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31 July 2022 Navigate 'up' to the Genesis index: index-genesis.
And a river went out from Eden to water the garden, and from there it was separated into four parts.
The rivers of Eden work opposite the usual pattern. In real life, rivers may join, but rivers do not split in two -- except in deltas, but that is another matter. But in Genesis, the one river from Eden splits into four rivers which go out through the world. Or at least Mesopotamia.
The four parts, in Hebrew, are four heads. In Hebrew, head is used for, among other things, when something larger is split into smaller sub-parts. In Judges 7:16, Gideon divides his three-hundred-man army into three heads. Abimelech divides his troops into four heads for an ambush (Judges 9:34, etc.). Saul separates his men into four heads (1 Samuel 11:1).
Though these other examples are all military uses, in each case a crowd of men is split into smaller subcrowds, just as the river of Genesis is split into four sub-rivers springing from it.
Another interpretation is that of Gesenius, who reads the "heads" as beginnings [of rivers]. To Gesenius' reading one may compare the English expression headwaters.
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