Genesis 14:18-20

Abram and Melchizedek

SPECIAL NOTE ON MELCHIZEDEK

1. Its significance. The episode of Melchizedek (Genesis 14:18-20) is one of the most interesting in the Book of Genesis. Its extreme brevity heightens the sense of mystery in which it is involved. It may be taken for granted that the incident is introduced on account of its profound religious significance. It describes the meeting between the Priest-King of "the Most High God" of the Human Race and the Father of the Chosen People, the Servant of Jehovah, the God of the new Revelation. The moment chosen for this meeting is instructive. Abram, the Hebrew stranger, is returning from victory over the foes of the land: Melchizedek, the Canaanite Priest-King, has had no part in the campaign. Abram represents the new spiritual force that has entered the world's history: Melchizedek represents the ideal of the permanent communion of mankind with God. The new family and the new nation, through whom that communion is ultimately to be perfected, render their homage to the representative of the Universal and the Omnipotent.

To the Israelite reader Jerusalem was the centre of pure religion and spiritual aspirations. Abram, impersonating the people of which he was to be the founder, receives from Melchizedek, the Priest-King of Jerusalem (Salem), not riches, nor offers of reward and possessions, but firstly bread and wine, sustenance and refreshment, and secondly his blessing, in the name of the Most High God, upon the servant of Jehovah. Abram, in his turn, renders tithe to Melchizedek, typifying thereby the obligation of every true son of Abram to recognize the full claims of the spiritual life upon his loyal service.

II. Details for study. 1. The Name. Though originally the name may have meant "Zedek is king," it suggested to Israelite readers or hearers "the king of righteousness," cf. Hebrews 7:2, or "righteous king," cf. Joseph. B. J. vi. 10, Μελχ. ὁ τῇ πατρίᾳ γλώσσῃ κληθεὶς βασιλεὺς δίκαιος. For the Messianic significance of which, cf. Psalms 45:4 ff.; Jeremiah 23:6; Jeremiah 33:15-16; Daniel 9:24; Malachi 4:2.

2. His Royal Office. He is King of Salem; and, while this title denoted to the Israelite the personal character of "a king of peace" (cf. Hebrews 7:2), it can scarcely be doubted that in the identification of Salem with Jerusalem (cf. Psalms 76:2; Joseph. Ant. i. 180) lies the peculiar typical significance of the event. The name of the city in the Tel-el-Amarna tablets (circ. 1400) is Urusalim: the king of Jerusalem in Joshua 10:1 is Adoni-zedek.

3. His Priestly Office. He is Priest as well as king. He is Priest of the Most High God, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, who is identified, according to the text of Genesis 14:22, by Abram with Jehovah. There is no suggestion of anything evil, impure, or polluting, in the worship of which Melchizedek, a native Canaanite, is a priest. Abram treats him as the official representative of the true God. It was not until the age of the Maccabees that the High Priest was also king.

4. His Blessing. As the representative of the true God, Melchizedek invokes upon Abram a message of Divine blessing. He blesses God; the victory of Abram over his foes is a ground for grateful praise. He presents the patriarch with bread and wine as the pledge of good-will and as an expression of honour and gratitude.

5. He receives tithe from Abram, cf. Hebrews 7:7-10. The receiver is greater than the giver of tithe. The impersonator of the ideal worship at Jerusalem receives tithe from the father and founder of the Israelite people.

6. Melchizedek disappears from the page of history as suddenly as he appears. Nothing is recorded of his family or lineage, of his life or actions. He "stands unique and isolated both in his person and in his history … his life has no recorded beginning or close" (Westcott, Ep. Hebrews, p. 172). It is not the man Melchizedek, but the Scripture portrait of Melchizedek in Genesis 14, which causes the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews to designate him as "without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life."

7. The Messianic passage in Psalms 110:4 (quoted in Hebrews 5:6; Hebrews 7:17; Hebrews 7:21), "Thou art a priest after the order (or, manner) of Melchizedek," seems to mean that the Messiah is not a priest of the tribe of Levi, or of the family of Aaron, but, like the Priest-King of Jerusalem in the story of Abram, is, according to a more primitive conception of priesthood, the king of a kingdom of priests (cf. Exodus 19:6).

