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1 And it came to pass in the days of Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goyim[a],

2 that they made war with Bera king of Sodom, and with Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, and Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (the same is Zoar).

3 All these joined[b] together in the vale of Siddim[c], which is now the Salt Sea.

4 For twelve years they served Chedorlaomer, and in the thirteenth year they rebelled.

5 And in the fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer, and the kings that were with him, and smote the Rephaims[d] in Ashteroth-karnaim, and the Zuzim in Ham, and the Emim in Shaveh-kiriathaim[e],

6 and the Horites in their mount Seir, unto the plains of El-paran, which is by the wilderness.

7 And they returned, and came to En-mishpat (the same is Kadesh), and smote all the [d]country of the Amalekites, and also the Amorites, that dwelt in Hazazon-tamar.

8 And there went out the king of Sodom, and the king of Gomorrah, and the king of Admah, and the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (the same is Zoar); and they set the battle in array against them in the vale of Siddim;

9 against Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goyim[1a], and Amraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar; four kings against the five.

10 Now the vale of Siddim was full of slime[a] pits; and when the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah tried to retreat they fell there, and they that remained fled into the mountain.

11 And they took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all of their supplies, and went their way.

12 And they took Lot, Abram’s brother’s son, who dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed.

13 And there came one that had escaped, and told Abram the Hebrew; for he dwelt by the [f]oaks of Mamre, the Amorite, brother of Eshcol, and brother of Aner; and they were all friends of Abram.

14 And when Abram heard that his brother was taken captive, he led forth his trained men, born in his house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued as far as Dan.

15 And he divided himself against them by night, he and his servants, and smote them, and pursued them unto Hobah, which is on the [g]left hand of Damascus.

16 And he brought back all the goods, and also brought back his brother Lot, and his goods, and the women also, and the people.

17 And the king of Sodom went out to meet him, after his return from the slaughter of Chedorlaomer and the kings that were with him, at the vale of Shaveh (the same is the King’s Vale).

18 And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine; and he was priest of [h]God Most High.

19 And he blessed him, and said, Blessed be Abram of [i]God Most High, [j]possessor of heaven and earth;

20 and blessed be [k]God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand. And he gave him a tenth of all.

21 And the king of Sodom said unto Abram, ”Give me the peope, and take the goods for yourself.”

22 But Abram said to the king of Sodom, ”I have lifted up my hand unto the LORD God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth,

23 that I will not take a thread nor a shoelace nor anything that is yours, lest you should say ‘I have made Abram rich;’

24 [l]save only that which the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men that went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their portion.”

[1a] h.goyim (KJV: “nations”) referring to the other nations in general

[3b] Or, joined themselves together against

[3c] lit. 'the woodland vale'; however we do not know where “the” woodland vale is, so I have left it as 'the vale of Siddim' re: KJV.

[5d] 'Rephaims' etc.; a clan similar to the (former) giants, nephilim or 'mighty'.

[5e] Or, the plain of Kiriathaim

[7d] Hebrew field.

[10e] this 'slime' was bitumen.

[13f] Or, terebinths

[15g] Or, north

[18h] Hebrew El Elyon.

[19i] Hebrew El Elyon.

[19j] Or, maker

[20k] Hebrew El Elyon.

[24l] Or, let there be nothing for me; only that etc.

[13] 18:19

[24] 18:19

13 And there came one that had escaped, and told Abram the Hebrew; for he dwelt by the [f]oaks of Mamre, the Amorite, brother of Eshcol, and brother of Aner; and they were all friends of Abram. Genesis 14:13

24 [l]save only that which the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men that went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their portion.”Genesis 14:24

Who was Aner?

Once Sarah met a man named Aner, who was a captain of the guards in Nimrod’s palace in Ur. They began talking about religion. Aner said that he felt that all the silver and gold people spent on making statues to worship, would be better spent helping the poor and redeeming war captives.

Sarah agreed and said that she and her husband were the leaders of a small group of people who were starting a new religious community, They were all determined to follow a path different from the majority of other people.

When you are in the majority, and everyone agrees with you, it is hard to be critical of the way society does things. “We are a small minority and we intend to stay that way,” Sarah said, “although we hope to become a blessing for many other peoples. God willing.”

