NOTES for Heb 7:1-14

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¹For this Melchisedec, king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him;

²To whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all; first being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that also King of Salem, which is, King of peace;

³Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually.

⁴Now consider how great this man was, unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils.

⁵And verily they that are of the sons of Levi, who receive the office of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham:

⁶But he whose descent is not counted from them received tithes of Abraham, and blessed him that had the promises.

⁷And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better.

⁸And here men that die receive tithes; but there he receiveth them, of whom it is witnessed that he liveth.

⁹And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, payed tithes in Abraham.

¹⁰For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him.

¹¹If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it the people received the law,) what further need was there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchisedec, and not be called after the order of Aaron?

¹²For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law.

¹³For he of whom these things are spoken pertaineth to another tribe, of which no man gave attendance at the altar.

¹⁴For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda; of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood.

It is remarkable how the text unfolds from the phrase, “Beyond all dispute, the lesser is blessed by the greater.” I pictured a mother bringing a small child to a priest and asking for a blessing; after blessing the little one, the priest asks him, “Now you bless me.” I was deeply struck by this at the time. Did that priest see the infant Jesus in the child? Or, more simply, someone who was closer to the Kingdom than any of us? Either way, he did not look down on the child. Nor did Abraham think about who was greater or more important, or who possessed greater gifts from God—he or Melchizedek. When the Lord blesses, He does so through whomever He wishes. And it may turn out that the source of blessing for us will be someone from whom we did not expect it at all.

Other notes

For Heb 7:1-10

¹For this Melchisedec, king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him;

²To whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all; first being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that also King of Salem, which is, King of peace;

³Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually.

⁴Now consider how great this man was, unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils.

⁵And verily they that are of the sons of Levi, who receive the office of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham:

⁶But he whose descent is not counted from them received tithes of Abraham, and blessed him that had the promises.

⁷And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better.

⁸And here men that die receive tithes; but there he receiveth them, of whom it is witnessed that he liveth.

⁹And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, payed tithes in Abraham.

¹⁰For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him.

Continuing the theme of charismatic high priesthood, the author of the epistle again turns to the figure of Melchizedek... Read more

Continuing the theme of charismatic high priesthood, the author of the epistle again turns to the figure of Melchizedek, who became a symbol of the Messiah as High Priest. This symbolism was quite traditional, rooted in the pre-exilic era, when the Yahwist messianic tradition was being formed under the influence of the preaching of the later prophets. It was in those days that Melchizedek of the ancient tradition became Melchizedek as a prototype of the Messiah. His name literally means "righteous ruler" or "ruler of righteousness" (historically this may have been not a name but a title, but in any case it later came to be perceived as a proper name), and the title ruler of Shalem (Salem), as Jerusalem was called in the most ancient period, was interpreted as "ruler of peace" (Hebrew shalem means "peace," including that gracious peace of God which, according to traditional messianic expectations, would descend on the people and the land on the day of the Messiah's coming).

It is no surprise that such a ruler-priest, who blessed Abraham himself, was seen as a prototype of the Messiah-High Priest, who in due time would bless the people in the same way, opening for them the way into the Kingdom (vv. 1-3). Speaking this way, the author of the epistle emphasizes that priesthood, as a spiritual reality and as a ministry, is not limited only to the specific form of Levitical priesthood that belonged to the Jewish people throughout their history. He does not deny the reality or effectiveness of the Levitical priesthood; he merely points to the fact that the possibility of priestly ministry in the world existed even before the birth of Moses and Aaron, with whose name the Yahwist tradition connects the beginning of the Levitical priesthood, and that Abraham himself, the forefather of the Jewish people, does not reject this priestly ministry (vv. 4-10). Just as the Kingdom exists from the beginning, so too the possibility of sanctifying creation, and above all the human person, exists from the beginning. And if this is so, then priestly ministry, without which such sanctification is impossible, must also exist in the world from the beginning. And just as the fullness of the Kingdom is not revealed to the fallen world all at once, neither is the whole fullness of priestly ministry revealed to it all at once, though at times it is partly disclosed to the chosen, just as the fullness of the Kingdom, hidden until its time, was sometimes partly disclosed to them.

For Heb 7:11-19

¹¹If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it the people received the law,) what further need was there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchisedec, and not be called after the order of Aaron?

¹²For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law.

¹³For he of whom these things are spoken pertaineth to another tribe, of which no man gave attendance at the altar.

¹⁴For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda; of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood.

¹⁵And it is yet far more evident: for that after the similitude of Melchisedec there ariseth another priest,

¹⁶Who is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life.

¹⁷For he testifieth, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.

¹⁸For there is verily a disannulling of the commandment going before for the weakness and unprofitableness thereof.

¹⁹For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did; by the which we draw nigh unto God.

Turning to the theme of the Torah (the Law), the author of the epistle reasons about it in the same way as his teacher Paul. He sees several levels of Torah: on the one hand, Torah as legislation... Read more

Turning to the theme of the Torah (the Law), the author of the epistle reasons about it in the same way as his teacher Paul. He sees several levels of Torah: on the one hand, Torah as legislation, as a legal and moral code, and on the other, the inner Torah as a spiritual core and a spiritual and moral imperative that defines a person's relationship with God and his whole life. It is clear that the author of the epistle looks at Christ in the same way as all Christians of that time did: as the only example in the history of the people of God of the living Torah.

Continuing Paul's thought about the Torah and extending it to the Levitical priesthood, he says: just as the Torah by itself does not make a person perfect, so the priesthood existing within the framework of such a Torah, which does not bring to perfection, cannot sanctify the people in all fullness. Paul speaks often and at length in his epistles about the fact that the Torah, even the inner Torah, still does not make a person perfect, that it cannot qualitatively change human nature and free it from the power of sin. But the Levitical priests are the same sinful people as everyone else; none of them revealed to the world examples of the living Torah. And if so, then the sanctification by which God sanctified the people through their priestly action could not be complete. The fullness of the Torah is the living Torah, and the living Torah is Christ Himself.

In Christ there is a change, or alteration, of the Torah, and therefore the priesthood must also change. Of course, this does not mean that some other priestly community or corporation should come to replace the Levitical priesthood. The point is different: it concerns the manner and fullness of the people's sanctification, corresponding to the new quality of their life. In fact, for life in the Kingdom, for abiding as part of the body of Christ, a Christian must be sanctified in all the fullness possible for him, in a way he was never sanctified through Yahwist sacrifices, because no person in a fallen state can be sanctified completely.

But now, in the process of a person becoming a living Torah (and the path in Christ, the path of becoming like Christ, was understood by the first generations of Christians precisely as a person's becoming in Christ as the living Torah), he must be sanctified precisely in fullness, since it is given to him as a created being. And such sanctification is possible only in that spiritual space of the relationship between the Father and the Son where the Church also abides. There the High Priest is already Christ Himself, and the fullness of sanctification also proves to correspond to Him.

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