In The Beginning I

   257. God began it all. "In the beginning God..." is how the first verse of the first chapter of the first book of the Bible begins. The beginning of the history of the world is chronicled with those words!

   258. Elohim, which originates from the Hebrews word el, is translated as "God." The Hebrew word el actually is used for reference to all general gods. Another title of God, el elyon, is also a derivation of this and means "the most high God" (Gen. 14:18).

   259. Yahweh is the only name for God that is personal in nature. A Hebrew word, it is commonly translated into English versions as "Jehovah." or "the Lord" (Exod. 6:3).

   260. When creation began. Relying on Biblical sources such as the chronologies and genealogies in Genesis, numerous people have attempted to pinpoint a time and date for the precise moment of creation. Ancient Hebrew scholars placed the moment as 3761 B.C. Perhaps the most famous creation date was the one produced by Irish bishop James Ussher (1581-1656). Using Genesis, Ussher dated the moment of creation to the early morning of the twenty-third of October in 4004 B.C. (Ussher actually used the Julian calendar year of 710). Ussher's calculation was widely accepted by European Christians for centuries and was included in the margins of many editions of the King James Bible, giving it nearly divine "authority."

   261. Eden, which means "a place of delight," is believed by some scholars to have been located at the eastern end of the Fertile Crescent, near where the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers meet the Persian Gulf.

   262. The name "Adam" is a pun on the similar Hebrew words for "soil" and for "man." The word Adam is derived from the Hebrew word for "man" in the collective sense, as in humanity or humankind. It is also related to the Hebrew word adamah, which means "ground" or "earth." The author of Genesis used a word-play. Adam, man, came from adamah, the ground.

   263. Not an apple. Though legend has it that the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge that Eve was tempted by the serpent to taste was an apple, nowhere does the Bible identify it as one. In fact most scholars agree that the one fruit it definitely could not have been was the apple. Apples were not likely to have grown in the Bible ands in Old Testament times. However, apples were cultivated by the Egyptians, and the Romans at the time of Christ had more than twenty varieties.

   264. The legend that the apple was the fruit on the tree of knowledge arose in the Middle Ages when artists painted pictures of Eve tasting the apple. Another source of confusion was the medieval custom of calling many different kinds of fruit "apples." Lemons were known as "Persian apples," dates as "finger apples," and pomegranates as "apples of Carthage."

   265. Apples or apricots? The fruit meant by the Hebrew word commonly translated as "apple" was probably the apricot, which flourishes all over the Bible lands. A clue comes from Solomon, who used the same word to describe a tree: "I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste" (Songs of Sol. 2:3). Solomon seems to be describing the apricot, for even today nomads pitch their tents under its branches for shade, and it is the fruit with the sweetest taste in the Holy Land.