The Hellenists gave the term "Mesopotamia" to the regions below modern day Baghdad, between the Tigris and Euphrates. It is a region that has held strategic interest to the great nations of history, even to the present era. It was formely regarded as Sumerian after possibly the oldest city of recorded history, Sumeria. The region was one of a handful of city states that served as a cradle to early civilisation. It is my own theory that Eden lay beyond the current water courses, below the waters of the Arabian gulf. As the earth cooled, water condensed into the great basins of the world and also reduced the high humidity levels of the highlands, resulting in a migration to the upper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates. The area provided the birth place of mid and near east civilisations and it was clearly also the place where early bible incidents took place, including the building of the tower of Babel and the settlement of the sons of Shem, son of Noah: they were the ealiest semites (shemites).Abram emerged from this fairly advanced, but pagan and (if Babel is anything to go by) willful culture. He left it all behind, to face another contradiction in the dry, barren wastelands towards Canaan. He left a fertile, progressive but spiritually barren cradle, for a dry, dusty but spiritually fruitful plain, where he grew up and became a significant man and father in God. As he entered Canaan, he camped between Bethel, the house of God and future touchstone of Israel, and Ai, a heap of ruins that symbolised the corrupt, uncertain remnants of his past.
Image source: McClungmuseum.uk.edu
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