“when Avram heard that his brother had been taken captive, etc.” Bereshis 14,14
Avram girded himself for battle as soon as he heard about this. He immediately mobilized the three hundred and eighteen men who derived their immediate sustenance from him.
Bereshit Rabbah 43,2 claims that the number 318 is really only the numerical value of the letters in the name of his trusted servant אליעזר. How do we reconcile this Midrash with the principle of אין מקרא יוצא מידי פשוטו, that “we must not completely divorce a verse of Scripture from its literal meaning?” After all, the Torah expressly states that the three hundred people concerned were ילידי ביתו “members of Avram’s household?”
Actually, the meaning of the Midrash is that all the three hundred and eighteen men mentioned were members of Avram’s household, were being fed at his table. Having mobilized all of them, Avram discounted most of them realizing that the credit for the victory went only to Eliezer who was the most G’d-fearing one amongst them. Victory in battle is not determined by the size of the armies- as we know from Gideon- but is due to the merit of the individual soldiers. The Torah told us in Deut 20, 8 that if someone has reason to fear for his life (due to sins he has committed) he should go home instead of joining the ranks of the soldiers. The author of the Midrash noticed that the word וירק, he “mobilized,” is composed of the word רק, “only.” It means that Avram reduced the men whose merit could ensure victory to those that possessed sufficient merit which left him with his trusted servant Eliezer, whose merit was equivalent to that of the other 317 men in his household. While it is true that the word חניכיו is spelled with the letter י indicating that there were more than one person, the fact is that “200 includes 100,” i.e. that the word חניכו, “the one whom he had trained,” is included in the word חניכיו, “the ones whom he had trained.” We may interpret the word to mean that all the people whom Avram had trained (in matters spiritual) were loyal to the most illustrious of them all, to Eliezer.
As to the word אחיו, “his brother,” when in fact Lot was Avram’s nephew and not his brother, the Torah wrote it in this way in order to show us the virtue of brotherliness which Avram extended even to a nephew who had chosen to live as a neighbor of the wicked people of Sodom. He had not allowed considerations of the strife which had occurred between them previously to influence his judgment concerning his nephew, the son of his brother. He risked his life on his behalf as if he were a biological brother.
“if as much as a thread or shoe-lace, etc.” Bereshis 14,23
This was a demonstration of Avram’s generosity in that he did not want to be enriched by the spoils of war. He did not even want to accept trivial matters which have no monetary value. He even rendered an oath concerning this when he said: “I have raised my hand to the Lord, etc.” The expression ידי הרימותי is equivalent to the expression נשאתי את ידי (Numbers 14, 30), the standard formula introducing an oath. The reason he chose this expression is that it is related to תרומה, a gift to the temple treasury or to the priest which sanctifies the objects in question. It is as if Avram had declared that just as sanctified property was out of bounds to him, so the booty of his victory against the four kings was equally out of bounds to him. Such gifts are usually termed תרומת יד, “a gift from someone’s hand.”
