5. This was before there were plants on the earth. Nothing was growing in the fields because the Lord God had not yet made it rain on the earth, and there was no one to care for the plants.
6. So water came up from the earth and spread over the ground.
7. Then the Lord God took dust from the ground and made a man. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nose, and the man became a living thing.
8. Then the Lord God planted a garden in the East, in a place named Eden. He put the man he made in that garden.
9. Then the Lord God caused all the beautiful trees that were good for food to grow in the garden. In the middle of the garden, he put the tree of life and the tree that gives knowledge about good and evil.
10. A river flowed from Eden and watered the garden. The river then separated and became four smaller rivers.
11. The name of the first river was Pishon. This river flowed around the entire country of Havilah.
12. (There is gold in that country, and that gold is pure. A kind of expensive perfume and onyx are also found there.)
13. The name of the second river was Gihon. This river flowed around the whole land of Cush.
14. The name of the third river was Tigris. This river flowed east of Assyria. The fourth river was the Euphrates.
15. The Lord God put the man in the Garden of Eden to work the soil and take care of the garden.
16. The Lord God gave him this command: “You may eat from any tree in the garden.
17. But you must not eat from the tree that gives knowledge about good and evil. If you eat fruit from that tree, on that day you will certainly die!”