Encyclopedia entry · Place
Abana
also called Amana
Abana is one of the two rivers of Damascus named in scripture, appearing once in 2 Kings 5:12 in the mouth of Naaman the Syrian. Sent by Elisha to wash seven times in the Jordan as a cure for his leprosy, Naaman flies into a rage: *Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? may I not wash in them, and be clean?* The objection is partly geographic and partly tribal — the Damascus rivers ran clear and fast from the snows of the Anti-Lebanon; the Jordan, by comparison, was a muddy lowland creek. Naaman's servants persuade him to obey anyway, and the leprosy leaves him.
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The river is traditionally identified with the modern Barada — called Chrysorrhoas, the golden stream, by the Greeks — the watercourse that descends from the Anti-Lebanon range and, by irrigation, makes Damascus's celebrated oasis possible. Some Hebrew manuscripts read *Amana rather than Abana; the qere/ketiv* variant is preserved in the margins of the Masoretic text. Either form, it is the same river — the one that explains why a great desert city exists at all.
Source · AI-drafted from biblical text and standard reference works (Smith's, Easton's, ISBE) — verify and refine against authoritative sources before publication.
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