The Garden of Eden is one of the best-known stories in the Bible. It explains how the universe, the Earth, then plants and animals, and of course, humans were first made. There has been a lot of debate among theologians over whether these stories were literal or not.

Whether every event in that story happened exactly as described or not, it does make many people wonder where this incredible Garden of Eden really is, if it exists. In the book of Genesis, there are some clues that can help narrow it down. For example, in Genesis 2:10-14, it says:

“And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became four heads. The name of the first is Pishon; that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold; and the gold of that land is good; there is bdellium and the onyx stone. And the name of the second river is Gihon; the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Cush. And the name of the third river is Tigris; that is it which goeth toward the east of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.”

The referenced location where four rivers meet is a huge clue since that is not exactly a common occurrence. Two of the rivers are still known today, the Tigris and the Euphrates. These two start in Turkey and flow for many miles through the countries of Syria and Iraq until they finally meet the Persian Gulf. The other two rivers, called the Pishon and the Gihon, are not known for sure, though some have suggested that they are the Ganges (in India) and the Nile (in Egypt).

It is also possible that these rivers have since dried up, combined with other rivers, or had something else happen to them. It has been, after all, thousands of years since the events of Genesis, and that is if you take the young Earth view of the events. Most theologians do not have the view that the Earth is only 5000(ish) years old, and instead believe in a much older Earth, which would give those rivers a lot more time to move, change, or disappear entirely.

Just looking at the Tigris and Euphrates, however, the location of the Garden of Eden can be narrowed down quite a bit. There is an area in Iraq and Iran where the two rivers meet, relatively close to the Persian Gulf. Right on the Iran-Iraq border, there is another river known as Shatt Al-Arab, which would be the third of the four rivers mentioned in the story.

If that is the case, the general region where Eden may have existed should be in this area.

For those who want to take a different approach and look for where humans first came on the scene from an evolutionary point of view, and then assume that this location is the Garden of Eden, it is necessary to move further down into Africa. The location dubbed the Cradle of Humankind is located in South Africa near Johannesburg. This is where the largest number of human ancestral remains have been found, with many of the fossils indicating that this is where our pre-human ancestors eventually evolved into modern humans around 200,000-300,000 years ago.

Somewhere in that region, which includes South Africa and Ethiopia, may be the home to the actual Garden of Eden, if one existed.

The bottom line is that if there was ever an actual Garden of Eden, we can’t say for sure where it is (no matter what the tabloids would have you believe). Regardless, it is a fascinating subject both scientifically and theologically, which is why it has been studied so extensively.

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