<P> The River Litani and the River Jordan are the only rivers of any size in the vicinity of the land of Canaan . Perennial brooks are very scarce and the wadis, or streambeds, while numerous and impetuous in the rainy season, are dry during the rest of the year . Job 6: 16 - 17 compares faithless friends to these torrent - beds, swollen in the spring, but vanishing in the hot weather . Ben Sira twice enumerates water as the first among the "principal things necessary for the life of man ." </P> <P> All springs, wells and fountains were landmar)), sitting on the brim of Jacob's Well, taught the Samaritan woman the passing of the Old Covenant . An angel found Hagar at a well in the Sinai, Beer Lahai Roi (Genesis 16). </P> <P> To own a well and to possess the surrounding country were synonymous terms (Proverbs 5: 15 - 17). On the other hand, so serious might be the disputes arising out of the use or claim of a well that the sword was appealed to as the sole arbiter (Genesis 26: 21; Exodus 2: 17; Numbers 20: 17). If the approach of an enemy was feared, his progress might be seriously hampered, if not altogether frustrated, by stopping or destroying the wells along his route (2 Chronicles 32: 3). The enemy, in his turn, might reduce a city to starvation and submission by cutting off its water supply, as Holofernes did when besieging Bethulia (Judith, chapter 7). </P> <P> A spring is the "eye of the landscape", the natural burst of living water, flowing all year or drying up at certain seasons . In contrast to the "troubled waters" of wells and rivers (Jer. 2: 18), there gushes forth from it "living water", to which Jesus compared the grace of the Holy Spirit (John 4: 10; 7: 38; compare Isaiah 12: 3; 44: 3). </P>

What is the significance of wells in the bible