There's earth... and there's Earth.

In my studies of Chinese Medicine, I often run into the concept of "Earth". It comes up as one of Wu Xing - Five Phases (Wood Fire Earth Metal Water) and also in relationship with "Heaven". I recently learned these are actually two different Chinese characters (~words), both of which we generally translate as "Earth." I also found that they correspond respectively to two Hebrew words which are also generally translated as "Earth."

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地 - Di - earth, ground, field, place, land

ארץ - Eretz - country, land, territory, district, region, earth, Earth, ground, soil

土 - Tu - earth, dust, clay, local , indigenous

אדמה - Adamah - earth, soil, land

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地 - Di often is seen in relationship with 天 - Tian and 人 - Ren.

天 - Tian - sky, heaven, god, celestial, day

人 - Ren - man, person, people, mankind, someone else

This is not unlike the very first line of our תורה - Torah,

.בראשית ברא אלהים, את השמים, ואת הארץ

Bereshit Bara Elohim, Et HaShamayim, V'et HaEretz.

In Beginning Created Many Powers, the Heavens, and the Earth.

It is interesting to note that some commentators say that שמים ("Heaven") is made up of אש - aish - fire & מים - mayim - water, which makes sense, considering that to folks wandering back and forth across a desert, שמים - sky would have been the source of fire (light, heat and energy from Sun and stars) and water (precipitation). In the ancient pre-Kabbalistic text (ספר יצירה - Sefer Yetzirah - Book of Formation), the Three Mother letters are א–מ–ש, representing (אש - aish - fire), (מים - mayim - water), along with the addition of (אויר - avir - air), which mediates between the other do, as does (人 - ren), between (天 - tian) and (地 - di).

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土 - tǔ - earth is often seen along with:

木 - mù - wood

火 - huǒ - fire

金 - jīn - metal/gold

水 - shuǐ - water

Together them make up 五行 - wǔ xíng.

五 - wǔ - 5

行 - xíng - phase, go, walk, move, travel, circulate, (often translated as Elements)

Within this context, i've seen (土 - tǔ - earth) contextualized two different ways.

The older way has it in the middle of the other 4 (行 - xíng - phases) which represent the 4 seasons and directions.

火 - huǒ - fire

木 - mù - wood 土- tǔ - earth 金 - jīn - metal

水 - shuǐ - water

In this scenario, water is winter/north/midnight, wood is spring/east/morning, fire is summer/south/noon, and metal is autumn/west/evening.

The other is similar, but it presents them all in a circle, with (土 - tǔ - earth) coming in the middle of the rotation of wood, fire, earth, metal, water and being given a 5th damp season between hot summer and dry autumn. This is the version more often seen pictured today.

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Its also interesting to note that both traditions have ancient stories about humans being formed out of clay (土 אדמה) and surviving a flood. In the Hebrew tradition, the first human [called אדם - Adam - Earth Being] is formed out of אדמה - Adamah - Clay. Ten generations later, his descendent נח - Noah, along with his wife, sons, and their wives were the only survivors who then began repopulating the earth.

In the Chinese tradition, the order is a little different. The flood is survived by Fuxi (伏羲) and his sister/wife Nüwa (女媧) who then begin to repopulate the earth. To speed things up, they began to form people out of clay. I'm not sure if 土 - tu is the character for "earth/clay" used in this story, but i'd be interested to find out.