Hebrews 7:4

Hebrews 7:4. Now consider (consider further, a slightly transitional particle) how great (applied to age, size, or, as here, to moral grandeur) this man was, to whom even Abraham the patriarch (the father of the tribe, of the whole race of Israel) gave the tenth out of the best of the spoils. The word rendered ‘spoils' means properly that which lies at the top of a heap, ‘the finest of the wheat,' and so of any spoils taken in war. It is questioned whether the tenth of the best of the spoil means the tenth of the best of the spoils, leaving what was of less value untithed, or a tenth of all the spoil, which tenth as given to God was to be the best part of the whole. The last is the true meaning (comp. Numbers 15:21), for it is already said that Abraham gave a tenth part of all (Hebrews 7:2). As was fitting, he gave to God the tenth, and that tenth the best.