5. =Pursuit of the Elamites.= (Gen. 14.) At that period the early Babylonian empire, under Amraphel or Hammurabi (see p. 91), was at the height of its power. Its king governed Elam, Chaldea, Assyria, Mesopotamia, and most of Palestine. Chedorlaomer, the head of the united peoples, led his armies against the aboriginal races east of the Jordan. (See Map of Palestine Before the Conquest, and description, on page 37.) After subduing them he passed around south of the Dead Sea, smote the Amorites in the mountains near Hazezon-tamar, afterward En-gedi, and poured his host down upon the Jordan Valley. The cities on the north of the Dead Sea, Sodom and Gomorrah, with their dependent villages, being unable to stay his progress, were ravaged, and their inhabitants (including Abraham's nephew Lot) carried away captive, up the valley. News of the invasion came to Abraham, and he instantly gathered his servants and allies, and pursued the marauders. He overtook them near Laish, afterward Dan, now _Tell el Kady_, attacked them by night, pursued them as far as Hobah, near Damascus, and brought back the booty and the prisoners. On the return took place the remarkable interview with Melchizedek, a priest-king over the city of Salem, perhaps the place afterward Jerusalem. After the return to Hebron the following events occurred: 1. The covenant of God with Abraham. (Gen. 15.) 2. The birth of Ishmael. (Gen. 16.) 3. The destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. (Gen. 18, 19.) These cities were probably located on the plain of Jordan, north of the Dead Sea, and not on the south, as formerly supposed; but all traces of them have entirely disappeared. [Illustration: EMPIRE OF AMRAPHEL OR HAMMURABI.] 6. =The Settlement at Beersheba.= (Gen. 20-25.) After the destruction of the cities of the plain, Abraham moved southward, and made his home at Beersheba, on the desert border, now _Bir es Seba_. Here he spent most of his later years, as after various journeys we find him each time encamped at Beersheba. 7. =The Offering of Isaac.= (Gen. 22.) From Beersheba Abraham took his son Isaac, at God's command, to offer him as a burnt offering in "the land of Moriah." Some authorities accept the Samaritan tradition, that this place was Mount Gerizim; but we see no sufficient reason to dissent from the general view, that it was Mount Moriah, at Jerusalem, ten centuries afterward the site of the Temple. After this sublime token of his faith in God, the patriarch returned to his tent at Beersheba.