Melchizedek: New Insights into the Genesis’ King of Salem

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily match my own. - Dr. Bart D. Ehrman

Among the more enigmatic figures in the Hebrew Bible, Melchizedek occupies a remarkably disproportionate place in Jewish and Christian interpretive history. The sparse and ambiguous biblical data concerning Melchizedek invites a wide range of interpretive possibilities that later communities would eagerly exploit.

In this article, I’ll examine the development of Melchizedek’s significance across biblical and post-biblical traditions, tracing how a marginal character evolved into a theological archetype. By following Melchizedek’s trajectory through both Bible verses and later understandings, we’ll see that his enduring influence lies not in his prominence in the biblical story but in interpretive potential. We’ll see that the figure of Melchizedek illustrates how textual ambiguity can generate lasting religious meaning.

By the way, if you’re interested in learning more about biblical traditions, check out Bart Ehrman’s course on the Hebrew Bible featuring scholar Dr. Joel Baden.

Background in Genesis

Who is Melchizedek in the Bible? The Hebrew name Melchizedek (pronounced mel-KEE-zeh-dek) is composed of two Hebrew words. The first, mal-kee’, is derived from the word for king which is melekh. The second, ṣedeq, can be translated as “righteousness” but might also just be the proper name Zedek. The original text in Genesis where Melchizedek is presented does not clarify the best translation. In addition, I should note that outside of this biblical story, there is no evidence that Melchizedek actually existed in history.

Melchizedek is first introduced in Genesis 14:17-24 after Abram (soon to be renamed Abraham by God), returns from battling against a king named Chedorlaomer who, along with some other kings, had kidnapped Abram’s nephew Lot and taken all his possessions:

We see two things happening here that will be significant for our interpretation of Melchizedek. First, as Bill Creasy points out, Melchizedek seems to come out of nowhere. Dr. Creasy notes that, in Genesis, most patriarchal characters are introduced with a genealogy. The introduction of Abraham, for example, is preceded by verses about his ancestry (Gen. 11:10-27). The fact that Melchizedek gets no such narrative treatment makes him seem mysterious, to say the least.

Second, Abraham, who is clearly a fighter in the early part of his story, is also portrayed in this passage as selfless and generous, in that he gives ten percent of the goods he retakes from Chedorlaomer to Melchizedek. While it’s not entirely clear why he does this, it is surely meant to show that Abraham was a good, heroic person. However, just to complicate things a bit further, Robert Alter, in his commentary on The Five Books of Moses, notes that the Hebrew in the passage is a bit ambiguous. Alter says it’s not entirely clear whether Abram gives one-tenth to Melchizedek or the other way around:

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So what else do we find out about Melchizedek from this short passage?

He’s called both the King of Salem (Hebrew: Shalem) and a priest (Hebrew: Kohen) of “God Most High” (Hebrew: El Elyon). Today, many identify Salem with Jerusalem, although the Hebrew word Shalem also means “peace”— perhaps Melchizedek was the “king of peace.” All of these interpretations are speculative, however, since there are multiple ways to translate the passage. In fact, in his book Melchizedek, King of Sodom: How Scribes Invented the Biblical Priest-King, Robert Cargill proposes that the original section likely called Melchizedek the King of Sodom. Why would this be significant?

In case you didn’t know, scholars have determined that the book of Genesis had multiple authors and editors or redactors. Cargill believes that a later redactor changed the verse about Melchizedek, making two separate kings where there was originally only one:

As we’ll see, this change, if it happened as Cargill suggests, would have a major impact on later Jewish and Christian interpretations of Melchizedek. For a guy only mentioned in three books in the entire Bible, his influence was surprisingly large. Notice also that Melchizedek brings Abram and his men bread and wine, something that will come to have major symbolic meaning later.

Melchizedek in the Psalms

The next and final mention of Melchizedek in the Hebrew Bible is found in Psalm 110:4. However, despite the shortness of the passage, there are some ambiguities in its translation. Here’s the New Revised Standard Updated Edition translation:

But to whom is the Psalm speaking? The first part of the Psalm says

This lord – with a lower-case l – is often associated with King David who is traditionally said to be the author of the Psalms. If this is the case, though, God is calling David both king and priest, connecting him directly to the verse in Genesis where Melchizedek was both king and priest. In other words, “the order of Melchizedek” means a special order of priest-kings. However, since Melchizedek can also be translated as “king of righteousness,” the New Jewish Publication Society’s English translation of the Hebrew Bible translates the phrase this way:

This translation would make sense if the one being addressed is indeed David. However, the Babylonian Talmud, an authoritative compilation of ancient Jewish teachings, states that the addressee of this Psalm is actually Abram, while the Zohar — the main medieval text of Kabbalistic Judaism — believes the Psalm is addressed to Aaron, the brother of Moses and the first high priest ordained by God after the Israelites were freed from slavery. Unfortunately, there is no way to decide who is being addressed in the Psalm for certain.

