Whence the Jordan is derived can be inquired in two ways: namely, as to the thing [itself], and as to the word [name]. As to the thing, its origin is twofold. One [is] general, from the sea — about which [I treated] once in [my commentary on] the Meteors [of Aristotle], and afterward perhaps on Eccl. 1, if [it seem] good to God. The other [is] special: [namely], from what place it first begins to gush forth, and to appear to men. “The Jordan,” says Pliny (bk. 5 ch. 15), “is a river [that] rises from the Paneas spring, which gave [its] surname to Caesarea.” And he adds, “of which we have spoken.” But where? At chapter 13, I think. But there he described not this Caesarea — which by Ptolemy [is called] Panea, [and] more usually [Caesarea] Philippi (for a reason handed down in [the account of] Herod, ch. 20) — but the [Caesarea] which is [Caesarea] of Strato. And therefore, [it is] to be corrected with Delechamps, we shall say. For below (ch. 17) he names that one in the Decapolis. Yet the same Pliny — or certainly the authors whom he followed — in this origin of the Jordan too, Josephus seems to correct (bk. 3 of the Captivity ch. 35, or in the Latin, 18), when he writes: “And the source of the Jordan does indeed seem to be Paneum; but [the river] is carried in this [source], hidden under the earth, from Phiala.” Now this [Phiala] is a pool [stagnum], which there — from its round shape — is called Phiala [Greek “bowl, saucer”]; and toward Trachonitis it is distant from Caesarea 120 stadia to the right. In Burchard (bk. On the Holy Land) [it] is called Medon, that is, “the waters of Dan,” [and] Magedan, and Dalmanutha; and he puts the distance from Caesarea at 125 stadia. Meanwhile, [as long as] it was unknown [that] the Jordan takes its beginning hence, this was demonstrated by Philip, when he was acting [as] tetrarch of the Trachonites. For when he had cast chaff into that Phiala, he found it carried down into the Paneum — from which the ancients thought the river Jordan to be generated. Now the Paneum is both a spring and a mountain, from which [there is] also a cave, in which it gushes forth; and it has a remarkable beauty from nature itself, but [one] which King Agrippa greatly increased by work and royal expense — as Josephus there narrates, who, because there [it lies] under—
(col. 419)
—[because there it lies underground, [and] the flow of the Jordan first becomes manifest] from that spring, we shall assign to it a twofold special origin: one indeed hidden and latent, from Phiala; the other visible and open, from the Paneum. But in the book On the Holy Land, Burchard establishes not only one, but two springs there, from which the Jordan flows, in these words: “Not far above this city” (namely Caesarea — or, as he calls it, Bellena; Benjamin, in the Itinerary, folio 52, seems to call [it] Balivus) “arise two springs, namely Ior and Dan, which, meeting at the foot of Mount Lebanon before the gate of the city, make the river Jordan.” From another description of the same Holy Land, Abulensis too (quest. 37) cites similar [things] — except that he will [have] the Jordan made from those springs beneath the mountains of Gilboa. But that it is formed before those mountains, Burchard more truly asserts; between whom, however, and Pliny and Josephus — when they name only a “spring” [fons] — I think [there is] no difference. For authors are sometimes wont to call that the “spring” of some river whence it rises, whether [there] be properly only one spring and fountain-head, or several — as when, of the Danube (about which St. Ambrose, bk. 2 of the Hexaemeron ch. 3), we say the spring is at Donaueschingen, in the domain of the Counts of Zimmern — a place which Tiberius once deservedly thought worth visiting for himself — where, however, [there are] several sources. The most illustrious Duke of Olyka, Lord Radziwiłł (epist. 