140 
133. For, having swept all the country of the Amalekites, 
he smote the Amorites that dwelt at Hazezon-tamar, that is, 
En-geddi, in its beautiful nook to the west of the Dead Sea. 
Having thus cleared his rear and both flanks, he fell at last on 
the devoted kings below, where lay the battlefield of the vale 
of Siddim, with its treacherous u slime-pits ” of fluid asphalt 
or bitumen. This kind of ground the Chaldseaus would under- 
stand very well. Here they routed the degraded citizens of 
Sodom and Gomorrah, and sacked those towns, taking all 
the goods and all their victuals, and Lot and his goods besides. 
1 34. So the long train of the eastern forces, cumbered with 
captives and spoil, drew on its triumphal homeward march. 
135. Meanwhile it is remarkable that the fugitives flyto 
“ Abram the Hebrew ” for succour, not to Aner, Eshcol, or 
Mamre. 
136. We must not follow these allies in the fine military 
exploit which alone stands recorded as the proof of AbrauPs 
skill and valour in war. 
137. But we must notice that the Hebrew expression does 
not, any more than the Greek ko7 rrj (Heb. vii. 1), decide that 
either of the eastern kings was killed in the action. 
138. The more, however, we appreciate the real significance 
of this history, the more are we convinced of the importance 
of this decisive defeat. 
139. Doubtless Abram intended effectually to prevent 
the return of this monarch to Canaan. And, whether slain 
or not, he disappears from the history thenceforward, and 
the Canaanites regard Abram as “ a prince of God.” He 
had at one blow broken in the hour of its crowning triumph 
the power of the most extensive kingdom which the woi’ld 
then knew ; the very heathen power from whose grasp he 
had himself been rescued by the hand of Jehovah. 
140. We must not linger on the meeting with Melchizedek. 
I have sometimes thought the name of Salem (or rather 
Shalem) may be derived from Shalamu, the sunsetting or 
West in Assyrian, as Martu (the West) was applied to 
Palestine. 
141. We find it in the form Shaluma in the records of 
the conquests of Rameses II. 
142. The Kenites are called Salmasans, says Ainsworth, 
in the Chaldee paraphrase of Gen. xv. 19. 
143. Whether there is here any connection of name I 
cannot say.* 
* See. also, Smith’s Die. of Bible , — “ Kenite,” 
