The idea to create Ukraine’s first biblical garden belongs to the younger sister of Volodymyr Ivasiuk, Oksana Ivasiuk (assistant professor at the Ukrainian Literature Department, Fedkovych University in Chernivtsi), who last year initiated compiling Ukraine’s Red Book in verse. According to her project, Eden was supposed to be grown on the historical land of Shypyntsi, located not far from Chernivtsi. Several decades before Vikentii Khvoika discovered Trypillia, the archeologists of the Austrian Empire excavated a settlement here, which is identical to the Trypillian culture.
Ivasiuk appealed for help to botanists and theologians of the Chernivtsi National University Svitlana Rudenko and Stepan Kostyshyn, who both hold the Doctor of Science degree, as well as the head of the Theology Section at the Department of Philosophy and Theology Mykola Shcherban. Within a year period the researchers have revealed and given description to 145 specimens of trees, shrubs, and other plants mentioned in the Bible. Besides wheat, barley, spelt, it mentions also lily, melon, cucumber, and even union, two specimens of which were known at the time, leek and bulb union. They also had place for exotic plants like a fig tree specimen and other plants that do not grow on Ukrainian territory, and even a sort of investigation. In particular, the authors of the work Roslyny Sviatoho Pysma (Plants in the Holy Writ) suggested three versions concerning what plant could be the prototype of the manna of heaven. This could be Fraxinus ornus (Manna), which oozes a substance which looks like semolina when it hardens; Aspicilia vagans, whose eatable ball-shaped fruits are blown by the wind for a distance covering tens and hundreds kilometers; and tamarisk. It exudes white and glutinous sweet substance with looks of Turkish delight. Actually, it is exuded not by the plant itself, rather by the greenflies that live on it. In Biblical times, as it has been ascertained by the researchers, this ooze was gathered for food and called manna.
The in-depth work has resulted in a sci-fi book Plants of the Holy Writ, which will soon see the light through one of the publishing houses in Chernivtsi. While creating it, the authors were using only the Biblical texts as well as numerous apocrypha and the works of the late Judaic and early Christian literature, which were not included into the Biblical text. All the plants in the book were systematized according to different chapters, taking into account their pure botanic classification (trees, bushes, etc.), utilitarian designation (eatable plants and sources of building materials), and their theological designation. For some plants, like wheat, are mentioned in the Holy Writ with a positive connotation, whereas others, like cockle, sow thistle, nettle etc. – with a negative one. The book also includes a substantial index of plants arranged with accordance to Biblical quotations, and it also contains the parables connected with plants, Biblical truth, and scientific hypotheses.
A problem emerged when it came to practical realization of the Biblical garden. Today’s Shypyntsi is a big village where a big school is located; however, the biology teacher and students will hardly be able to look after the unique garden on their own. A solution was suggested by Mykhailo Marchenko, Dean of the Biology Department at the Chernivtsi University. He offered to plant the Eden in the courtyard of the university’s old buildings, which have been nominated for being included in UNESCO’s List of World Cultural Heritage.
The administration of the higher educational establishment liked the idea. However, it will hardly be possible to realize it by the university’s 135th anniversary, says the rector of the university Stepan Melnychuk. With a view to the high number of thermophytes among the Eden plants, there is a need to build a sort of a winter garden for them or reconstruct one of the greenhouses in the university park, which would require substantial money injections. However, it is beyond doubt that the Biblical garden will for sure appear in the university that stands on a sacred place (a residence of the Bukovynian metropolitans was located here in the pre-Soviet period), has a theological department and two functioning churches.
According to biologist Rudenko, the planting stock of subtropical plants that do not grow in Transcarpathia will be granted by the colleagues from the Nikitsky Botanical Garden. And Marchenko is now negotiating with Israeli landscape designers, who in their time created the Eden Garden in the Holy Land. Apart from being an educational and tourist object, the Chernivtsi garden made up by the Biblical plants will be a kind of scientific research springboard. In particular, Rudenko intends to try to grow an analogue to the tree which was used as a material to make the cross where Christ was crucified. The scientific studies of the Bible give reasons to assert that the unique tree was an accretion of a fir-tree, cedar, and cypress. The scholar says that such an accretion is no fiction, because the accreted trees can be found, for example, in the Belavezhskaya Pushcha National Park. It remains unknown whether the experiment will be a success. But the fact that the Eden Garden on the Chernivtsi University’s territory will attract numerous visitors is beyond doubt, first and foremost those will be newly-wed couples, who come to marry in the university churches. Can you imagine what the newly-weds should feel when they will walk along the Eden Garden, like real Adam and Eve?
