In Lehi's dream he beholds "a river of water; and it ran along, and it was near the tree of which I was partaking the fruit" (1 Nephi 8:13). One should note that the river here is described as being both near a tree and having its head a little way off. It would therefore seem to be a life-giving stream which starts in a valley and does not flow into the valley from some other distant location. Nephi later tells us that this "fountain of living water" was "a representation of the love of God" (1 Nephi 11:25). According to George Potter and Richard Wellington, in the wadi Tayyib al-Ism, moving from the upper valley of the Waters of Moses to the canyon proper and about 200 yards into the canyon, a spring emerges and feeds a small river near some date palms. This stream runs toward and finally empties into the Gulf of Aqaba at the canyon's end. Commenting on Nephi's description of the river, Hugh Nibley writes:
This is the authentic scenery of a desert oasis, with its rivers springing miraculously from nowhere and emptying themselves again perhaps into the desert sands. The expression "river of water" is used only for small, local streams, and here Lehi is so near the source of the little stream that he can recognize people standing there.
Thus, this real-life scenario of the river of water in wadi Tayyib al-Ism matches the symbols of Lehi's dream quite adequately. It is easy to see why the river represents "the love of God" (see 1 Nephi 11:25). Together with the date palms, it was essential to the survival of Lehi's family and its very existence in the middle of the wilderness and the fact that the family had been divinely led to it must have indicated to Lehi the love and concern the Lord had for them. But more than this, the river seems to be a representation of the Savior himself. The phrase "living water" (1 Nephi 11:25) is the same terminology the Lord used to describe himself in both the Old Testament (Jeremiah 2:13) and the New Testament (John 4:10). [George Potter and Richard Wellington, Discovering the Lehi-Nephi Trail, p. 60]