Aner liked what Sarah told him. Sarah invited him to join their new community; and to come with them to a new land that her husband said would be a special place for them all to start building a holy community. Aner did join them, went to Canaan with them. He settled with Abram’s nephew Lot in Sodom.

When the town was conquered and Lot was carried away as a war captive, Aner was the one who brought the news to Avram. (Genesis 14:13) He and his men, joined Avram in the battle to free Lot. Aner was with Avram when he met with Melchizedek, the King of Salem. (Genesis 14:24)Rabbi Allen S. Maller,
The Times of Israel, “Sarah and Abraham Making Converts” (Nov. 12, 2016)
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/sarah-and-abraham-making-converts/

Also see: Genesis 18:19.

Selected commentary

h.אמרפל AMRAPHEL — He is identical with Nimrod who said (אמר) to Abraham, “Plunge (פול) into the fiery furnace” (Eruvin 53a).

¹⁾.

h.שנאב SHINAB — He hated (שנא) his Father (אב) in heaven (Midrash Tanchuma, Lech Lecha 8)).

h.שמאבר SHEMEBER — He set his wings (שם אבר) to fly, flapping them to rebel against the Holy One, blessed be He (Midrash Tanchuma, Lech Lecha 8)).

h.בלע BELA is the name of this king’s city (but the king’s own name is not mentioned here).

h.עמק השדים VALE OF SIDDIM — So it was named because it contained many fields (שדות).

There are many Midrashic explanations of this name. הוא ים המלח THE SAME IS THE SALT SEA — After some time the sea flowed into it (the vale) and thus the Salt Sea came into existence. The Midrashic explanation states that the rocks that surrounded it had cracked and streams thus flowed into it (Genesis Rabbah 42:5).

h.שתים עשרה שנה עבדו TWELVE YEARS DID THEY i.e. these five kings SERVE Chedorlaomer.

h.ובארבע עשרה שנה AND IN THE FOURTEENTH YEAR of their rebellion

h.בא כדרלעמר CHEDORLAOMER CAME — Because the matter concerned him mostly, “he bore the heavier side of the beam“ (Genesis Rabbah 42:6).

h.והמלכים AND THE KINGS [THAT WERE WITH HIM] — These are the other three kings.

h.הזוזים These are the Zamzumim (see Deuteronomy 2:10 and Deuteronomy 11:20).

h.בהררם means IN THEIR MOUNT (i. e.הרר is a form of הר — really an earlier form — with pronominal suffix ָ מ ;cf. הררי קדש etc.)

h.איל פארן EL-PARAN — As it is translated in the Targum: Plain of Paran. But I hold that איל does not signify a plain in general but that the lowland of Paran bore the name of El, and that of Mamre was named Elone; that of the Jordan was called Kikkar, whilst that of Shittim was called Abel — Abel-Shittim — and so, too, the lowland of [Baal] Gad was named Baal. All these are translated in the Targum by מישור, but each really had its own particular name.

h.על המדבר BY THE WILDERNESS — next to the wilderness; a similar use of על is (Numbers 2:20) “and next unto him (עליו) shall be the tribe of Manasseh’’.

h.עין משפט היא קדש EN-MISHPAT, THE SAME IS KADESH — It is here named EN-MISHPAT (“the well of judgment’’) in reference to what would happen there in the future — where Moses and Aaron would once be judged because of what occurred at that fountain. It is identical with “the waters of Meribah” (cf. Numbers 20:1 and Numbers 20:13) (Midrash Tanchuma, Lech Lecha 8). Onkelos, however, translates it according to its plain sense: the plain where the people of the district used to gather for every lawsuit.

h.שדה העמלקי THE COUNTRY OF THE AMALEKITES — Amalek, it is true, was not yet born, but it is here named in reference to the name it would bear in the future (Genesis Rabbah 42:7).

h.בחצצון תמר IN HAZEZON-TAMAR — This is En-Gedi: so a text plainly states in Chronicles (2 Chronicles 20:2) in the history of Jehoshaphat.

h.'ארבעה מלכים וגו FOUR KINGS [AGAINST THE FIVE]— and yet the fewer were victorious; this statement is expressly made to tell you how powerful they were, and yet Abraham did not refrain from pursuing them.

