Bible Meaning: Grassy meadow
Strong's Concordance #G9
The region of Abilene was located just north of Damacus. A man named Lysanias ruled the area for Rome at the time when John the Baptist's ministry began in 26 A.D. (Luke 3:1).
Abilene, in 37 A.D., was placed under the administrative control of Herod Agrippa I (one of the grandsons of Herod the Great). The territory was later put under his son, Agrippa II. Rome, toward the end of the first century, incorporated Abilene into the province of Syria.
Important Verses
Luke 3:1 - 3
Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of Ituraea and of the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of Abilene,
Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests, the word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness.
And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins;