the Malbim, the rivers were preparation for feeding mankind, inevitably destined to wander the globe. God had placed the primordial river’s offshoots on the Earth to sustain the great civilizations that would arise near each one.
Moving ahead to modern times, the contemporary architect and Bible scholar Joshua Skarf has noted the widespread popularity of the motif. “The description of these four rivers,” he notes, “has served as inspiration for paradise gardens, primarily in the Muslim world. Gardens were an important part of the landscape in Persia, providing a respite from the harsh climate … The classic Persian garden is known as chahar bagh, literally ‘four gardens.’ Chahar bagh gardens remained popular for centuries, with the most famous example found in Mughal India as part of the Taj Mahal complex.”
Another contemporary thinker, Mordechai Bar-Or, in his “Be a Blessing: Jewish Wisdom on Celebrating Life,” offers an echo of Radak’s earlier reading. He contends that “the river symbolizes both physical and conscious security. Its perpetual flow signifies a dynamic present, constantly renewing. Those connected to this river are connected to a life of fluidity and evolution, immersed in a sense of existential abundance … Beyond its physical aspects, the river also embodies clarity of consciousness. The Hebrew word for river, nahar, parallels the Aramaic nahara, meaning light or illumination. It represents a synergy of endless abundance and lucid thought, weaving together material wealth and mental clarity … [which] invites a reflective question: What sustains us in our lives? What sources of abundance irrigate our personal Garden of Eden?”
Similarly, in “We Who Wrestle with God,” the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson meditatively senses in the rivers “a mandala… a representation of optimized order… representative of the place man always stands in the world, with the cardinal directions (north, south, east and west) stretching out from there.”
In his 2021 book, “The Tree of Life and Prosperity: 21st Century Business Principles from the Book of Genesis,” the Israeli-American venture capitalist Michael Eisenberg offers a meditation on the meaning of money. The banks of the Pishon, which winds through the land of Havilah, “where the gold is,” presumably were enjoyed by Adam, who found among them wealth and beauty. But the first man grew bored and stagnant. His wanderings subsequently continued along the other rivers, lacking direction and purpose. That is why God commanded man to work in the Garden – “to cultivate it and safeguard it.” “Man’s labor,” Eisenberg writes in summarizing his understanding of the verses in question, “is necessary for the earth itself to flourish and hence necessary for providing for humanity.”
For the British-Israeli contemporary educator Rabbi Alex Israel, the river reflects not monetary value but messianic yearnings. The full meaning of the passage in Genesis is only understood by subsequent biblical books, he argues. Rabbi Israel notes that in a vision of the ultimate redemption described by the 6th-century B.C.E. prophet Zechariah, the seer pictures a time in which: “In that day, fresh water shall flow from Jerusalem, part of it to the Eastern Sea and part to the Western Sea, throughout the summer and winter. And God shall be sovereign over all the earth; in that day there shall be one God with one name … Never again shall destruction be decreed, and Jerusalem shall dwell secure.” In other words, Jerusalem shall serve as the wellspring of the world’s sustaining waters, an Earthly stand-in for the ethereal ancient Garden. Jerusalem’s prayed-for redemption will reestablish the Edenic existence for all of humanity which God envisioned when He first created the world.
Whether one sees in Eden’s river a reflection of humanity’s mental and spiritual capabilities, the source of our sustenance, an indictment of materialism or a prefiguring of the Messianic Era, pondering its waters will no doubt continue to inspire wonder.
Rabbi Dr. Stuart Halpern is Senior Adviser to the Provost of Yeshiva University and Deputy Director of Y.U.’s Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought. His books include the newly released “Jewish Roots of American Liberty,” “The Promise of Liberty: A Passover Haggada,” “Esther in America,” “Gleanings: Reflections on Ruth” and “Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land: The Hebrew Bible in the United States.”