h.בארת בארת חמר FULL OF BITUMEN PITS — There were many pits there from which they took earth as clay for building purposes. The Midrashic explanation is that the clay was closely kneaded together in them (was very sticky) so that it was only because a miracle was performed for the king of Sodom that he escaped from them. For amongst those nations there were some who did not believe that Abraham had been delivered from Ur-Kasdim — from the fiery furnace — but as soon as this one escaped from the slime they corrected their past disbelief regarding what had happened to Abraham (literally, they believed retrospectively in Abraham) (Genesis Rabbah 42:7).

h.הרה נסו means THEY FLED TO A MOUNTAIN. The word הרה is the same as לְהַר. When a word requires a ל as a prefix one may put instead a ה as a suffix. There is a difference between הֶרָה and הָהָרָה, for the ה at the end takes the place of a לְ (with Shewa) prefixed (another version has: for the ה at the end does not take the place of a prefixed ל with Patach which would mean to “the”) so that הֶרָה is equal to לְהַר or to אֶל הַר to “a” mountain, without explaining which mountain — so that the meaning here is that each person fled to the first mountain he came across. When, however, a ה is prefixed to a word having this ה suffix so that it reads e. g., הָהרה or הַמדברה, it is the same as אל הָהר or לְהָהר (to “the” mount) signifying that mount which is well-known and has been definitely mentioned in the passage.

h.והוא ישב בסדם FOR HE DWELT IN SODOM — What made this happen to him? The fact that he was dwelling in Sodom (Genesis Rabbah 42:7).

h.ויבא הפליט AND THERE CAME THE ONE WHO ESCAPED — According to the real meaning this was Og who had escaped from the battle with the Rephaim (see Genesis 5:5) and it is to this that the text refers (Deuteronomy 3:11) “For only Og king of Bashan was left of the remnant of the Rephaim”, and this is what is meant by נשאר “left”, for Amraphel and his allies did not kill him when they smote the Rephaim in Ashteroth Karnaim. So is the statement in the Tanchuma 4:6:25 (Chukat). But according to the Midrash Genesis Rabbah (Genesis Rabbah 42:8) it refers to Og in allusion to him as the only one of the generation of the Flood who escaped that catastrophe, and this is what is meant (Deuteronomy 3:11) “of the remnant of the Rephaim”, for it is said. (Genesis 6:4) “The Nephilim (= Rephaim cf. Genesis Rabbah 26) were in the earth etc.” His intention in telling Abraham that his nephew was captured was that Abraham should wage war against the kings and that he should be killed so that he, himself, might marry Sarah.

h.העברי THE HEBREW — the one who came from the other side (עבר) of the River (Euphrates) (Genesis Rabbah 42:8).

h.בעלי ברית אברם CONFEDERATE WITH ABRAM (literally, owners of a covenant with Abram) — They had entered into a covenant with him. Other versions of Rashi have: another explanation is, they advised him to circumcise himself (to keep the [ברית] covenant), as is explained in another place (cf. Rashi on Genesis [18]:1).

h.וירק Its meaning is as the Targum takes it: “he girded”. Similar are (Leviticus 24:33) “And I will gird myself (והריקותי) with the sword against you”, and (Exodus 15:9) “I will gird on (אריק) my sword”, and (Psalms 35:3) “Gird thyself (הרק) with the spear and battle axe”.

h.חניכיו HIS TRAINED SERVANTS — The word is written without a י (after the כ) so it may be read חניכו “his trained one”, referring to Eliezer whom he had trained to the observance of religious duties. The word חנך signifies introducing a person or a thing, for the first time, to some particular occupation in which it is intended that he should remain (i. e. to dedicate or devote to some particular purpose). It has a similar sense in (Proverbs 22:6) “Train up (חנוך) a child”, and in (Numbers 7:84) חנוכת המזבח “the dedication of the altar”, and (Psalms 30:1) “The dedication (חנוכת) of the house” In old French enseigner; English: to teach, instruct.

h.'שמנה עשר וגו THREE HUNDRED AND EIGHTEEN — Our Rabbis said, “It was Eliezer alone whom he armed and it (318) is the numerical value of his name” (Nedarim 32a).

h.עד רן AS FAR AS DAN — There his strength failed him for he saw prophetically that at some future time his descendants would there erect a calf (Sanhedrin 96a).

