Nehardea or Nehardeah (Imperial Aramaic: נהרדעא, romanized: nəhardəʿā "river of knowledge") was a city from the area called by ancient Jewish sources Babylonia, situated at or near the junction of the Euphrates with the Nahr Malka (the Royal Canal), one of the earliest and most prominent centers of Babylonian Judaism.

Nehardea was adjacent or identical to Anbar, a short distance from the modern city of Fallujah (formerly the site of Pumbedita).

[2] For this reason it was called 'The Synagogue that Slid and Settled' ("Shaf we-Yatib") to which there are several references dating from the third and fourth centuries,[3] and which Abaye asserts was the seat of the Shekhinah in Babylonia.

[4] The priestly portion of the Jewish population of Nehardea was said to be descended from the slaves of Pashur ben Immer, the contemporary of King Jehoiachin.

[5] The fact that Hyrcanus II, the high priest, lived for a time in that city as a captive of the Parthians[6] may explain the circumstance that as late as the third century certain of its inhabitants traced their descent back to the Hasmoneans.

founded a semi-autonomous state on the Euphrates, under the Parthian government, and caused much trouble to the Babylonian Jews because of their marauder-like escapades.

[11][12] From the post-Hadrianic tannaitic period there is the anecdote referring to the debt which Aḥai ben Josiah had to collect at Nehardea.

Soon after Samuel's death, Nehardea was destroyed by Papa ben Neser (either another name for Odenathus, or one of his generals) in 259 CE,[14] and its place as seat of the second academy was taken by Pumbedita.

[20] Nehardea always remained the residence of a certain number of learned men, some of whom belonged to the school of Mahuza, which was of considerable prominence at that time, and some to that of Pumbedita.

Toward the end of the 4th and at the beginning of the 5th century Nehardea again became a center of Babylonian Judaism through Amemar's activity, though this was overshadowed by that of Rav Ashi, the director of the Academy of Sura.

[22] Amemar attempted in Nehardea to introduce the recitation of the Ten Commandments into the daily prayer ritual, but was dissuaded from doing so by Ashi.

Other scholars of the 4th and 5th centuries who are mentioned in the Talmud as natives of Nehardea include Dimi[23] (who subsequently presided at Pumbedita as second successor to Ḥama),[24] Zebid,[25] Rav Nachman,[26] Ḥanan[27] and Simai.