In the Bible, he provided sailors with an extract of calomel (7)
I believe the answer is:
absalom
'in the bible he' is the definition.
The definition suggests a singular noun which matches the answer.
'sailors with an extract of calomel' is the wordplay.
'sailors' becomes 'abs' (AB is short for able seaman).
'with' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'an' becomes 'a'.
'extract of calomel' becomes 'lom' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'abs'+'a'+'lom'='ABSALOM'
'provided' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for absalom that I've seen before include "Son of King David (Bible)" , "Son of King David (OT)" , "David's third son (OT)" , "King's rebellious son" , "King David's rebellious son" .)