h.ויחלק עליהם AND HE DIVIDED HIMSELF AGAINST THEM — In accordance with its plain sense you must invert the order of the words of the verse: “And he divided himself, he and his servants, against them, at night”, as is the manner of those who pursue their enemies — they divide themselves up to follow after those of whom they are in pursuit when these flee in different directions.

h.לילה BY NIGHT, meaning, even after it became dark they did not give up pursuing them. According to the Midrashic explanation, it was the night that was divided): during its first half a miracle was wrought for him, and the second half was kept in reserve for the miracle of the midnight in Egypt (Genesis Rabbah 43:3).

h.עד חובה UNTO HOBAH — There is no place bearing the name Hobah, but the city Dan is called Hobah (guilty city) on account of the idolatry which would once be practised there (Midrash Tanchuma, Lech Lecha 13).

h.עמק שוה THE VALLEY OF SHAVEH— So was its name; but the Targum translates it, “to the empty plain” — clear of trees and all impediments.

h.עמק המלך THE KINGS VALE Onkelos translates it by the king’s race-course: a hippodrome that was thirty “kona” (measuring rods) and was set apart for the king’s sport. The Midrashic explanation is that it was the valley where all the nations unanimously agreed (הושוו) in appointing Abraham as prince and leader over them (Genesis Rabbah 43:5).

h.ומלכי צדק AND MELCHIZEDEK — A Midrashic explanation is that he is identical with Shem, son of Noah (Nedarim 32b).

h.לחם ויין BREAD AND WINE — Thus is done for those wearied through battle. He showed him (Abraham) that he bore him no malice for killing his descendants. The Midrashic explanation is that he (Melchizedek) thereby gave an intimation to him (Abraham) of the meal-offerings and libations which his descendants would offer there (in Salem which is Jeru-salem) (Genesis Rabbah 43:6).

h.קנה שמים וארץ MAKER, or POSSESSOR OF HEAVEN AND EARTH — similar to (Psalms 134:3) עשה שמים וארץ “Maker of heaven and earth”: through His having made them He acquired them as His possession.

h.אשר מגן WHO HATH DELIVERED [THY ENEMIES INTO THY HANDS] — מגן means who has handed over or surrendered, as (Hosea 11:8) “How shall I give thee over, (אמגנך) Israel”

h.ויתן לו AND HE — Abraham — GAVE HIM מעשר מכל A TITHE OF EVERYTHING that he had, because he was a priest.

h.תן לי הנפש GIVE ME THE PERSONS — Of that which was captured of mine and which you have rescued give me back the people only.

h.הרמתי ידי I HAVE LIFTED UP MY HAND — An expression signifying an oath: I lift up my hand to the Most High God (not, I have lifted up). Similarly, (Genesis 22:16) בי נשבעתי which means “By myself do I swear” and similarly, (Genesis 23:13) נתתי כסף השדה קח ממני which means “I give the price of the field, take it from me”.)

h.אם מחוט ועד שרוך נעל NOT ANYTHING FROM A THREAD EVEN TO A SANDAL TIE shall I retain for myself from the spoil.

h.ואם אקח מכל אשר לך NOR ANYTHING THAT IS THINE WILL I TAKE — And if you say that you will reward me from your own treasures I will still not accept anything

h.'ולא תאמר וגו SO THAT THOU SHOULDST NOT SAY etc. — For the Holy One, blessed be He, has promised to give me riches, as it is said, (Genesis 12:2) “And I will bless thee” (see Rashi on this passage, where the blessing is explained to consist in ממון “wealth”).

h.הנערים THE LADS — My servants who went with me. Then, again, the others ANER, ESHCOL AND MAMRE [THEY MAY TAKE THEIR PORTION ] — Although my servants took part in the battle as it is said (Genesis 14:15) “he and his servants and smote them” — whilst Aner and his friends remained with the baggage to guard it yet they may take their share. From him (Abraham) David took a lesson when he said, (1 Samuel 30:24) “But as his part is that goeth down to the battle, so shall his part be that tarrieth by the stuff: they shall share alike”; therefore it goes on to say (1 Samuel 30:25), “And this had been so from that day — ומעלה — and had been so from former times: therefore he (David) made it a statute and an ordinance” — it does not state והלאה “and henceforward”, for the statute had already been ordained) in the days of Abram (Genesis Rabbah 43:9).