NEBO
1. （Ναβαῦ, LXX.), the mountain from which the patriarch Moses was permitted to view the Promised Land. Its situation is thus described:—Get thee up into this mountain Abarim, untoMount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, that is over against Jericho( Deut. 32.49); and Moses went up from the plains of Moab unto the mountain of Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, that is over against Jericho.We have here three names of the mount, of which, however, Abarim may designate the range or mountain region rising from the high table-land of Moab (comp. Numbers, 27.12, 33.47); while Pisgah is an appellative for a hill,—as it is rendered in our margin, wherever the name occurs in the text ( Numb. 21.20; Deut. 3.27, 34.1), and in several oriental versions (Lex. s. v. HEBREW),—Nebo the proper name of some one particular peak. This name is regarded by M. Quatremère as of Aramaic origin, identical with that of the celebrated Chaldean divinity ( Isaiah, 46.1) so frequently compounded with the names of their most eminent kings, &c. and he discovers other names of like origin in the same parts. ( Mémoire sur les Nabatéens, p. 87.) It is placed by Eusebius and St. Jerome 6 miles west of Esbus (Heshbon), over against Jericho, on the road from Livias to Esbus, near to Mount Phogor [PEOR] : it was still called by its ancient name ( Onomast. s. vv. Nabau, Abarimn). Dr. Robinson has truly remarked that over against Jericho there is no peak or point perceptibly higher than the rest; but all is apparently one level line of summit, without peaks or gaps.. .. Seetzen, Burckhardt, and also Irby and Mangles, have all found Mount Nebo in Jebel Attârûs, a high mountain south of the Zûrka Máîn(Arnon). This, however, is far south of the latitude of Jericho. ( Bib. Res. vol. iii. pp. 306, 307).
2. A town of the tribe of Reuben, mentioned with Heshbon, Elealeh, and others ( Numb. 32.38); doubtless the site now marked by Nebain the Belka, south of Es-Salt(Robinson, Bib. Res. vol. 2. p. 307, n. 1, vol. iii. appendix, p. 170), i. e. in the same district with Hesbânand El-‘Al, the modern representatives of Heshbon and Elealeh. Whether this town was connected with the synonymous mountain is very uncertain.
3. A town in Judah. ( Ezra, 2.29; Nehem. 7.33.) [G. W.