These last-named ti'aditions even proceed to detail
the steps hy which this fair abode was forfeited. Ac- cording to the Zendavesta, men were so blinded by a wicked dtemon that they viewed the whole creation, and their own happiness, as the work of Ahriman. After thirty days they -went hunting, with black cloth- ing on ; shot a white goat, and drank its milk, finding it pleasant. The evil spirits now brought them fruit, which the}' ate, and straightway lost all their excel- lence. After fiftj' years they first began sexual in- tercourse. (See Rhode, Ileil. Sage dts Zendvolks, p. 391 sq. ; and comp. Ballenstedt, in Schriiter u. Klein, Opposltionsschr. v, 3 sq., who connects the account of the fall of man with the conflict between Ormuzd, the principle of good, and Ahriman, that of evil ; and the victory of the latter, Gen. iii, 15.) But nearest of all, the fable of the Dalai Lama (see Vater, Archivf. Kir- chengesch. i, 15 sq.) approaches the Mosaic narrative. A plant of sweet taste appeared on the earth : first one greedy man ate of it, then all followed his example, and immediately all spirituality and all happiness were gone. The length of life decreased, and with it human stature. At last the plant disappeared, and men were left to subsist, first on a kind of reddish butter, then on reed-grass, and finally on what their own hard labor could cause the earth to produce. Virtues had fled from earth ; deeds of violence, mur- der, and adulter^' had taken their place. Compare further, Rosenmiiller, Alterthum. I, i, ISO ; Tuch, Genes. p. 50 sq. On Grecian nij'ths, see Volkcr, Mythol. d. Japhet. Geschlechts, oder d. Silndenfall des Menschen, nach Griech. Mgthen (Giesen. 1824).
All these and similar traditions are but mere mock- ing echoes of the old Hebrew story, jarred and broken notes of the same strain ; but, with all their exagger- ations, "they intimate how in the background of man's visions la}'^ a paradise of holy J03' — a paradise secured from everj' kind of profanation, and made in- accessible to the guilty ; a paradise full of objects that were calculated to delight the senses and to ele- vate the mind ; a paradise that granted to its tenant rich and rare immunities, and that fed with its peren- nial streams the tree of life and immortality" (Hard- wick, Christ and other Masters, pt. ii, p. 133).
III. Figurative Application of ^^ Paradise'" to the Heavenly World (chiefly from Smith's Diet, of the Bible). — The term, having by a natural process be- come a metaphor for the abstract idea of excfuisite delight, was transferred still higher to denote the hap- piness of the righteous in the future state. The ori- gin of this application must be assigned to the Jews of the middle period between the Old and the New Tes- tament. In the Chaldeo Targums, "the garden of Eden" is put as the exposition of heavenly blessed- ness (Psa. xc, 17, and other places). The Talmudical writings, cited by the elder Buxtorf {Lee. Ch:dd. et Talm. p. 1802) and John James Wetstein (V. T. Gr. i, 819), contain frequent references to Paradise as the immortal heaven, to which the spirits of the just are admitted immeiliately upon their liberation from the body. The book Sohar speaks of an earthly and a heavenlj' Paradise, of which the latter excels the for- mer "as much as darkness does light" (Schottgen, Ifor. Ilehr. i, 1096).
Hence we see tl)at it was in the acceptation of the current Jewish phraseology that the expression was used by our Lord and the apostles: "To-day thou shalt be with me in Paradise;" " He was caught up into Paradise;" "The tree of life, which is in the Paradise of my God" (Luke xxiii, 43; 2 Cor. xii, 4; Rev. ii, 7).
It was natural that this higher meaning should at length become the exclusive one, and be associated with new thoughts. Paradise, with no other word to qualify it, was the bright region which man had lost, which was guarded by the flaming swonl. Soon a new hope sprang up. Over and above all questions as to where the primeval garden had been, there came
PARADISE
657
PARADISE
the belief that it did not belong entirely to the past. There was a paradise still into which man might hope to enter. It is a matter of some interest to ascertain with what associations the word was connected in the minds of the Jews of Palestine and other countries at the time of our Lord's teaching, what sense therefore we may attach to it in the writings of the N. T.
In this as in other instances we may distinguish sev- eral modes of thought, each with marked character- istics, yet often blended together in different propor- tions, and melting one into the other by hardly per- ceptible degrees. Each has its counterpart in the teaching of Christian theologians. The language of the N. T. stands apart from and above all. Traces of this way of looking at it had appeared previously in the teaching of the Son of Sirach. The four rivers of Eden are figures of the wide streams of Wisdom, and she is as the brook which becomes a river and waters the paradise of God (Ecclus. xxiv, 25-30). This, how- cvei', was compatible with the recognition of Gen. ii, as speaking of a fact. But in later times the figura- tive or celestial reference became more and more dis- tinct. It would be a hopeless task to attempt to recite the opinions of all the commentators upon this question: their name is legion. All that we can at- tempt is a chronological outline of the m.iin course of thought on the subject.