Hobah

The Hebrew Masoretic Text and Koine Greek Septuagint say that Hobah is "to the left" of Damascus.^[8] This is generally translated to mean "north", as in the Aramaic Targum Onkelos.^[9] Although suggestions have been made for the exact location of Hobah, no identification is certain.^[10] In his commentary on Genesis, Antoine Augustin Calmet identified Hobah as Abila of Celesyria. The site of Ablia is the village of Souq Wadi Barada (called Abil-es-Suk by early Arab geographers), which is located about twelve miles northwest of Damascus. Calmet specifically noted that Hobah was to the left of the road that leads to Damascus, stating that if Hobah was north of the city, the text would have simply said "beyond Damascus", as can be seen in Amos 5:27 and Judith 15:5.^[11][12] This identification was later republished by George Leo Haydock.^[13] Johann Jakob Wettstein identified the Biblical Hobah with the modern Ḥoba, which he places sixty miles north of Damascus.^[14][15] The Keil and Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary of 1865 offers the most detailed theory on its location: “About 1 day’s journey north of Hoba on the road from Hims to Palmyra is a strong spring, which was a land rider station called Bet-Proclis under Roman rule... now all the structures have disappeared there and only the source Ain Forkutus has remained... Likewise, there is now only the Hoba spring without a village”. The Richard von Riess Bible Atlas of 1895 says that Hobah is “west of Karyetain, 111 kilometers northeast of Damascus”.

• Battle of Siddim
• Lot (biblical person)