In Jewish writings, the word pardes, borrowed from the Old Persian, occurs in the Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes, and Nehemiah, in each case meaning “park” or “garden”- the original Persian meaning of the word, where it describes the royal parks of Cyrus the Great (by Xenophon in Anabasis).
Later, in Second Temple-era Judaism, “paradise” came to be associated with the Garden of Eden and prophesies of restoration of Eden. The Septuagint uses the word around 30 times, both of Eden, (Genesis) and of Eden restored (Ezekiel 28:13, 36:35 etc.). In the Apocalypse of Moses, Adam and Eve are expelled from paradise (instead of Eden) after having been tricked by the serpent. Later after the death of Adam, the Archangel Michael carries the body of Adam to be buried in Paradise, which is in the Third Heaven.
As to “Christianity didn’t invent paradise, but it did offer a formula for obtaining it that seemed to offer a high degree of certainty”, the rest of that is their Hell, where God delights in punishing unsaved human souls FOREVER, including new-born babies, Jews, atheists, Jains, Buddhists, etc. etc. etc. etc.
Pardon my possible ignorance here, but does not the threat of eternal damnation for rebellious slaves promoted by their Egyptian masters *
pre-date Zoroastianism with its damnation/paradise paradigm?
And they of course would have no reason to make it up.
Gosh, I was sure I had come across something fairly recently. I really should make notes on things of interest to me. It’s possible that I misread something, or that it was in error.
For the time being, at least, everyone should consider what I posed to be untrue.