2): “There is a bridge, which the very Turks call [the bridge] of Jacob the patriarch. It is fairly wide, and solidly compacted, and set over the Jordan; which river, on the right, has two channels — of which one is called Ior, the other Dan — [and], joined together above the bridge (yet at a fairly long interval), make, as it were, one stream, [and] thus retain one name; and it is called Jordan, which rises not far thence from the mountains.” But the same Lord may be read in the same letter, folios 103 & 104: “The Jordan,” he says, “a river, empties into this sea [the Dead Sea], on that side which meets those coming from the monastery of St. Sabas. Thence, [for] one and a half miles, through high and sterile sands, one reaches the place of Christ’s baptism. On the right of the river — which very often shows itself to be seen in very winding bends — in that very place where Christ was baptized by John, [there] is a shady grove, extending, near the banks of the river, half a mile in length, and a bowshot in breadth. It has trees, whose leaves imitate willows, yet are not of that kind — as [one] may see from the twigs which I brought with me. And this is that desert which the Evangelist Matthew (ch. 3) and Mark (ch. 1) mentioned, in which John baptized and preached penitence. Now those [things] on which the holy Forerunner lived — namely locust and wild honey — are no longer found in these places. But [it] is likely [that] the river — which has not a muddy, but even a sandy bottom, and glides between rocks — cast onto the banks certain shellfish [conchylia] edible without cooking (some species of which the sea too is wont to produce somewhere). Whether the Saint ate these, or similar [things], is uncertain. Wild honey too this grove could once produce, on which — scripture attesting — he fed. Now nothing such is found here, since [it] is a solitude, admitting no cultivation. The Jordan has very turbid water, but wholesome, which, kept in vessels, is never corrupted — as I have undoubtedly experienced in that [water] which I brought with me. Some of ours washed [their] body there, when we took refreshment on the bank. Scarcely does [it] grow to a breadth of [thirty cubits]—”
(col. 420)
—[scarcely does it grow to a breadth of] thirty cubits, except where it flows into the Dead Sea, in which place it is also spread more widely. Here are seen the ruins of the bridge on the farther bank — [a bridge] of stone which St. Helena once constructed. Beyond the river, on the right, toward the Asphalt Lake [Dead Sea], now begins Arabia, which is — and is deservedly called — ‘desert.’ For it produces nothing but rocks and sand, as [one] may manifestly see from the very first sight. Higher up, proceeding half a mile, [there] is the place where the Hebrews crossed the Jordan dry-shod. [See] Joshua ch. 3.”
[That] the whole land of Israel is surrounded by that same Jordan; [that] the middle part of it is above the earth, and the middle within; and [that] into them flows the Leviathan — which was created by God for the great banquet of the Just — R. Eleazer teaches, rabbinically (that is, triflingly), ch. 11.
As to the word [name], [it] is now sufficiently plain [that] Burchard and others compose the name of the Jordan from those two springs [Ior + Dan]. But by the Hebrews today it is called, and in the Bibles everywhere written, Iarden [יַרְדֵּן]; and they will [have it derived] from Iarad [יָרַד], that is, “to descend” — as if [it were] “descending from Dan.” For thus that Caesarea is everywhere named in scripture, as we shall see below in its place. And to this notion of “descending” St. Ambrose looks, in the preface on Psalm 37, where, for Salim — which is rendered by him “ascending” — [he says] Halim or Salik is to be read. But of old, not Iarden was read, but Iordan, as [is] gathered from the most ancient 70, and from the Syriac Testament. And [that] Herodotus (bk. 1) looked to this name, when he wrote Iardanes [as] the parent [ancestor] of the Heraclidae, I noted [on] 1 Macc. ch. 12 — just as in the same region there was the Saronic gulf, because, since in the sacred books among the Hebrews Saron [שָׁרוֹן] occurs so often, by that name ancient Greece called the oak, as Pliny says (bk. 4 ch. 5). But in the Syriac text of the Gospels [it] is indeed so written, with Syriac letters and points, that [it] can be read Iourdanan — although Boderianus writes [it] in Latin Iourdenon (for example, Matt. 3 v. 5 & 6). But Tremellius [writes] Iourdanan — just as, namely, in the same place (v. 3) and elsewhere, St. John is always called Iouchanon. But the Paneum, or Dan, is at the root of Lebanon — or, to speak more properly, of Anti-Lebanon — as will be said below (quest. 5) against Strabo. Eusebius, moreover, narrates (bk. 7 of the History ch. 17, in the Greek) [that] a certain mockery of the devil was exterminated at these springs of Paneum and Jordan by St. Astyrius; and (ch. 18) about the statue [effigy] made by [the woman] with the issue of blood, [as] worker of the miracles of CHRIST the Lord. But whether, and how, there was amber in this river, David Pomarius disputes, from the book Mishnaioth, in the book Tsemach, under the word Kiphah.