Boston University - HUB Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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ALL ROADS LEAD T0 TIIULE. 21 Where, then, is the long-lost but now, at last, re-discovered Garden of Eden? ' , Ii' the reader will open his best map ol' Palestine, and, looking a little te the south-east of Damascus, carefully 'note where a line from 330 8' north latitude would intersect a line from 37D 2-1' east from Greenwich, he may place his linger upon the very spot. The Eden in which it is situated is not prepossessiug. Our author makes no attempt to make it out a H land of pleasant- ness. On the contrary, the whole region is described as one of' the most desolate and lifeless and Tartarean deserts to be found on the face of the earth.1 For miles on miles in every direction there is not a green tlnng, nothing but ancient lava- Iields, and fields covered with black volcanic stones, often so thick that a horse cannot make his way over Ll10lll.2 In other places, vast lumps of basalt, large as a camel, eneumber the ground? This vast tract is called the Harra, 'i a glowing region, or a burned region. This, Mr. Engel assures us, was the land of Eden 3 nor was it ever any more fruitful or attractive than it is to-day. One charm of the garden consisted in the contrast which it presented to the surrounding desolation. 'The Garden in Eden was simply the oasis which gradu- ally formed at the lowest point in this vast volcanic basin, and wihich is to-day called, by the Bedouin tribes, H Ruhbe, a word which, we are told, means a it wide, rich seed-ground. The four Paradise rivers are four torrents, which, during the rainy 1 Die gauze Vulkanregion, wovon die Harra den griissereu Thcil aus- macht, heisst dort ' die Gegend des schwarzen Steins! Das VVort Harra. selbst bedeutet 'gliihendlicissf oder ' verbranntf Die Harra ist also eine Glutgegend, oder eine verbrannte Gcgend .... Sie ist eine Gegcnd die durch ilireu Steinpanzer zur ewigen Unfruchtbarkeit bestimmt und nic- mals von Menschen bewohnt gewesen ist .... Die Hurra ist niemals cultivlrt gewesen und wird es der sengeudeu Hitze wegen niemals werden, Keinerlei Spuren einer friiheren Wohnung weist sich auf .... Diese Hari-a ist Eden fpp. 76-78J. 2 Es ist absolut uumiiglicli in der Mltte der I-Iarra zu reiten, das Pferd ist nirgends im Stande sicher aufzutrcten. Gegen Siiden ist die Harm 'l1Ildll1iCl'ldl'lIlgllCllL'' 3 Die welliue Ebene ist mit vulkanischen Steinen diclit bedeckt, zwis- chen' denenidslcli' einzelne Eruptionskegel erhehen .... Es giebt Felder voiiaingelldrireii'lllasaltbliicken vlele Klaftern dick und oft so gross wie liegende Kaineltiaher auch Felder von kleinern Steinen, im Gcwichte volt 6-8 lffund fppr 75, 761. .- 1 , ,v

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20 BOSTON UNIVERSITY YEAR BOOK. tions, the traditions, the mythologies, the laws, and the reli- gions of all the tribes and races of mankind. In the present paper it is proposed to notice some of' the latest and least known of' recent attempts to answer the great problem, and with brevity to indicate their bearing upon another solution, which on both sides of' the Atlantic, in the most scientific and- scholarly circles, is to-day rapidly superseding every earlier hypothesis. Last spring, simultaneously with the issue ot' Paradise Found, 1 there was published in Leipsic a German work, enti- tled H The Solution of the Paradise Question. 