Renowned biblical sleuth and scholar Richard Elliot Friedman reveals the first work of prose literature in the world-a 3000-year-old epic hidden within the books of the Hebrew Bible. Written by a single, masterful author but obscured by ancient editors and lost for millennia, this brilliant epic of love, deception, war, and redemption is a compelling account of humankind's complex relationship with God. Friedman boldly restores this prose masterpiece-the very heart of the Bible-to the extraordinary form in which it was originally written. "Richard Elliott Friedman is that rare biblical scholar who is both able to address a broad audience and willing to raise large speculative issues about the Bible...a challenging, exhilarating theory that will force biblical scholars to rethink some basic assumptions...a bold thesis that should give everyone pause." -- Robert Alter, the "New York Times Book Review""A brilliant piece of scholarly detective work...Friedman's book blows like a fresh breeze through the halls of biblical study."-- "Publishers Weekly""[Friedman's] work is poised to produce one of those once-in-a-generation breakthroughs, after which the field of study can never look the same again."-- H. G. M. Williamson, Regius Professor of Hebrew, Oxford University Renowned biblical sleuth and scholar Richard Elliot Friedman reveals the first work of prose literature in the world-a 3000-year-old epic hidden within the books of the Hebrew Bible. Written by a single, masterful author but obscured by ancient editors and lost for millennia, this brilliant epic of love, deception, war, and redemption is a compelling account of humankind's complex relationship with God. Friedman boldly restores this prose masterpiece-the very heart of the Bible-to the extraordinary form in which it was originally written. RICHARD ELLIOTT FRIEDMAN is one of the premier bible scholars in the country. He earned his doctorate at Harvard and was a visiting fellow at Oxford and Cambridge, a Senior Fellow of the American Schools of Oriental Research in Jerusalem, and a Visiting Professor at the University of Haifa. He is the Ann & Jay Davis Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Georgia and the Katzin Professor of Jewish Civilization Emeritus of the University of California, San Diego. He is the author of Commentary on the Torah, The Disappearance of God, The Hidden Book in the Bible, The Bible with Sources Revealed, The Bible Now, The Exile and Biblical Narrative, the bestselling Who Wrote the Bible? , and most recently, The Exodus . He was an American Council of Learned Societies Fellow and was elected to membership in The Biblical Colloquium. His books have been translated into Hebrew, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Japanese, Polish, Hungarian, Dutch, Portuguese, Czech, Turkish, Korean, and French. He was a consultant for the Dreamworks film The Prince of Egypt , for Alice Hoffman's The Dovekeepers , and for NBC, A&E, PBS, and Nova. Genesis 2:4b. In the day that YHWH made earth and skies -- 5. when all produce of the field had not yet been in theearth, and all vegetation of the field had not yet grown, forYHWH had not rained on the earth, and there had been nohuman to work the ground, 6. and a river had come up fromthe earth and watered the whole face of the ground-- 7. YHWH fashioned a human, dust from the ground, and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and the human became a living being. 8. And YHWH planted a garden in Eden at the cast, and he set the human whom He had fashioned there. 9. And YHWH caused every tree that was pleasant to the sight and good for food to grow, and the tree of life within the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and bad. 10. And a river had gone out from Eden to water the garden, and it was dispersed from there and became four heads. I 1. The name of one was Pishon; that is the one that circles all the land of Havilah where there is gold. 12. And that land's gold is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. 13. And the name of the second river is Gihon; that is the one that circles all the land of Cush. 14. And the name of the third river is Tigris; that is the one that goes cast of Assyria. And the fourth river: that is Euphrates. 15. And YHWH took the human and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and to watch over it. 16. And YHWH commanded the human, saying, "You may eat from every tree of the garden. 17 But from the tree of knowledge of good and bad: you shall not eat from it, because in the day you eat from it: you'll die! " 18. And YHWH said, "It's not good for the human to be by himself. I'll make for him a strength corresponding to him." 19. And YHWH fashioned from the ground every animal of the field and every bird of the skies and brought it to the human to see what he would call it. And whatever the human would call it, each living being, that would be its name. 20. And the human gave names to every beast and bird of the skies and every animal of the fiel