MELCHIZIDEK AND JESUS IN HEBREWS

Sacrificing priesthood was central to Jewish religion.  When Christianity proceeded on the path of schism from Judaism, it sought a way to make Jesus a priest though Jesus was not of the Levitical tribe and so could have no right to be a priest.  God vows never to flood the earth again in response to how he liked the smell of Noah’s sacrifices.  Noah was not a Levite.  So the Christians could say Jesus became a priest in the way that Noah did - appointment by God.  But no - they stretch things to make it Melchizidek a totally unimportant figure in the Old Testament.  Why not Noah?  Probably because the first Christians mined traditions like those that were preserved in the Dead Sea Scrolls to invent a new theology.  Melchizidek was hugely important in such heretical circles. 

In Melchizidek from the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Old Testament text Jesus used about himself that he would proclaim liberty to captives appears. It is quoted to make Melchizidek out to be the person the prediction is about. And Melchizidek is portrayed as judge and savior from Belial but he is spoken of as priest in Jewish context, with the bloody rites of the Law and the festivals.  The Day of Atonment is specifically mentioned.

It is hard to avoid the notion that the author of Hebrews knew these teachings and was helped by them to write his letter.

Some say that Hebrews thinks Melchizidek blessed Jesus to turn him into a priest. Hebrews is insistent and firm that it is only one who is lower than the one doing the blessing that can be blessed. It gives the example of Melchizidek blessing Abraham. Hebrews stresses humility so much that this teaching clearly rules out the notion that Jesus set up the Catholic priesthood for its blessing people with rites and sacraments would be turning it into a regal elite.  If Melchizidek was higher than Abraham in rank before God then he was higher than Jesus if he blessed Jesus. 

There might be a higher meaning in this for Abraham might not just be an individual here.  God promised him great seed and to make him into a great nation.  If so then Jesus as part of this Abraham collective, as his descendant would be inferior to Melchizidek.

The Letter to the Hebrews says that Melchizidek is a picture of Jesus for having no father or mother and no birth or no death Melchizedek was better than Moses and even the angels. For that reason, many feel the text thinks Melchizidek is God himself. Christians sometimes hold that God appeared as Melchizidek when he dealt with Abraham. The Melchizedek scroll from the Dead Sea Scroll has Melchizidek ruling as judge of all where in Psalm 7 it is God. The scroll does the same thing with Psalm 82 where instead of God ruling gods it is Melchizidek. Isaiah 61:2 is altered to speak of the year of the favour of Melchizidek . The original Isaiah said God. How does the assertion that Melchizidek is priest forever fit the assertion in Hebrews that Jesus is the only priest and reigns as priest forever? For some, the answer is that Jesus and Melchizidek are the same being: God.  For others, men could be called God but this was honorific and not saying they are actually God.

In Hebrews, Jesus is a priest according to the order of Melchizidek.  There is no mention of this priesthood apart from in relation to this man and Jesus.  An order can have only two members.  Certainly not just one!  The idea is that Melchizidek was accepted by God as priest without any formal ordination which characterised Aaron's priesthood.  Why Melchizidek?  Why not some other figure such as Abel or Abraham who offered sacrifice without being ordained priests of any kind?  Melchizidek is chosen for he was directly chosen by God as priest.  The same thing happened to Jesus.  The suggestion is that there can be only one of these priests at a time.  No wonder Hebrews stresses that Jesus' priesthood is everlasting and the only one for this dispensation.

Hebrews accepts the psalm in which God says that somebody is a priest forever according to the priesthood of Melchizidek as referring to Jesus becoming a priest. It was desperate when it could not use any sayings of Jesus to proclaim him a priest who offered his life on the altar of the cross but had to resort to the use of an obscure statement in a psalm. The author knew what the Jews were like for disagreeing about the interpretation of texts so his evidence was so weak that useless was the only word for it. So clearly Jesus did not leave any concrete information about himself behind so he could have been a fiction.

The silliest thing about the way it is saying Jesus and Melchizidek were priests is that it leaves one the high priest of the Old Covenant and Jesus the high priest of the New.  The text stresses that Melchizidek had no parents or genealogy and neither comes into being or will ever cease to be.  This is to parallel Jesus.  One answer is that Melchizidek is purely about being a type of Jesus.  His story is like a parable prefiguring Jesus so Jesus is the only priest so Jesus is the real priest of both covenants.

The Bible says Abraham tithed to Melchizidek.  The tithes would probably have been animals which were presumably sacrificed by Melchizidek.  Melchizidek killing animals would be the major thing and thus disqualify him as a type for Jesus who did not offer animal sacrifices.  The tithes were spoils - stolen from innocent people!  So much for great Melchizidek.

What on earth then is Hebrews doing with Melchizidek?  The answer is it wants a man who had no origin or end or genealogy who was a priest seemingly appointed by God and not through a bloodline. And it wants him for it wants to be able to say the same things about Jesus.  It needs to explain why Jesus had no human parentage!  More about that later on.

