And they took Lot, Abram's brother's son, who dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed.
They took Lot ... who dwelt in Sodom. Though retaining his pastoral habits, he seems to have taken up his abode in the town (cf. Genesis 19:1), and his goods. [The Hebrew has the same word here as in the preceding verse; but the Septuagint has: teen aposkeueen autou, his baggage]. How would the conscience of that young man now upbraid him for his selfish folly and ingratitude in withdrawing from his kind and pious relative! Whenever we go out of the path of duty, we put ourselves away from God's protection, and cannot expect that the choice we make will be for our lasting good.
Thus far the career of the warlike chiefs from Mesopotamia was one of uninterrupted conquest; and their route, from the details in the sacred narrative, is easily traced. Having crossed the Euphrates, they would proceed along the right bank of that river until they reached a point where they had to strike off for Tadmor (Palmyra), the only place in the desert where a copious supply of water is at all times to be got. Directing their course southwards, they would then traverse the plains of Syria to near Damascus, where there are two roads into Palestine. Choosing the eastward, they came to the Bashan mountains, and surprised by their unexpected onset the Titanic inhabitants of Gaulonitis (the Jaulan). Thence, sweeping rapidly southward, they overran the whole country east of the Jordan, with that portion of Arabia Petraea which borders on the eastern extremity of the Dead Sea, and penetrated the Arabah as far as the head of the Elanitic Gulf. Having reached that point, the goal of their expedition, they turned northwards again, and by a westward route re-entered the southern border of Canaan, and encamped at Engedi.
It is evident from the rapidity of their movements, the suddenness of their attacks, and their avidity for booty and captives, that this was an Arab raid on a large scale-an incursion in the manner of the marauders of the desert, who frequently scour the neighbouring country, attack the villages, and loading themselves with as much plunder, in the shape of victuals, substance, and prisoners, as they can take, scamper off as quickly as they came.
Nor, probably, was the Mesopotamian army, though a formidable, a very numerous horde. Burckhardt and others who have traveled among the Arabs say, that a chief rarely musters above three hundred men in the greatest of their warlike expeditions; and supposing that Chedorlaomer and his allies brought each of them such a contingent, the whole amount would be 1,200 men-a very inconsiderable force according to modern notions of an army (Genesis 14:12).
And departed. Considerable difference of opinion exists as to the homeward route of the invaders after the battle of Siddim. The common opinion is that they went up the valley of the Jordan. But Tuch maintains that, from the fact of the conquerors plundering Siddim, which was near to Zoar, 'they must have marched across the plain, and reached at Zoar the eastern bank of the sea, at that which was then the southeast point.' This he considers to be decisive respecting the direction of the way back, which cannot be up Canaan along the western bank, which is in various ways shut up through the steep pass En-gedi (Rob., 2: 1, 38), but along the east bank of the Dead Sea.