7
This Melchizedek was king of Salem and priest of God Most High. He met Abraham
returning from the defeat of the kings and blessed him, 2 and Abraham gave him
a tenth of everything. First, the name Melchizedek means “king of
righteousness”; then also, “king of Salem” means “king of peace.” 3 Without
father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life,
resembling the Son of God, he remains a priest forever.
4 Just think how great he was: Even the patriarch
Abraham gave him a tenth of the plunder! 5 Now the law requires the descendants
of Levi who become priests to collect a tenth from the people —that is, from
their fellow Israelites—even though they also are descended from Abraham. 6
This man, however, did not trace his descent from Levi, yet he collected a
tenth from Abraham and blessed him who had the promises. 7 And without doubt
the lesser is blessed by the greater. 8 In the one case, the tenth is collected
by people who die; but in the other case, by him who is declared to be living.
9 One might even say that Levi, who collects the tenth, paid the tenth through
Abraham, 10 because when Melchizedek met Abraham, Levi was still in the body of
his ancestor.
Dig Deeper
I have the pleasure and privilege of having a wife who
is fun, loving, kind, hard-working, and incredibly smart. She works as a nurse in a critical care unit
at a big hospital in our area and she is very good at what she does. She goes through incredibly difficult
circumstances daily on her job and handles them with grace and a deep sense of
care for each patient. But she often
comes home and will try to tell me some incredible story that took place on her
unit or fill me in on the ongoing saga of a patient struggling to regain their
health (while always strictly observing patient confidentiality). That might not sound that bad but there is a
challenge in there for me. Most of the
time I don’t have the foggiest clue of what she’s talking about. I might grasp that there was a conflict over
method of care between two nurses, or a doctor is trying some new method that a
nurse doesn’t like, or various things like that, but she tends to use the
proper medical terms for conditions and treatments and completely loses
me. I get a vague idea of the story that
she is trying to tell me but if you were to ask me to explain to someone else
what she just told me I wouldn’t have a chance.
Not only do I not understand many of the terms and words she uses, I
don’t think I could even spell most of them.
What I have discovered, however, is that when I ask her to clarify a few
things or remind her to put it in simple English for me then I can usually
follow along quite nicely and get a pretty good idea of what she is trying to
convey to me. I have discovered, much to
my delight, that once I got an understanding of the culture at the hospital and
get a feel for some of the procedures and expectations, and once I can actually
recognize and know the meaning of a few basic terms, the stories are quite
engrossing and interesting. On top of
that, being able to understand what my wife is actually talking about helps
open a whole new window of understanding and appreciation for her on my part.
The book of Hebrews is widely accepted to be one of the
more difficult books in the New Testament to read and fully understand, and
this passage on Melchizedek certainly ranks up there as perhaps the most
difficult passage to decipher in the whole book. In fact, it is pretty common for someone to
refer to this section on Melchizedek if someone wants to make a joke about
someone preaching on something that no one understands. The reason that this passage can be so
difficult is not that there is no value in it for us and it is not that there
was something wrong with the author who was so smart that he just went off
prattling on about things that no one would have or could have really
understood. The problem is that we are
not familiar with the world of priests, Temples, tithes, sacrifices, and so
on. Not only are we not familiar with
Melchizedek, most of us would probably have trouble spelling his name without
looking and an even harder time pronouncing his name. Then we have to add to that the fact that the
writer, particularly in this section, engages in a style of writing and logic
with which we are wholly unfamiliar. The
sum of all of that leads us to find passages like this quite a mystery and we
start to treat them like the commercials in a recorded television program,
nothing more than something to skip over quickly. But if we slow down, take the time to learn a
few basic principles and terms, just like my wife’s stories, we will find that
they are treasure troves of interesting and important information in the goal
to help us understand the superiority of Jesus in his role as high priest.
Three times already Hebrews has mentioned Melchizedek
(5:6; 10; 6:20) and that the Messiah is a priest in the order of the same
name. Now he is finally ready to unpack
that statement and unfurl the significance.
Melchizedek is a rather shadowy figure who is mentioned just twice in
the Old Testament and is referred to by no other New Testament authors. Psalm 110, a messianic Psalm which was much
beloved and studied by the early Christians and a passage to which the author
of Hebrews has already turned several times.
Psalm 110 is a majestic Psalm that looks forward to the rule of the
Messiah. Yahweh calls the Messiah “lord”
and tells him to sit in his throne room with him until he has made the enemies
of the Messiah a footstool. Yahweh will
not change his mind in giving the Messiah the scepter of power and dominion,
declares the Psalmist, precisely because the Messiah is “a priest forever in
the order of Melchizedek.” This was a
strange prophecy both because of the relative obscurity of Melchizedek and
because of the absolute rarity of mixing the roles of king and priest in
Israel.
The only other mention of Melchizedek in the Old
Testament comes in Genesis 14 as Abraham returns from a successful foray to
retrieve his nephew Lot from a collection of kings who stormed into Sodom,
among other places, and took Lot and his entire household as captives. The king of Salem, Melchizedek, approached
Abraham (then Abram), gave him bread and wine, blessed him, and Abraham
responded by giving him a tenth of everything that he captured in the
conquest. That’s all we know about
Melchizedek, just three short verses in Genesis and the stunning prophecy in
Psalm 110 that the Messiah would reign forever in his priestly order.