Melchizedek and Jesus in Hebrews

The most extensive use and mention of Melchizedek, however, comes not in the Hebrew Bible but in the New Testament book of Hebrews, written centuries after the completion of Genesis. Hebrews is the only NT book that mentions Melchizedek, as well as the only book that calls Jesus a high priest, specifically referring to him as the addressee of Psalm 110:

The unknown author of Hebrews actually uses the lack of genealogy attributed to Melchizedek as a way to further identify him with Jesus, reasoning in one Bible verse that one who is “without father, without mother, without genealogy” also has “neither beginning of days nor end of life (Hebrews 7:3)” and is thus immortal. But in what way is Jesus a high priest, according to this author?

The function of the Jewish high priest was to mediate between God and the people. As such, he was the only person authorized to take on the concerns of the people and bring them directly to God in the most sacred part of the Temple, the Holy of Holies, thus obtaining God’s mercy. This is how the author of Hebrews puts it, describing Jesus’ role, in Heb 4:14-16:

In place of the Holy of Holies in the Temple, Jesus ascended to heaven and thus into God’s presence. However, despite his divinity, Jesus was also human and thus, like the high priest, understood human temptations. He was, therefore, the intercessor for people who believed in him and could thus obtain God’s mercy for them.

Furthermore, Hebrews 7:27 says that Jesus’ death has taken the place of the sacrificial function of the former high priests:

The line from Psalm 110,  which Hebrews interprets as placing Jesus as a high priest in “the order of Melchizedek,” is repeated often in Hebrews. However, it turns out that the identification of Melchizedek with the Messiah precedes Christianity.

Other Interpretations of Melchizedek

In the Dead Sea Scrolls, Jewish writings that preceded the writings of the New Testament, an entire scroll, known to scholars as 11QMelch, is devoted to Melchizedek. In the Jewish Annotated New Testament, scholar (and my former professor!) Pamela Eisenbaum notes that in this scroll, Melchizedek “becomes a superhuman figure, who executes divine judgment.” This is unusual in early Jewish texts where only God is supposed to function as a judge. However, it also provides a theological bridge between Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity.

In the Nag Hammadi Library, a group of Gnostic Christian texts discovered in Egypt, there is a text called The Coming of the Son of God Melchizedek. This tractate explicitly says not that Jesus was in the order of Melchizedek but that he is Jesus. This “Melchizedek” is therefore said to have preached, died, and been resurrected. It also says that he will return and that he is a priest-king who metes out God’s justice.

Several more orthodox church fathers interpreted various Old Testament figures like Melchizedek as paradigms of Christ. Christ was thus called a new Adam by some and was sometimes identified with Abraham by others. However, with regard to Melchizedek, 3rd-century Christian author Clement of Alexandria also claimed that the bread and wine given by Melchizedek to Abraham and his men in Genesis was a prophetic representation of the Eucharist, which Christ would institute for the church before his death.

Conclusion

In many ways, the stories and representations of Melchizedek are odd. He is mentioned in only three books of the Bible — how could so many people deem him so significant? I would guess that given his place in the story of the all-important patriarch Abraham, the relative mystery and curiosity surrounding Melchizedek’s identity was only enhanced by the lack of information about him.

In the original Genesis story, Melchizedek is introduced as both a king of Salem and a priest. He plays a miniscule role in Abraham’s story, giving him bread and wine and blessing him after Abraham returns from saving his nephew. However, rather than disappearing, as some minor biblical characters did, an entire mythology would grow up around this figure.

In Psalm 110, God tells someone that he will conquer his enemies for him, later claiming that his addressee is a priest “according to the order of Melchizedek.” Whatever the truth of the matter, the interlocutor of this Psalm — whether David, Jesus, or someone else — would go on to fulfill a much larger role in texts such as the Dead Sea Scrolls and the book of Hebrews.

In fact, it’s only in the book of Hebrews that Melchizedek is finally allegorized into an archetype of Jesus. As such, Jesus himself is called a high priest, one who mediates between humans and God and brings God’s mercy to the people. This adds to the story of Jesus’ atoning sacrifice and goes on to affect Christian theology forever after.

For a guy who is barely mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, he sure got a lot of press!