2 In his preface the author speaks in no hesitant style. He tells his readers how the discovery dashed upon him in the month ot' August, 1873. It was 4' like a lightning flash, it came as an illumination, it was a revelation. During more than ten years he has been acquir- ing data, and elaborating the work now presented. He claims, that, as soon as once the main idea was caught, every thing else followed so inevitably from it, that every danger of screwing, up the possible or merely probable to the point of certainty H was entirely precluded. So he adds, ti Even in the fzicgof eighty nugatory attempts at a solution, it is no illusion or ar- rogancy to name this treatise 'Tue Solution of the Paradise, Questiou,' for it accomplishes what it promises, it proves what it asserts, it gives perfect certainty as to that which Gen. 10-14 geographically describes. B ' ' 1 Paradise Found: The Cradle of the Iluman Race at the North Pole. A Study Qt' the Prehistoric World. By William F. Warren. Boston: Hough- ton, Mifiiin, 86 Co.g London: Sampson Low Sa Co. Reached its sixth edi- tion in eight months. I 2 Die Llisung der Paradieqfrage. Von Moritz Engel. Verlag von Otto Schulz. The hook is an octave of 207 pages. It includes also a folded map, on which Eden and its surroundings are depicted. Part I., including pp. 1-70, is devoted to the.statc of the question, and other preliminarles. Part II. consists of five chapters: 1. Eden, 2 and 3. The Garden in Eden, and its Watcrsg 4. The Four Paradise Riversg 5. Summary. The author dates his preface from Dresden-Nenstadt, on Adam and Evefs day, in the month of lJecernber,,1884. I - . i, , , , 3 Selbst gegeniiber achtzig vergeblichen Liisungsversptcllcll,jst, es daher keine Vcrblendung oder Vcrinessenheir, diese Schril,t.,', D,i,e,.Liis11.ng der Paradiesfragc' zu beuennen, deun sie leistet xvaS,,Sie,ye,lgsnriqlrt, sie bcweist was sie behauptet, sie giebt iihcr dns 0riglnal,zu ilcgtgeograplr- ischen Beschreibung 1 Mos. 3, 10-14 volle Gewisslieitl' Vorwort, S. ix.

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I 22 BOSTON 'UNIVERSITY YEAR BOOK. season, run down from the adjacent slopes, and empty them- selves upon this oasis, but which dry up Htoward the end of May or the first of June. This interpretation of the river which 4' went out of' Eden to water the garden, and from thence was parted, and became four heads, is the very apple of our author's eye. The 4' river is the entire mass of water, which, from rain or springs, finds its way during the wet season down the various slopes oi' the surrounding basin into thc oasis. Here it is all absorbed or evaporatedg but this is only a modern and Occidental way of looking at it. If we are good Orientalists we shall be able to turn our inner eye around, and, looking up at the surrounding water-sheds and at the two pairs of' chief to1'- rents, we shall say, U And from hence this all-surrounding and concentrated waterflow was parted, and became four heads. Pages on pages are expended upon this felicitous interpreta- tion of tl1e Paradise rivers, and upon the demonstration oi' the falsity of every other cxplanation.1 And does, then, our author actually believe that this deep swale in the heart of' the North Syrian desert, this depression which is sometimes fur weeks together under water, 4and which in the hot season is so singeing hot that all 'velrdtiiie dies, and the very stones around it explode with a loud 1'eport,,2+- does Mr. Engel actually believe that this was the cradle of the human race? W A Oh, no! at least he does not say so. It is simply the earliest seat of' the earliest ancestor oi' the Hebrews. Indeed, it is hardly that. It is rather the spot where some great religious poet belonging to the Hebrew people, and writing ages after Abraham, -if' there ever was an Abraham, - located the first scat of the 1 Thus he speaks of its strictly textual character : Dicser Textsinn ist gewonnen durch eine genetische Behandlung der Sache. Keiueriei Text- iinderung glebt es hier, keinerlei NVortsinnverdrehung, keinerlei Wider- sprueh zwischen Textworten und ihrer Wiedergabeg Wohl aber sind nun die durch Uebersetzer und Ausleger ansgerenkteu Glieder des Textes so wiedorcingerenkt, dass sie wieder riehtig functioniren kiiwnnen fp, 571, But from p. 60 to 67 one can see that this wonderful reverence for the sacred- ness of the text does not at all stand in his way when he desires tb make up a QuelZenschrU'l, omitting here and transposing there t0iSllll2'llilS'6Wl1 fancy. ' 'f f 2 Int Sommer wird die Glnth so stark dass die schwarzdxrSteine'mit lautem Knalle zersprengen tp. 773. A ' L X ' WMV 'NW