Before we begin to understand this passage at all, and
the author of Hebrews’ comments on Melchizedek we must understand a fairly
common technique of understanding the Torah and the other Scriptures in the Old
Testament that were common in Jewish circles in the first century. They read the stories in the Torah as though
they were a self-sustained world. If
something was not written in the text then it had no interpretive reality in
the real world. So if a text does not
say that someone died, then in the world of textual interpretation, they did
not die. To look at the passage in
Genesis with that eye helps us greatly to understand what Hebrews is
saying. According to the text of
Genesis, Melchizedek just appears on the scene as a high priest. He precedes the Law and the Aaronic
priesthood and so has no connection to them and is not bound by them. In the world of the text, Melchizedek has no
parents and did not come upon his priesthood through any specific lineage or
any other means, and it never came to an end because it does not record him
dying and passing it on. He simply was
the king of Salem (ancient Jerusalem) and the priest of God. We know nothing more about him. This allowed the Psalmist, through the
inspiration of the Spirit, to declare that God had used that enigmatic scene to
foreshadow and teach something vital about the coming Messiah and his role.
The passages concerning Melchizedek are so mysterious
that it has led some to declare that Melchizedek was not just a type or a
foreshadowing of the Messiah but was actually the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ
himself. Given the austerity with which
Hebrews treats the priest that might seem attractive but is really not
necessary, and is not at all the point of the author. If he wanted to say that Jesus was
Melchizedek he would have just said so, but he doesn’t. Melchizedek wasn’t Christ, but he did bear
some important resemblances to him.
In some important ways, the Melchizedek of the text (not
necessarily the Melchizedek of real life) foreshadowed the priestly vocation of
the Messiah. This priesthood was not
based on lineage, a prestigious pedigree, or the Law but was based solely on
the assumed appointment by God. He was
both the “king of righteousness” and “the king of peace. In those ways, he resembled the Son of God
and pointed to his Messiah-ship and priesthood which was also appointed by God
apart from the Law or the order of Aaron.
The Messiah too was the king of peace and righteousness. In addition, Just as the Melchizedek of the
text was a priestly order forever (because in the text his priesthood had no
beginning and no end) so this character of the text pointed to the Messiah that
would rule as the high priest for God’s people forever.
Having established that there were two completely
separate priestly orders established by God, Hebrews sets about in verses 4-10
to show that the one, the order of Melchizedek which pointed to the Messiah,
was far superior to Aaron’s priestly order, just as the Messiah was superior to
every aspect of the Old Testament.
Specifically we are given four distinct aspects of the superiority of
the Melchizedekian priesthood. The first
is that Abraham gave him a tenth of his spoils.
Since the Aaronic priesthood traced its lineage back to Abraham it was
significant that Abraham humbled himself before Melchizedek’s priesthood and
gave a tithe of reverence to God by giving it to Melchizedek. Second, Melchizedek spoke a blessing over the
one who was the recipient of God’s promises, showing that he was superior in
his access and ability to confer blessings directly from God. Abraham received blessings from God but
Melchizedek gave them. Third, Levi who
was the ancestor of the Aaronic priesthood gave his homage and tithe, in
effect, to Melchizedek because he was still “in the body of his ancestor.” The author tacitly admits that this point
might be stretching it a bit, as he says “one might even say,” but he no doubt
felt that his overall point was still quite sound. Finally, the Melchizedekian priesthood is
superior because his order does not come to an end. The Melchizedek of the text did not die and
end his reign (using the same “world of the text” logic that led Jews to assume
that God continued to rest from his initial work of physical creation because
there was no end drawn to his resting in the seventh day of creation in Genesis
2) just as the Messiah’s reign will never end.
There are three big conclusions that can be drawn at
this point, then, based on what we have already learned about this order of
Melchizedek to which Jesus was the ultimate fulfillment. First, this priestly order was superior and
eternal which was in sharp contrast to the priesthood of Aaron which was
limited by the physical realm. Second,
it meant that the Temple and the corresponding priesthood of the Temple were
unnecessary. You don’t need the picture
of a beautiful landscape when you are standing right in front of the real
thing. Third, Complete confidence and
faith could be placed in Jesus as the true high priest that would go on without
end. There was no need to look to the
Levitical priesthood of the Law because it was inferior, temporary, and of a
different order than the Scriptures themselves pointed to as the priesthood of
the Messiah. The Messiah had arrived and
those who really wanted to be God’s people had better take notice and cling to
him as their one and only priest. These
issues become pressing for us because, although we may not be tempted to turn
to the Levitical priesthood we still need to cling to the Messiah as our high
priest, our only means of access to God.
Devotional Thought
As we read and study Hebrews it is vital to always keep
the practical aspects on our heart and not get lost in the majesty of the deep
teaching itself. Knowing that Jesus is
our eternal high priest in the order of Melchizedek matters in keeping us
focused and faithful in the kingdom of God.
Spend some time today focusing on just why this aspect of Jesus is so
important and what it means in your daily walk as a disciple.
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