EDEN. - The place where the earthly paradise was located (Gen. 2:8, 13). The Hebrew "edhen" was understood by the ancients to mean "delight, pleasure" (2 Sam. 1:24; Ps. 35 [36]:9); modern scholars interpret it as "steppe," "waste plain," like the Akkadian *edinu*, or "fertile field," like the Sumerian *edin*. In Sacred Scripture it also denotes:
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