Heaven on earth. Scientists have tried to find out where on the planet Eden could be.

The Garden of Eden is a biblical site deeply rooted in the imagination of Christianity and Judaism. Did this heaven exist, and where would it be, writes IFLScience.

It is clear that the Garden of Eden is full of symbolism, and there are many moments in this story that cannot be understood from a rational point of view (for example, it is not fully believed that snakes can talk).

However, it is quite reasonable to assume that this mythological garden is based on a real site.

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Eden is known as the place where man was first created. The first two people, a naked couple named Adam and Eve, wandered innocently through this paradise until the sneaking snake and forbidden fruit brought serious trouble to them (and thus to all of humanity).

The story is said to symbolize how people fall from a childlike position of innocence and blessing to a state of free will and knowledge, as well as evil and death.

The location of the garden is described in Genesis 2:10-14:

“A river came out of Eden to water the paradise, and then it was divided into four rivers. One is named Pishon; it flows around all the land of Havilah where there is gold; and that land has good gold; bdola and an onyx stone. The second river is called Gihon (Geon) : flows around the whole country of Cush. The name of the third river is Hiddekel (Tigris): It flows before Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.”

The key here is that it is located at the confluence of four rivers. Two of these rivers we know today: Tigris and Euphrates. They come from Turkey, then pass through Syria and Iraq, pouring into the Persian Gulf.

However, it remains unclear what the names “Pison” and “Gihon” mean. For centuries, some theologians have suggested that they may refer to the Ganges in India and the Nile in Egypt, but others have stated that in this case they refer to a large part of the Earth.

John Calvin, the 16th-century theologian known for his role in the Protestant Reformation, wrote: “Many think that the Pison and Gihon are the Ganges and the Nile, but the fallacy of these people is convincingly refuted by the distance between the two leaders’ positions. These rivers are the Danube, a they don’t want to think that the place where a person lives extends from the farthest corner of Asia to the farthest point of Europe.

However, when the Tigris and Euphrates are mentioned, it can be assumed that the Garden of Eden was inspired by the region in Iraq and Iran where these two rivers converge in the Persian Gulf. Especially on the Iran-Iraq border, there is the Shattularap river, which is formed at the confluence of the aforementioned rivers.

If we look at the location of the Garden of Eden from the point of view of science and accept it as a symbol of human origin, then we should definitely turn our eyes to Africa.

The so-called Cradle of Humanity is located about 50 kilometers northwest of Johannesburg in South Africa. This site is home to the largest human ancestral remains in the world.

Among the thousands of fossils found here, the researchers unearthed the remains of Australopithecus, an early ape-like human species about 3.4-3.7 million years old.

Only 200.00 – 300.000 years ago, modern Homo sapiens appeared. Again, Africa was the site of this development, and modern humans likely first appeared somewhere in what is today Ethiopia.

So if we’re looking for a “scientific” Garden of Eden, South Africa and Ethiopia seem like our best choices. However, it remains to be seen whether these places were once a paradise where four rivers meet.

Previously Focus He wrote about the oldest map of Europe. It turned out to be more than 4,000 years old.