Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Fernando Arias" <fernando.arias AT lycos.com>]

Dear members,
The word used in the Bible for the fruit of the tree of good and evil is the 
generic term "pry"(Peh,Resh,Yod). There is no indication of a particular 
fruit in the Biblical verses related. However, traditionally the fruit of the 
tree of life is considered to be the apple. My questions are:
1) How did the apple become the fruit of such tree?
2) Why is the apple considered the fruit of the tree of good and evil? Any 
symbolic meaning? 
Fernando. 



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From richard.petersen AT noaa.gov Thu Aug 16 10:42:13 2001
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To: Walter Mattfeld <mattfeld AT mail.pjsnet.com>
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Subject: Re: Locating Eden
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Assuming the Biblical account to be factual and accurate, the problem goes 
far beyond
just identifying geographical features.  What kind of water and air currents 
would be
present on the earth covered with water for a full year?  It seems very 
unlikely that a
ship would remain stationary over the same general area after an entire year 
of free
floating.  Could it have circled the globe in a year's time?  Would it 
gradually work
it's way toward the equator?  Even if we knew where the ship ended up, it 
might not
help much in determining where the trip started.  Further, geographical 
features after
an event as described in the bible would be much different than those that 
existed
before the flood.

Walter Mattfeld wrote:

>  Available is an article titled "In Search of the Garden of Eden and the
> Rivers of Paradise," if interested please click on the following url
> http://www.bibleorigins.net/Edenslocation.html
>
> There are a wide variety of proposals for Eden's location, made by
> professional Bible scholars as well as enthusiastic amateurs. We will look
> at some of the problems which must be surmounted in identifying Eden's
> location and explain how and why  these problems have stymied attempts to
> locate Eden. There is today no scholarly consensus on Eden's location. Some
> claim it is a myth, others that it is, or was, a real place.
>
> Everyone brings presuppositions and biases to their research and I am no
> different. It is my understanding that Eden is a myth, but that the writers
> of the Bible believed it really existed and that it could be located. The
> pinpointing of Eden's location has to be based on the geographical
> information provided in the Bible.
>
> An Important  Note about Methodologies-
>
> A commonly committed error by many modern scholars -in my opinion-  both
> professional and amateur, is that they "insist" that "modern geographical
> knowledge" of the Earth's features must be used  in determining Eden's
> location. They therefore either seek flowing rivers or the beds of ancient
> dried-up rivers, called wadis in Arabic, to locate Eden. They fail to take
> into account ancient man's imperfect geographical knowledge, and the realm
> of myth and error which existed in ancient geographical understanding. No
> success can be had  in identifying Eden if one does not first study how
> ancient man understood his world, a world  full of impossible geographical
> features by today's geographical standards.
>
> Before attempting to identify Eden and its rivers we will first take a
> glimpse into the archaic notions man had about his world and its
> geography...
>
> Archaic Notions about the World's Rivers and their Sources
> (3rd millenium BCE through 1st century CE)
>
> All the best, Walter
>
> Walter Reinhold Warttig Mattfeld
> Walldorf by Heidelberg
> Baden-Wurttemburg, Germany
> www.bibleorigins.net
>
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