Melchizedek #27

Melchizedek is the king of Salem and “priest of God Most High” who meets Abraham after a military victory. He appears in only a few verses of Genesis, yet he is picked up in Psalm 110 and developed at length in the letter to the Hebrews. His name is commonly explained as “king of righteousness,” and Salem is related to the Hebrew word for peace.

Biblical Significance

After Abraham rescues his nephew Lot from a coalition of eastern kings, Melchizedek comes out to meet him with bread and wine. He blesses Abraham in the name of “the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth,” and Abraham gives him “tithes of all” (Genesis 14:17-20). The account gives no genealogy for him, and he is neither introduced nor mentioned again in the narrative. He is a non-Israelite who worships the true God and holds both royal and priestly office, two roles that later Israel usually kept apart.

Centuries later, a psalm ascribed to David declares of a coming king, “Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek” (Psalm 110:4). Salem is identified with Jerusalem elsewhere in the psalms (Psalm 76:2), which has led many to view Melchizedek as a priest-king of the city that David would later capture, though the text of Genesis does not say so directly.

Melchizedek in Hebrews

The author of Hebrews applies the psalm to Jesus. Because Jesus came from the tribe of Judah and not Levi, the argument runs, his priesthood must be of a different order, and Melchizedek shows what that order looks like (Hebrews 5:5-10; 7:11-17). The author notes that Genesis gives Melchizedek no genealogy and no record of birth or death, so that he is “made like unto the Son of God” and “abideth a priest continually” (Hebrews 7:1-3). Abraham’s tithe and Melchizedek’s blessing are taken to show that Melchizedek was greater than Abraham and, by extension, greater than the Levitical priests descended from him (Hebrews 7:4-10).

Legacy

Interpreters differ on who Melchizedek was. Most Christians take him as a historical king who served as a type, or pattern, of Christ. A minority have proposed that he was a preincarnate appearance of Christ, though Hebrews describes him as resembling the Son of God and not as being him. Jewish tradition has sometimes identified him with Shem, Noah’s son, an idea found in later rabbinic writings and not stated in the Bible. A fragmentary text among the Dead Sea Scrolls also presents him as a heavenly figure. Across these readings, he stands as an early sign that God’s purposes, and priesthood, would reach beyond the boundaries of a single family.