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Christopher Abbott as Adam Trask, Hoon Lee as Lee in episode 107 of East of Eden.
. Courtesy of Netflix © 2026
By PJ Grisar
October 1, 2026
The crucial point of John Steinbeck’s thinking East of Edennow a spectacular Netflix miniseries, is a Hebrew word that doesn’t exist.
At one point in Steinbeck’s 600-page tome, as teeming with biblical allegory as the Salinas Valley is with natural beauty, Lee’s character offers a midrash on Genesis 4, and the moment when God rejects Cain’s offering.
Speaking to Samuel Hamilton, the Trask family neighbor at the center of the generational drama, Lee said he was bothered by a passage where God says, in the King James Bible: “If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not well, sin is at the door. And for you will be its desire, and you will reign over it.”
Lee says he compared translations and eventually returned to the source: Hebrew, through some ancient Chinese scholars who consulted a rabbi.
In Hebrew they found the word “Timshel”, which they translate as “you can. You can reign over sin. (The word, the last in Steinbeck’s book, is the title of the final episode of the Netflix series.)
“The American Standard Translation commands men to triumph over sin, and you can call ignorance of sin,” Lee tells Samuel, scholar to scholar. “The King James translation makes a promise in “Thou shalt,” meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word, the word Timshel — “You can” — that gives you a choice. It’s perhaps the most important word in the world. This means that the way is open. This puts the situation back on a man. Because if “You can”, it is also true that “You cannot”.
This interpretation, in a book about how sin can be passed from one group of brothers similar to Cain and Abel to another, is at the heart of Steinbeck’s philosophy. He is so central that he carved the word into a wooden box containing the manuscript.
But as I’m not the first to notice, “Timshel“is a corruption of”Timshol”, תמשל, and it does not mean “you can” so much as “you will rule” — the future, the second person, a more complete thought.
That said, sages debated whether the word was truly determining or whether it implied a feeling of choice. Ramban and Rashi are among those who suggest that free will be factored into the equation.
By quoting the entire sentence in English, Steinbeck evidently thought that the word “Timshol” indicated only how one could govern, and did not encompass the article on the decision. As our language columnist Aviya Kushner wrote, Steinbeck’s explanation “reveals an ignorance of the basic fact that Hebrew is more concise than English.” (Sheila Tuller Keiter, in a 2022 piece for the Jewish Review of Booksgoes further, explaining how the erroneous transliteration into “Timshel” may be the result of the Litvak accent of the legendary Jewish scholar Louis Ginzberg, whom Steinbeck’s editor consulted.)
Steinbeck wrote for an English-speaking audience. Zoe Kazan released her miniseries on Netflix and to a global audience of approximately 9 to 10 million Hebrew speakers. How did they adapt the passage for the Hebrew subtitles?
In the series, the scene plays out in much the same way. Lee (Hon Lee) and Samuel (Ciarán Hinds) are at the kitchen table at the Trask farm in the valley.
King James asks God to tell Cain “you must” reign over sin. This feels, as Lee says, “like a promise.” THE American Standard Bible translates it as “do you”. “It’s more of an order” from the Almighty, Samuel said.
Lee said Jewish scholars in San Francisco found the original in “Timshel”, which, as in the book, translates to “you can”.
In the Hebrew subtitles, the word is correctly rendered as follows: timsholOf course. Netflix translated Lee’s “you can” as הבחירה בידך, literally, “the choice is in your hands,” which, while not actually what the word means in Hebrew, suggests that it is something a little more complex than “you can.”
(Netflix did not respond to a request for comment on how the Hebrew translations were decided; while the English subtitles say: “Timshel“, the actors seem to split the difference when pronouncing it”Timshol.“)
Perhaps it’s the spirit – if not the letter – that counts. And indeed, the rejection of evil as an innate element of human nature has more in common with the Jewish tradition than the Episcopalian concept of original sin and free will linked to God that Steinbeck grew up with.
Lee explains that “Timshel“, a Steinbeckian invention, is perhaps the most important word there is.
“It offers a choice,” he says. “Our future is not determined by God or by our past. Even Cain, in his weakness and filth following the murder of his brother, can still choose his path. Because Timshel. You can.
It’s an interesting message that, of course, resonates. But of course you can also consult Hebrew.
Mira Fox contributed to the research and translation.
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