אריב"ל כל העולם כולו מתמצית גן עדן הוא שותה
שנאמר (בראשית ב, י) ונהר יוצא מעדן וגו'
ת"ר ארץ מצרים הויא ד' מאות פרסה על ד' מאות פרסה
והוא אחד מששים בכוש
וכוש אחד מששים בעולם
ועולם א' מששים בגן
וגן אחד מששים לעדן
ועדן אחד מס' לגיהנם
נמצא כל העולם כולו ככיסוי קדרה לגיהנם
וי"א גיהנם אין לה שיעור וי"א עדן אין לה שיעור
Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said: The entire world drinks from the runoff of the Garden of Eden, as it is stated: “And a river went out of Eden to water the garden” (Genesis 2:10)...
The Sages taught in a baraita: The area of the land of Egypt is four hundred parasangs [parsa] by four hundred parasangs. And this is one sixtieth the size of Cush, and Cush itself is one sixtieth the size of the rest of the world. And the world is one sixtieth of the Garden of Eden, and the Garden of Eden is one sixtieth of Eden itself, and Eden is one sixtieth of Gehenna. You find that the entire world is like a pot cover for Gehenna, as Eden, which is far larger than the rest of the world, is only one sixtieth the size of Gehenna. And some say: Gehenna has no measure. And some say that Eden has no measure.
(א) ונהר יצא מעדן וגו׳ ומשם יפרד וגו׳. הנה אין ספק שהענין הוא כמשמעו.
אבל מ״מ יש להבין מזה הליכות עולם ותכלית חיי האדם.
אלא כך הענין דג״ע התחתון שנעשה מתחלה לגמול טוב ולתענוג רוחני לרוח האדם שזוכה לה. והוא אינו גמול עוה״ב של צדיקים אשר זכו להיות נשמתם צרורה בצרה״ח ומתענגים בזיו השכינה שהוא השכר היותר מעולה גבוה מעל גבוה.
אבל ג״ע זה אינו אלא שכר הרוחני לנפש החיוני שבאדם שזוכה לשכר. או גם לנשמה עד שלא הגיעה לעלות למקומה והנה הודיע הכתוב שזה התענוג וג״ע התחתון מתפשט לארבעה אופני בני האדם שמקבלים שכר טוב אחר מותם.
או גם בעוה״ז ממש מתפשט מזה העדן איזה תענוג רוחני גם בהיות האדם בחיים. ...
אמנם בפרשה זו שאנו עומדים עוד לא הגיע ביחוד לישראל שיהא ע״פ תורה ומצות דוקא אלא גם לאו״ה ע״פ דרכם...
והנה ייחד המקום ית׳ מקומם של נהרות במדינות מורות בשמן או בטבע אותה מדינה על איזה פרט בגמול השייך לזה האופן שנקרא אותו הנהר על שם אותו האופן כאשר יבואר. כדי להתבונן ע״ז וללמוד חכמה ומוסר...
כל העולם לא נברא אלא לצוות לזה. מש״ה ברא הקב״ה צורת הנהרות הללו בזה האופן. שיהיה נהר פרת יוצא ראשון מג״ע וממנו יפרד עוד שלשה נהרות גדולים ומרובים ממנו כדאיתא במס׳ בכורות הנ״ל :
...The River goes forth from Eden and divides... There is no doubt that there is a literal meaning...
But, we can learn from this ways of the world and the point of the life of a person.
Rather, the matter of the Lower Garden of Eden that was created at the beginning to give good and spiritual enjoyment to the soul of man that is worth. This is not the reward for the righteous in the next world that their soul becomes bound with the Soul of Life, and they enjoy the Radiance of the Divine Presence, that this is the reward extremely elevated.
But, this Garden of Eden is only the reward for a person that deserves it. Or, also a Neshama until it reaches the next world. The verse comes to inform you that this is true pleasure, and the Garden of Eden Below spreads out in four ways to four types of people that receive reward after their death.
So too in this world, it spreads out from Eden which spiritual enjoyment man can have in life...
However, in this section, we have not gotten to the level of the Jewish people with Torah and Mitzvos, but rather the nations of the world, on their way...
And the Hashem has designated places of the river in lands to teach you their names of their nature of that country on what detail in related to them on what is called in the river like I will explain. In order to contemplate on this and to learn wisdom and self perfection.
The entire world was only created to connect this. Because of this, Hashem created these rivers in this way. That the Euphrates river goes out first from the Garden, and from it, the other three branch out, greater and more that it...
The Torah continues by describing rivers which originated in that garden, describing their parameters and the countries which surrounded the garden. There were a total of four rivers which were all branches of a single river which flowed out of Eden. As long as that river was a single river its function was to irrigate the garden. Subsequently, this river split into what the Torah called ארבעה ראשים, “four headwaters.”
You are aware already that though the Torah describes a scenery on earth when describing Gan Eden and what is related to it, the manifestations described by the Torah are metaphors for phenomena in the celestial regions. (4) A Midrashic, homiletical view of our verse sees in the four rivers a reference to four kingdoms:
The river Pishon is a reference to the king of Babylon...
אשר שם הזהב, “where the gold is.” The “gold” referred to here are the words of Torah which have been extolled as הנחמדים מזהב ומפז רב, “more desirable than gold, than much fine gold.” (Psalms 19,11). We are taught by this verse that the quality of Torah studied in the land of Israel is superior to Torah studied elsewhere as is the wisdom acquired in the land of Israel.
שם הבדולח ואבן השהם, “there can be found the bedolach and the shoham stone.” These are names of gems and they symbolise different disciplines of Torah study such as מקרא, משנה, תלמוד, הלכות, תוספות ואגדות, “Holy Scripture, Mishnah, Talmud, Halachot, interpretations and aggadic material.”
ושם הנהר השני גיחון, “and the name of the second river is Gichon.” This is a reference to the kingdom of the Medes, whereas the third river חידקל is a reference to the kingdom of Greece which imposed a particularly draconian rule on the Jewish people in Israel.
The fourth river, the river Euphratus, represents the Roman Empire which oppressed the Jewish people inordinately. The word פרת is equated by the Midrash with the word הפרה, “breach (of trust).” ...
ונהר, “and a river, etc.” According to the Targum the Hebrew word אור, “light,” equivalent to the aramaic נהורא, “light.”
The Torah therefore tells us that a “light” comes forth from Eden, and that this light originates in the region known as אין סוף, “G’’d’s Essence.” The meaning of the word מעדן is that it emanates from regions which are not bounded by any boundaries, or which defy further definition by man.
The region has been so named by our sages because they cannot define it . It is beyond the outermost boundaries of our understanding.
It is contrasted with the light emanating in אין סוף which is never withheld and this is why the word describing whence this light emanates is in the present tense, i.e. יוצא, “it comes forth,” instead of the past tense יצא, “it came forth,” which is what we would have expected.
להשקות את הגן, “to irrigate the garden.” This task would be performed by the emanation עטרת.
This is what the Torah means when it states that משם, i.e. from there on the “light” was divided into four categories. This is a reference to four separate “camps.” These “camps” provide “energy” for the four “rivers” or “lights” of Gan Eden. Thence this energy or different forms of energies are channeled to the four kingdoms on earth. May the Lord continue to enlighten us with the light of His Torah.