The Message

Chapter 7 begins with Luke recounting the story of Abraham and Melchizedek found in Genesis 14.  Abraham, the great Jewish patriarch from whom the Jewish nation was brought forth, is greeted by the mysterious Melchizedek with bread and wine after Abraham’s great rescue of his nephew
Lot.  Luke recounts how Abraham gave a tithe from his spoils to Melchizedek and by that very act established Melchizedek as the greater of the two.  Luke continues the point that all of the descendants of Abraham, acknowledge the superiority of the Priest King Melchizedek, for his lineage is eternal where as the line of priests that come from Abraham (Levites) are not.  Jesus is a priest according to the order of Melchizedek and as a result ushers in a better covenant than any established by the imperfect and mortal Jewish priesthood.

Abraham is the great patriarch of not only the Jewish nation but is also the father of the nations of Islam and Christianity.  If Luke is to be believed (and I do) then the three major religions are all subordinate to Melchizedek through the offering of the tithe from Abraham.  Who is this mysterious figure that demands so much respect?

  Melchizedek’s name means “King of Righteousness” according to Luke.  He was also the King of the Canaanite city of Salem (peace) so his title is King of Peace.  The Genesis story mentions him as the Priest of El Elyon (God most High) the deity of the city of Salem (modern Jerusalem).  King of Righteousness, King of Peace.  Priest of God Most High having no beginning and no end who brought bread and wine to Abraham the father of the Jews, the similarities to Jesus are more than coincidence for Luke.  Some Christian scholars say that Melchizedek and Jesus are the same but I disagree.  The scriptures mention that Jesus came according to the order of Melchizedek, not as Melchizedek. What is certain is that the order of Melchizedek is higher than the priestly line of Aaron. 

Imagine for a moment what these words meant to the Jewish Orthodoxy.  Luke is telling his Jewish Christian brothers that they no longer have to abide by the religious authority of the Levites that could be seen and whose rituals could be participated in.  Greater mediation is being made for them by the eternal priesthood of Melchizedek revealed in Jesus the priest who cannot be seen, only believed in. The Jewish Orthodoxy certainly knew the story of Melchizedek so it must have been sheer blasphemy to them for anyone to claim that Jesus a non Levite was a greater priest because he came from the priestly line of Melchizedek a non Hebrew!

Orthodoxy (Jewish, Christian, Mormon, Muslim etc…) will always deny that there is any chance that God will accomplish his holy work through the unorthodox.  They are right in so far as that God cannot accomplish his work in their lives or in the church that they control (the example here is that Christianity never took root among the Jews).  They are dead wrong in the sense that God will not begin a new work apart from their inflexibility.  I am a harbinger of the new work.  

The Kingdom of God is promised to the humble, the meek, to those that hunger and thirst for righteousness, to the merciful, to the pure in heart, to the peacemakers, and to the persecuted (Mathew 5:3).  The Orthodox are too busy battering each other with their doctrines to fit this description.  Welcome to the new work.  We are the builders of the Common Ground.   

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 11:28 am and is filed under Mythos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.