JORDAN, RIVER OF (jor'dan), (Hebrew gen erally with article kah-yar-dane., the de scender, probably from the rapid descent of the stream), the great river of Palestine, as the Nile is of Egypt.
(1) Name. Thc name "Jordan" is always joined with the article in the Old Testament, with two exceptions (Ps. xlii :6; Job xl :23). The Arabs call it esh-Sheriah, or the watering-place." A tra dition as old as St. Jerome, A. D. 400, says that the Jordan derived its name from two rivers, the Jor, rising at Banias, and thc Dan, rising at Tell el-Kadi. But this tradition 3eems to be erro neous; for, according to Gen. the river was known to Abraham as the Jordan long before the children of Dan gave their name to Leshem (Josh. xix :47), Or Laish (Judg. xviii:2g).
(2) Sources. The Jordan riscs atnong the moun tains of Anti-Lebanon, and has four sources: (t) The Hasbdny, which issues from the large foun tain 'Ain Furar, near Hasbeya, at an altitude of 1,7oo fect above the sea. This pool, which the natives say is i,000 feet dccp, Macgregor found to have a depth of it feet. (2) The Banias, which rises near the ruins of Banias (Cmsarea-Philippi), at thc base of Mount Hermon, i,t4o feet above the sea-level. (3) The Ledddn rising in a large fountain on the west side of the Tell el-Kadi ("hill of the judge," the site of the city of Dan). In the midst of a thicket of oleander bushes is a large pool, so or 6o yards wide, with the water bubbling out of the ground in a full-grown stream. This, which Josephus calls the Little Jordan, is the most copious source. (4) The Esh Shar, a minor tributary, only one or two yards broad. Besides the above four sources, there arc numerous small streams from the springs of Leba non which find their way into the swamp above Lake Hutch, and contribute to swell the Jordan.
(3) Course of the Stream. After flowing twelve miles through the valley, it enters a dark defile of six or seven miles, thence through a marsh ten miles, and coming out into the beauti ful Lake Merom or Huleh. Taking a south course twelve miles further on it enters the sea of Gali lee. Issuing from its southwest corner it flows on some sixty miles till it empties into the Dead Sea.
(4) The Plains of the Jordan. The popular notion that the waters of the river do not seem to mingle with those of the lake, but pass through in a united stream, is a "fable." From the Sea of Tiberias to the Dead Sea there is one deep depression, the hills from the east and west nearly meeting in many places. This depression is filled
up to a certain level with an alluvial deposit, forming a vast plain called the Jordan valley, or Ghdr (the hollow). This is the "upper plain." It varies in width from onc to twelve miles. The river has cut out for itself a plain lower than the preceding hy some 5o to too feet, and from a quarter of a mile to a mile wide. This is the "lower plain," through which the river, some 6o yards wide, winds its way. During the spring floods this lower plain is inundated. Although the distance in a straight line between Tiberias and the Dcad Sea is only 66 miles, the actual dis tance the stream flows, on account of its many windings, is zoo miles, and the fall 667 feet. Twenty-seven threatening rapids were counted hy Lieut. Lynch, besides many others of minor im portance. The whole distance from the sources of the river to its mouth is not more than 136 miles in a straight line. The whole descent is 2.999 feet to the Dead Sea, which, according to the latest determination of the British survey, is 1,292 feet below sea-level, although Lynch had reported it at 1,317 feet. (Scc SALT SEA.) The width of the stream varies from 45 to 18o feet, and its depth from three to twelve feet.
(5) Tributaries. The only living tributaries to the Jordan noticed particularly below Genncsa ret were the l'arma (Hieromax) and the Zerka (Jabbok). The mouth of thc formcr of these was passed on the third day, 4o yards wide, with moderate current, while the latter, whose course became visible on thc seventh day, was, on the eighth day, discovered to have two distinct out lets into the main stream, onc of which was then dry. Older writers had distinguished two beds and banks of the Jordan; the first, that occupied by the river in its normal state; the second, com prising the spacc which it occupied during its swelling or OVerflOW (Martiniere, Diet. Geograph. s. v). Similarly Lieut. Lynch has remarked: "There are evidently two terraces to the Jordan, and through the lower one the river runs its ser pentine course. From the stream, above the im mediate banks, there is, on each side, a singular terrace of low hills, like truncated cones, which is the bluff terminus of an extended table-land, reaching quite to the mountains of Hauran on the eastern and the high hills on the western side" (Narrat., April 3, and comp. whn Capt. New bold says, p. 22).