This offering of tithes was no new thing. In his Babylonian home Abraham
must have been familiar with the practice. The cuneiform inscriptions of
Babylonia contain frequent references to it. It went back to the
pre-Semitic age of Chaldæa, and the great temples of Babylonia were
largely supported by the _esra_ or tithe which was levied upon prince
and peasant alike. That the god should receive a tenth of the good
things which, it was believed, he had bestowed upon mankind, was not
considered to be asking too much. There are many tablets in the British
Museum which are receipts for the payment of the tithe to the great
temple of the Sun-god at Sippara in the time of Nebuchadrezzar and his
successors. From one of them we learn that Belshazzar, even at the very
moment when the Babylonian empire was falling from his father's hands,
nevertheless found an opportunity for paying the tithe due from his
sister; while others show us that Cyrus and Cambyses did not regard
their foreign origin as affording any pretext for refusing to pay tithe
to the gods of the kingdom they had overthrown.

The Babylonian army had been defeated near Damascus, and immediately
after this we are told that the steward of Abraham's house was "Eli-ezer
of Damascus." Whether there is any connection between the two facts we
cannot say; but it may be that Eli-ezer had attached himself to the
Hebrew conqueror when he was returning "from the slaughter of
Chedor-laomer." The name of Eli-ezer, "God is a help," is characteristic
of Damascus. More often in place of El, "God," we have Hadad, the
supreme deity of Syria; but just as among the Israelites Eli-akim and
Jeho-iakim are equivalent, so among the Aramaeans of Syria were Eli-ezer
and Hadad-ezer. Hadad-ezer, it will be remembered, was the king of Zobah
who was overthrown by David.

Sarai, the wife of Abraham, was still childless, but the patriarch had a