faileth me." Travel, as it is written (Ps. cii. 23), "He hath weakened
my strength in the way." ... Sin, as it is written (Ps. xxxi. 10), "My
strength faileth me, because of my iniquity."

Ibid., fol. 70, col 2.

Abraham was three years old when he first learned to know his Creator;
as it is said (Gen. xxvi. 5), "Because Abraham obeyed my voice."

_Nedarim_, fol. 32, col. 1.

The conclusion arrived at here is founded on interpreting the
Hebrew letters of the word rendered "because" numerically, in
which the value of the letters gives a total of one hundred and
seventy-two; so that the sense of the text is, "Abraham obeyed
my voice" one hundred and seventy-two years. Now Abraham died
when he was a hundred and seventy-five, therefore he must have
been only three when he began to serve the Lord.

As Abraham plays so important a part both in the history and the
imagination of the Jewish race, we may quote here a score or so
of the Talmudic traditions regarding him. The traditions, as is
like, contributed quite as much, if not more, to give character
to his descendants as his actual personality and that spirit of
faith which was the central fact in his history. Races and
nations often draw more inspiration from what they fancy about
their ancestry and early history than from what they know; their
fables therefore are often more illuminative than the facts.

Abraham was Ethan the Ezrahite, who is mentioned in Ps. lxxxvii. 1.