8. Melchizedek is not mentioned in the Apocryphal Books. There is a lacunain the Book of Jubilees at this passage (13:25). Abram has evidently made his offering of tithe; and the next words are "… for Abram, and for his seed, a tenth of the first-fruits to the Lord, and the Lord ordained it as an ordinance for ever that they should give it to the priests who served before Him, that they should possess it for ever. And to this law there is no limit of days; for He hath ordained it for the generations for ever that they should give to the Lord the tenth of everything, of the seed and of the wine and of the oil and of the cattle and of the sheep. And He gave it unto His priests to eat and to drink with joy before Him" (Charles" Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, vol. ii. p. 33).

9. The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews regards Melchizedek as the type of Christ; as (a) King of Righteousness; (b) King of Peace; (c) Priest, not of the line of Levi or Aaron; (d) greater than Abraham, receiving tithes from him; (e) eternal. See chap. 7 with Westcott's notes.

10. Philo allegorizes the person of Melchizedek, who, he considers, represents the priesthood of "right reason," offering to the soul the sustenance of gladness and joy in the thoughts of absolute truth (Leg. Allegor. iii. § 25).

11. Clement of Alexandria (Strom. iv. 25) regards the offerings of bread and wine as typical of the Eucharist, adding, "And Melchizedek is interpreted -righteous King"; and the name is a synonym for righteousness and peace": cf. Strom. ii. 5, "He (the Saviour) is Melchizedek, -the king of peace," the most fit of all to head the race of men.";

12. Jerome (Ep. lxxiii. ad Evangelum), summarizing opinions about Melchizedek, mentions that Origen and Didymus held him to have been an Angel; many others thought he was a Canaanite prince, exercising priestly offices, like "Abel, Enoch, Noah, Job"; the Jews very commonly identified him with Shem. Again, it appears to have been held by some writers, that Melchizedek was a manifestation of the Son; by others, that he was an appearance of the Holy Spirit (cf. Quaest. ex V. et N. Test. Augustini Opera, tom. iii. App. § cix.: ed. Migne, P. L. 35, p. 2329).

13. Westcott (Ep. to the Hebrews, p. 203) gives an account of the interesting legend respecting Melchizedek preserved in "the Book of Adam." "To him (Melchizedek) and Shem … the charge was given to bear the body of Adam to Calvary, and to place it there where in after time the Incarnate Word should suffer, so that the blood of the Saviour might fall on the skull of the Protoplast. In the fulfilment of this mission Melchizedek built an altar of twelve stones, typical of the twelve apostles, by the spot where Adam was laid, and offered upon it, by the direction of an angel, bread and wine -as a symbol of the sacrifice which Christ should make" in due time. When the mission was accomplished, Shem returned to his old home, but Melchizedek, divinely appointed to this priesthood, continued to serve God with prayer and fasting at the holy place, arrayed in a robe of fire. So afterwards when Abraham came to the neighbourhood he communicated to him also -the holy Mysteries," the symbolical Eucharist."

14. That the episode of Melchizedek has been introduced from a distinct source of tradition is very probable. (a) It interrupts the narrative in Genesis 14:17, which is continued in Genesis 14:21. (b) Its contents are not in harmony with the context. In Genesis 14:22, Abram refuses to take anything from the spoil: in Genesis 14:20, Abram is said to give Melchizedek "a tenth of all." If "a tenth of all" refers to the spoil, it contradicts Genesis 14:22: if it refers to "all" his own property, then it assumes for Abram quite different surroundings from those of the story in chap. 14.

No late tradition of Abram is likely to have represented him as offering a tithe "of all" to a Canaanite king. But the short passage may illustrate a large class of traditions, religious and symbolical in character, which in early days had collected round the name of the patriarch. Psalms 110:4 is evidently based upon the present passage.