Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Genesis 14:14) delivers one of the boldest numeric readings in the Aramaic tradition. The Hebrew Bible says Abram armed three hundred and eighteen trained servants born in his house. The Targum rereads the number.
The Aramaic first concedes that Abram called up his armed retainers — and then drops a startling admission: they willed not to go with him. His household refused the fight. When faced with the terror of the four kings who had just crushed the giants of Ashtaroth (Genesis 14:5), Abram's own trained men declined.
So Abram took one. Eliezer, son of Nimrod — a detail the Targum adds to tie Eliezer to the very Nimrod who had once thrown Abram into the furnace (Genesis 11:28). The household servant is a prince of the house that tried to kill his master, now utterly loyal. And the Targumist makes the theological move: Eliezer alone was equal in strength to all the three hundred and eighteen.
The Sages in Bereshit Rabbah 43:2 and in Nedarim 32a notice the same thing. The Hebrew consonants of Eliezer's name — aleph-lamed-yod-ayin-zayin-resh — add up to three hundred and eighteen in Hebrew numerology. Eliezer is three hundred and eighteen.
This is the Targumist's way of saying that the force of arms does not always come from the size of the army. Abram rides out with one man whose very name is an army. The covenant's first military campaign is won by a single loyal servant who carries the strength of a host inside the letters of his own name.
Sometimes the rescue is not about how many come with you. It is about who.