The Pilgrim of Bordeaux, writing in AD 333, and the traveller Theodosius, writing in AD 530, both recorded the baptism location as sitting five miles from the point where the Jordan flows into the Dead Sea.
“From the site where the Lord was baptised, to the site where the river Jordan pours into the Dead Sea, there are five miles,” Theodosius wrote.
That distance matches the excavated area’s position, giving what Dr Waheeb considers a decisive geographical link between the ancient descriptions and the physical remains.
Dr Waheeb argued that much of the historical uncertainty stems from Origen, an early Christian scholar who could not find the riverside settlement, and proposed that the Gospel passage should refer to Bethabara, a name linked to the western bank, even though most manuscripts available to him use the name Bethany.