Jesus being ordained a priest according to the order of Melchizidek does not imply that Jesus lived after Melchizidek supposedly lived. The priesthood could have been called after Melchizidek for he was the first mentioned in the scriptures who had a priesthood that matches Jesus’. When God knows the future for God is outside time, he could call you a priest according to Melchizidek before Melchizidek was born.

Hebrews 7 says that Melchizidek is king of Salem meaning peace and is stated in such a way as to indicate he was not just king of a place called Salem but the king of peace and his name means king of righteousness. These titles alone make him to be a figure that is almost divine like Jesus who also was almost a god.

Hebrews declares that Jesus was the only begotten Son of God and existed before the world was made and that God said he was begotten long before the time specified by the gospels. It is meant to be an elementary instruction in religion so it is wrong to say begotten means that the Son comes from the Father in the Catholic sense for that is too difficult to grasp. There you have three “persons” in one being and the absurdity of Father causing the Son and both being the uncaused God!
 
Begotten is unlikely to mean creation by divine power alone for the angels and Adam, (Luke 3:38) were made that way while Jesus is described as the only-begotten. All power is directly God’s power for God made all things so all things are directly created by God anyway.
 
Begotten means something that is closer to the way human beings beget babies. Does that mean Jesus must have been caused by God in the womb of a female without a father as the Matthew gospel is alleged to say? No for Jesus was begotten before anything was made. Adam would have been far more begotten for he didn’t have a mother or father. You may say then that is not close to the way humans beget babies. The answer is that it is the way the first human had to be begotten for he couldn’t be the first human if he had a human father and mother.
 
God could make a force or person who always existed.  
 
Begotten means made as man. So in that understanding, Jesus having always existed as a man would be as much begotten and far more than a man who was born of human parents or who had a mother but no father or who was made directly by God as Adam was.
 
Then the letter goes on to claim that Melchizidek had no father or mother or origin and like Christ will have no end. Like the Son of God he will be a priest forever. Hebrews argues that since Abraham paid him tithes that this tells us that the priesthood of Levi (for which the regulations were made in the first five books of the Bible) was inferior to Melchizedek’s priesthood. This is pure imagination and a sectarian distortion of what the Old Testament says. First, how could Levi and his priestly caste be inferior when he and it were not born yet as Hebrews admits? Secondly, tithes do not prove that Melchizedek’s priesthood was even recognised by Abraham. He may have only respected him as a holy king or have been working on "just in case" logic. The Christians never deal with errors like this but only the ones they can handle and then they arrogantly boast that there is no error in the Bible. The zany logic in Hebrews definitely indicates that the Christians of 70AD had no quotes from Jesus with which to verify his alleged priesthood.

Hebrews 7 says that Melchizidek and Jesus were alike in having had no origin or father or mother. The author might have forgotten himself and written this - if Jesus had been born of Mary a virgin there would have been no way he could have forgotten it. Perhaps Jesus' origins were totally obscure. Or far more plausibly Hebrews meant there was no human father and mother. The assertion would be true if Melchizidek and Jesus had parents who were not human. There is just no way the author of Hebrews could have considered the man Melchizidek to be superior to Christ so he has to be implying that Jesus had no father or mother either but as man always existed.

The reason Melchizidek is referred to is as evidence that Jesus who was better than him must have had no origin from woman and will have no end when things were like that for Melchizidek. The logic is that when Melchizidek had those benefits Jesus being superior and more important would have had them too. But there is no doubt that the Old Testament does not teach these things about Melchizidek though the writer of Hebrews would have us believe that it does. So why does he twist the Old Testament to produce evidence for Jesus’ existence? It is because he is desperate and though an important teacher in the Church he cannot get access to it for it does not exist. He had no evidence apart from the testimony of visionaries and mystics that Jesus rose from the dead and existed. So his Jesus had no miraculous powers. He can’t be referring to anybody who lived in the first century and who claimed to be the Son of God for that would mean he would have had to believe that Jesus had miracle powers even if he never used them. He is definitely showing that the gospel Jesus is a fiction.

Melchizidek is greater than Abraham for he blessed Abraham for only superiors can bless inferiors (7:7). This tells us that Melchizidek was an occultist. Jesus being like him in every respect would mean that Jesus was one too. If God blesses people then inferiors can bless superiors. They cannot do it if they need magical powers to bless and the superiors have those powers. Hebrews tells us Melchizidek is better than Abraham because he shows that the Son of God is the greatest. The Jesus of the gospels then who used divine power and not magic is declared to be a fiction. The loyalty of Jesus to the Law of Moses which the gospels say he had is revealed as another fiction. So Jesus broke God’s law in the Law of Moses that occultism is evil and to be absolutely intolerable.
 
To summarise, Hebrews says that Jesus and Melchizidek had no father or mother and Jesus is the only-begotten Son of God. By a process of elimination, we find that this must be saying that Jesus as man always existed and he did not come from the Virgin Mary. That is a significant proof that the gospel Jesus, the only one that might justify acceptance of Jesus as a historical person, is a fantasy. I mean if you had no mother then you were not born, period.