Boston University - HUB Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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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

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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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ALL ROADS' LEAD T0 TIIULE. 23 first f'ather of the Hebrew stock. The description preserved to us in the second chapter of' Genesis is only a fragment of a di- dactic poem, written, it may be, in the days ot' Solomon, possi- bly in the days of Isaiah, by some great religious genius whose name nobody knows? To all appearance, it has, in our an- thor's mind, as little weight toward settling the question as to the primitive seat of the human race, as the Rime of the Ancient Mariner might have in settling the question ol' the tirst dis- coverer of the .Pacific Ocean? To all but the unbeliever-at-any-price, this H Solution ot' the Paradise Question will be very disappointing. Its interpreta- tion of Hebrew is arbitrariness itself. It nowhere alludes to the fact that traditions or myths of the Happy Garden are found in the religions of all the other ancient peoples. It no- where makes tributary to its argument the facts and theories 1 Die geographisehen und hydrograpliischen Angaben, well-he die Para- diesfrage hervorgerufen hahen, sind ein wesentlieher Bestandtheil dieser Quellensehrift. Ihr Verfasser, der Salolnonisehen Zeit angehiirig. vielleieht Saloino selhst, ist der erste Jalnvist. Das kunstvoll hineinverwobene Lelirgedicht, oder Theologumenon, die Siindenfallgesvliiehte, ist einem andern Verfnsser, dem zweiten Jahwist zuzuweisen, der unch Geist und Bqhandlungsweise der Prophet Jesain sein kann fp. G-D. Aber das ist es nicht allein und nicht hanpisiiehlicli, was den Garten in Eden beriilnnt gemacht hat. Anch das nicht, dass er als zeitweiliger Ursitz des Stainmvaters der hebriiisehen Viillcerfamilie in der Ueberlle- fernng feststand. Erst seitdmnn einst ein grosser religiijser Genius den Sehanplatz seiner tiefsinnegen Lelirdiehtnng dorthin verlegt hat, ist er hierdnreh liocli iiber Alles verkliirt Worden und hat fiir die Folgezeit in der Vorstellungswelt aller Bilmelviilker eine Weihe und eine Bedeutung empfangen, der kein auderes Land und kein anderer Ort auf Erden gleieh- komint fp. 825. 2 U We were the flrst thnt ever burst Into that silent Sen. 3 We mustleave the reader to consult Dr. Engel's hook, in order to dis- cover how Eden becomes Harra, and by what kind of torture Assnr is identified with the Hauran, not to speak of the wild theory of' the four rivers in Harra which 'formed the river,' or, as Dr. Engel translates, 'the wa.ters,' which 'went out of Eden to water the garden! Dr Engel is so little acquainted with Hebrew grammar and idioms as to translate Gen. ii- 10 : ,',And it fthe Nahar River, which is rendered by ' waters ' quite ad- missiblyl will separate itselffrom within, and it belonged tufourwell-1'ive:'s.' The AIhen.w1Lvn, London, June 27, 1885, p. 818. Not more respectful is the verdict of his own eonntrylnan, Professor ,Qttg,Ziiek.ler, as appears from his review of the work in Luthardtfs Zeit- schr-U2 jiir christliche Wisscnschqfl for 1886, pp. 7, 8.