The earthly, Persian origins of the word ‘paradise’, and where to find it in isolation
- Its genesis – pairaida za, meaning enclosure – referred to the gardens, arbours and orchards of the Zoroastrian religion
- Over time, the word has evolved and expanded in meaning, but it continues to conjure images of peace and tranquillity
To fully appreciate paradise though, we must travel back to Persia. There, in the Old Iranian base of Avestan, the language of Zoroastrian scripture, we note the word pairaidaēza, meaning enclosure, composed of the Old Iranian pari (“around”) and daiz (“to heap up, build”).
The first element is cognate to the Greek peri-, found in English words such as perimeter. The second element has as its Proto-Indo-European root *dheigh- (“to form, build”), which is also the ultimate source of the English “dough”.
The ancient Persian Zoroastrian religion encouraged, even required, the planting of arbours, public gardens and orchards. The pairidaēza surrounding such gardens were observed and recorded by Xenophon of Athens, the ancient Greek historian, philosopher and mercenary soldier who fought in the Persian campaign, as the Greekparadeisos.
Notably, the Greek word referred not to the enclosing wall, but to the vast orchards and parks filled with wild animals that the Persian nobles hunted. Later, paradeisos was used in the Greek Old Testament, Septuagint, to mean the Garden of Eden, and in the New Testament to mean heaven, or place where the souls of the righteous departed await resurrection.
Entering Latin, paradisus referred to a park, orchard or garden, as well as the Garden of Eden and the Judaeo-Christian heaven. From post-classical Latin, this entered Old English – Paradisum is used in the Old English Hexateuch, the first translation of the first six books of the Old Testament from Vulgate Latin into English, under the direction of famed monk Ælfric of Eynsham, in the late Anglo-Saxon period.
The Germanic-origin Old English compound neorxenawang, meaning something like fields of contentment (its etymology is debated by scholars), in use at the time, was displaced by the Latin-derived paradise and further reinforced by the Anglo Norman and Old and Middle French paradis (also from Latin).
Now reflect on paradise. Globalisation promised paradise on an Earth without borders. But the desire for isolation during the Covid-19 crisis is a reminder that paradise may be as much in the walls as the garden within.
