Emmaus
EMMA´US(Ἐμμαούς).
1.A village of Judaea mentioned by St. Luke (24.13), distant sixty furlongs from Jerusalem. This is doubtless identical with the Χώριον Ἀμμαούςof Josephus, which he says Ἀπέχει τῶν Ἰεροσολύμων σταδίους ἑξήκοντα, in which Vespasian established a colony of 800 veterans. ( B. J. 7.6.6.) A tradition, originating apparently in the 14th century, which has fixed its site at the village of El-Khubeibeh, has no value whatever, and the distance does not coincide (Robinsoh, B. R. vol. iii. pp. 65, 66). A more ancient and consistent tradition, which still prevails among the Greeks, identifies it. with the village of Kuriyat-el-Anûb, popularly called Abn-Goosh, on the road between Jerusalem and Jaffa, about 1 1/2 hour from the former city. The authenticity of this tradition is confirmed by the existence at the present day of a native village, on the road between Jerusalem and Kuriyat-el-Anûb, named Colonies or Kulonia, obviously deriving its name from the military colony established in the district of Ammaus by Vespasian. It is still celebrated for its waters, as it was in the time of Julian, who attempted to stop the fountain on account of the miraculous virtues imputed to it. (Theophanes, cited by Reland, Palaest. p. 759.) It is often coinfounded with the following, as it is, indeed, by Theophanes.
2.A city of Palaestine, about eight or ten miles from the former (with which it has been often confounded), still retaining its ancient name almost unchanged, being now called Ammwus. In classic times it was designated Nicopolis, in commemoration, as is suggested, of the destruction of Jerusalem. (Willibald. ap. Reland, p. 760.) It is frequently mentioned in the book of Maccabees, and by Josephus (cited in Reland, pp. 428, 429, 758, 759), and is joined with Lydda and Thamna. The Itinerarium Hierosolymitanum places it 22 Roman miles from Jerusalem; and St. Jerome accurately states its position, ubi incipiunt montana Judaeae consurgere( Comment. in Daniel. xii.); but both he and colony and a Eusebius erroneously identify this city with the village mentioned by St. Luke. ( Epitaph. Paulae, and de Locis Hebraicis, ad voc. Ἐμμαούς..) Pliny (Plin. Nat. 5.14) seems to make the same mistake, when he writes of it as a toparchy--Fontibus irriguam Emmaum, Lyddam, Joppicam,--a characteristic certainly more descriptive of the village of St. Luke than of the city Nicopolis, whose site is still marked by a village bearing the same name, and traces of ancient ruins, on the right hand, or north, of the road from Jerusalem to Jaffa, in the immediate a vicinity of Latrûn, the Castellum boni Latronisof the Crusades.
3.（Ἀμμαοῦς.) The name given by Josephus (J. AJ, B. J. 4.1.2) to the medicinal hot-springs of Tiberias, and which he interprets to mean warm baths,probably identifying the name with the Hebrew Hammath; which inclines Dr. Robinson to regard the ancient town of Hammath of the tribe of Naphthali ( Josh. 19.35) as represented in these hot springs. (B. Res.vol. 3. p. 260.) [TIBERIAS] [G.W]
A town 32 km N of Jerusalem in N Judea, on the border of that country in the Persian period. It was fortified by Bacchides at the beginning of the Hasmonaean uprising, and Judas Maccabeus defeated Gorgias there in 166 B.C. After the middle of the 1st c. B.C. Emmaus became the capital of a district. According to Luke (24: 13ff) Jesus met the disciples at Emmaus after the Crucifixion. After the destruction of Jerusalem Vespasian settled veterans of the Roman army there. In A.D. 221 it was given a status of polis by Elagabalus, who renamed it Nicopolis.
Excavations have revealed settlements of the Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, and later periods. Remains of a Samaritan synagogue have been found, and a Byzantine church, built above an earlier structure which is believed to have been the house of Cleophas.
BIBLIOGRAPHYL. H. Vincent & F. M. Abel, Emmaüs, sa basilique et son histoire (1932); M. Avi-Yonah, The Holy Land (1966) 84, 95, 115, 159.
A. NEGEV