BETHBASI (1Ma_9:62; 1Ma_9:64).Josephus reads Beth-hoglah. The name has not been recovered.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909
beth-bā?sı̄ (Βαιθβασί, Baithbası́): The name may mean ?place of marshes? = Hebrew bēth-becı̄̌. According to G. A. Smith there is a Wādy el-Bassah East of Tekoa in the wilderness of Judea. The name means ?marsh,? which Dr. Smith thinks impossible, and really ?an echo of an ancient name.? Jonathan and Simon repaired the ruins of the fortified place ?in the desert? (1 Macc 9:62, 64). Josephus reads Bethalaga, i.e. Beth-hoglah (Ant., XIII, i, 5). Peshitta version reads Beth-Yashan (see JESHANAH), which Dr. Cheyne thinks is probably correct. Thus the origin of the name and the site of the town are merely conjectural.
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.
Bethbasi
(Βαιθβασί), a town which, from the mention of its decays (τὰ καθηρημένα), must have been originally fortified, lying in the desert (τῇ ἐρήμῳ), and in which Jonathan and Simon Maccabaeus took refuge from Bacchides (1Ma_9:62; 1Ma_9:64). Josephus (Ant. 13, 1, 5) has. Bethalaga, Βηθαλαγά (Beth-hogla), but a reading of the passage quoted by Reland (Palaest. p. 632) presents the more probable form of Beth- keziz. Either alternative fixes the situation as in the Jordan valley not far from Jericho. SEE KEZIZ.
CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.