Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897)
House of fish. ” It was the native place of Peter, Andrew, and Philip, and was frequently resorted to by Jesus (Mark 6:45; John 1:44; 12:21). It is supposed to have been at the modern ‘Ain Tabighah, a bay to the north of Gennesaret. ) A city near which Christ fed 5,000 (Luke 9:10; comp. John 6:17; Matt. 14:15-21), and where the blind man had his sight restored (Mark 8:22), on the east side of the lake, two miles up the Jordan. It stood within the region of Gaulonitis, and was enlarged by Philip the tetrarch, who called it “Julias,” after the emperor’s daughter.
Or, as some have supposed, there may have been but one Bethsaida built on both sides of the lake, near where the Jordan enters it. Now the ruins et-Tel.
Smith's Bible Dictionary (1863)
(house of fish) of Galilee, (John 12:21) a city which was the native place of Andrew, Peter and Philip, (John 1:44; 12:21) in the land of Gennesareth, (Mark 6:46) comp. Mark 6:53 And therefore on the west side of the lake. By comparing the narratives in (Mark 6:31-53) and Luke 9:10-17 It appears certain that the Bethsaida at which the five thousand were fed must have been a second place of the same name on the east of the lake. ” L. Abbot in Biblical and Oriental Journal .
The fact is that Bethsaida was a village on both sides of the Jordan as it enters the sea of Galilee on the north, so that the western part of the village was in Galilee and the eastern portion in Gaulonitis, part of the tetrarchy of Philip. This eastern portion was built up into a beautiful city by Herod Philip, and named by him Bethsaida Julias, after Julia the daughter of the Roman emperor Tiberius Caesar. On the plain of Butaiha, a mile or two to the east, the five thousand were fed.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible (1898) & Schaff's Bible Dictionary
BETHSA'IDA (house of fishing), a city of Galilee, near Capernaum. John 12:21; Matt 11:21. Many recent writers urge that there were two Bethsaidas, since the desert-place where the 5000 were fed belonged to ''the city called Bethsaida," Luke 9:10, while after the miracle the disciples were to go before him unto the other side to Bethsaida, Mark 6:45, which it is said could not refer to the same town. 1. If there were two towns of this name, the first one, in Galilee, was on the west side of the lake.
Robinson, Grove, Porter, and others place it at Ain et-Tabighak, north of Khan Minyeb, others at Khan Minyeh. 2. Bethsaida Julias, in Gaulanitis, on the eastern bank of the Jordan, near its entrance into the lake. But it seems quite unlikely that two cities in such close neighborhood should have borne the same name. Hence Dr. W. M. Thomson supposes that there was but one Bethsaida, which was built on both sides of the Jordan, and places the site at Abu-Zany, where the Jordan empties into the Lake of Galilee.
The Sinaitic manuscript omits "belonging to a city called Bethsaida" in Luke 9:10; hence, Wilson also holds that there is no necessity for two Bethsaidas; and this seems the more probable view. The eastern part was beautified by Philip the tetrarch, and called Bethsaida Julias (in honor of a daughter of the emperor Augustus), to distinguish it from the western Bethsaida, in Galilee. — Schaff:Through Bible Lands, p. 353. See Capernaum.
Hitchcock's Bible Names (1869)
house of fruits, or of food, or of snares