'The sea of Apamia' is reckoned the seventh among those seas that compass the land of Israel; which word hath a sound so near akin to the word Pamias, by which name the Rabbins point out the fountains of Jordan, -- that the mention of that word cannot but excite the memory of this, yea, almost persuade that both design one and the same place: and that the sea Apamia was nothing else but some great collection of waters at the very springs of Jordan.

This also might moreover be added to strengthen that persuasion, that, in both places, in the quotations cited in the Jerusalem Talmud, these words are added; "The sea of Apamia is the same with the sea of Chamats, which Diocletianus, by the gathering together of the waters, caused to be made." But now that Diocletianus, whosoever he was (we prove elsewhere that he was the emperor), lived sometime at Paneas; as is clear also from the same Talmud.

But the thing is otherwise. Pamias and Apamia were different places, and far distant from each other: one in the land of Israel; the other in the confines indeed of the land of Israel, but in Syria.

Let this tradition be marked: -- "Ariston brought his first-fruits from Apamia, and they were received: for they said, He that hath a possession in Syria, is as if he had it in the suburbs of Jerusalem." The Gloss is, "Apamia is the name of a place in Syria."

And these things do appear more clearly in the Targumists, to omit other authors. The Samaritan interpreter renders the word Shepham, Numbers 34:10, by Apamia with Ain. (Note Shin changed into Ain; note also, in the word Bozor, 2 Peter 2:15, Ain changed into Shin.) Jonathan reads it Apamia, with Aleph: for "From Shepham to Riblah," he renders 'From Apamia to Daphne.'