A morning ride brings the traveller from the Sultan's Spring to the banks of Jordan, at the spot where the Kelt valley debouches, and where the Crusading monastery of St. John-on-Jordan, replacing the original building erected by the Emperor Anastasius, stands on the marl hillocks, by the fine reservoir built by Justinian for the former structure.
From the fourth century downwards, the great ford at this place has been pointed out as the scene of Our Lord's Baptism--the Bethabara of the fourth Gospel. This view is sanctioned by the Greek and Latin churches alike, and pilgrims yearly repair hither at Easter-time to bathe in Jordan.
Writers who have endeavoured to cast discredit on the Gospels, have, from an early period, caught at this identification as showing a physical impossibility. Bethabara was a spot where certain events took place on consecutive days, while on the "third day,â Christ was at Cana of Galilee (John i. 29, 35, 43; ii. 1). Now Cana was at least seventy miles from the neighbourhood of Jericho, and the distance is manifestly too great for one day's journey. But the error lies, not with the Evangelist, but with his opponents, who assume that the fourth-century tradition is necessarily correct. The name Bethabara is not to be found in the neighbourhood of Jericho, and the site discovered, by the Survey party, in 1874 (to be described in the next chapter) is much higher up the valley. The existence of the name in another direction, where the requisites of the New Testament narrative are fully borne out, is therefore, I think, fatal to the traditional site. But though the spot in question cannot apparently claim to be the real Bethabara, there is every reason to suppose that it is the place where Joshua and his host crossed over in front of Jericho, and it has thus an historical interest of a scarcely inferior degree.
Leaving behind us the mud hovels and black tents among low vineyards, which now make up modern Jericho, since the fire which lately destroyed the village, we rode through cornfields, and over open plains where the alkali plant (Hubeibeh) grows; descending a sort of step we came upon an extent of white-crusted mud, too salt for any plant to grow on, and so to the Zor, or broad trench in which the river flows. The Zor is full of Dôm trees and tamarisks in which the sun-birds swarm, while the ground is riddled with the burrows of the jerboa. The river itself flows in a brown swirling rapid stream, amid a thick jungle of tamarisk, cane, and willow. Here the Nimr or hunting leopard, much feared by the Arabs, finds a retreat, and, beside the river, I came suddenly on a wolf prowling alone.