Melchizedek

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MrMacSon
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Melchizedek

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Melchizedek is mentioned twice in the Hebrew Bible, the first in Genesis and the second in Psalms.
  • aka , Melkisetek, or Malki Tzedek (/mɛlˈkɪzədɛk/; Hebrew: מַלְכִּי־צֶדֶֿק‬ malkī-ṣeḏeq, "king of righteousness"; Amharic: መልከ ጼዴቅ malkī-ṣeḏeq; Armenian: Մելքիսեդեք, Melkisetek)
In chapter 14 of the Book of Genesis Melchizedek was the king of Salem and priest of El Elyon ("God most high") [Genesis 14:18-20]. He brings out bread and wine and blesses Abram and El Elyon.

Psalm 110 alludes to Melchizedek as a prototype of the messiah.

The Book of Jubilees [likely pre-100BC] read Abram as the giver of the tithe to Melchizedek.

Melchizedek is identified with or as the Messiah in Jewish messianism of the Second Temple period
  • Generally, In Jewish eschatology the term mashiach, or "Messiah", came to refer to a future Jewish king from the Davidic line, who is expected to be anointed with holy anointing oil and rule the Jewish people during the Messianic Age. In general, the term Messiah unqualified refers to Mashiach ben David (Messiah, son of David). Belief in the future advent of the Messiah was/is one of the fundamental requisites of the Jewish faith: Maimonides, a medieval [late 12th C.] Sephardic Jewish philosopher considered one of the most influential Torah scholars, wrote: "Anyone who does not believe in him, or who does not wait for his arrival, has not merely denied the other prophets, but has also denied the Torah and Moses, our Rabbi."
Philo identifies Melchizedek with the Logos as priest of God, and honoured as an untutored priesthood.
Philo and Josephus both make reference to Melchizedek, but only reiterate what the two biblical texts say about him. Philo allegorizes the Genesis account of Abram's meeting with Melchizedek. He writes, for example, "Melchizedek also has God made both king of peace, for that is the meaning of Salem, and his own priest...a king peaceable and worthy of his [God's] own priesthood. For he is entitled 'the righteous king', and a king is at enmity with a despot, the one being the author of laws, the other of lawlessness" (Leg. All. 3.79-82). Josephus explains why it was appropriate that Melchizedek should be a king and a priest. He says that Abram "was received by the king of Solyma [Salem], Melchizedek; the name means 'righteous king', and such he was by common consent, inasmuch for this reason he was moreover made priest of God; Solyma was in fact the place afterward called Hierosolyma [Jerusalem]" (Ant. 1.10.2 3 180). http://www.mycrandall.ca/courses/newtes ... /Melch.htm
William Horbury has suggested that "Josephus's story of the foundation of Jerusalem and the temple, beginning from a paraphrase of Gen. 14.18 on the lines of existing Aramaic and Greek Jewish interpretative tradition, is based on associative exegesis [which] would have been linked with a catena of biblical texts on Melchizedek, related to and perhaps illuminating that which lies behind 11Q13 (11QMelchizedek). The story as Josephus gives it seems wholly Hellenic; Hebrew names are omitted or Graecized. At the same time, however, it is bound up with Jewish renderings of Gen. 14.18, Aramaic as well as Greek ..." -- 'Josephus and 11Q13 on Melchizedek' in Studies on the Text and Versions of the Hebrew Bible in Honour of Robert Gordon, 2011, pp 239-252

The last section of the Second Book of Enoch (apparently a Jewish sectarian work of the 1st century AD, aka 'Slavonic Enoch') is 'the Exaltation of Melchizedek' which tells how Melchizedek was born of a virgin Sofonim (or Sopanima); the wife of Nir, a brother of Noah.

Melchizedek appear extensively in the Epistle to the Hebrews - 4:14-15; 5:6, 10; 6:19-20; 7:1-21 [1, 10, 11, 15, 17, 21]. Melchizedek as the "king of righteousness" and "king of peace" is explicitly associated with the "eternal priesthood" of the Son of God: Jesus Christ is identified as a priest forever in 'the order of Melchizedek' quoting from Psalm. 110:4, so Jesus assumes the role of High Priest once and for all.

Reference between the messiah and Melchizedek appears in subsequent biblical verses: I Corinthians 11:23-25; Matthew 22:44, 26:26-28; Luke 22:19; Mark 14:22; John 6:53; Acts 2:34; Revelation 1:6.

Melchizedek is proposed as Jesus Christ in some gnostic Nag Hammadi texts where, as Jesus Christ, he lives, preaches, dies and is resurrected, in a gnostic perspective. The Coming of the Son of God Melchizedek speaks of his return to bring peace, supported by the gods, and he is a priest-king who dispenses justice - http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/melchiz.html
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MrMacSon
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Re: Melchizedek

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German scholar Oscar Cullmann has written about Jesus’ self-identification as Melchizedek High Priest -
“When Jesus answers the high priest in Mark 14:62, he combines a reference to Daniel 7 with the reference to Psalm 110:

‘You will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven’

‘Sitting at the right hand’ is inseparably connected with the thought of the priest-king after the order of Melchizedek. Is it not significant that Jesus applies to himself a saying about the eternal High Priest precisely when he stands before the Jewish high priest and is questioned by him concerning his claim to be the Messiah? He says in effect that his messiahship is not that of an earthly messiah ... but that he is the heavenly Son of Man and the heavenly High Priest.”

• Oscar Cullmann, The Christology of the New Testament, trans. S.C. Guthrie and C.A.M. Hall (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1963), pp. 88–9
Also see http://www.askelm.com/doctrine/d110101.pdf
Charles Wilson
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Re: Melchizedek

Post by Charles Wilson »

I usta' have, on an old Hard Drive, a note on "Melchizedek", which someone had decomposed the word into "Malachi-Zadok".

I believe that there is something to this, a reference from Someone Who Knew Something. It may be datable from a Source.

CW
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