Joseph Smith was a very bold individual. He made all kinds of daring religious claims and published many of them in writing for all to judge their legitimacy. In 1830, he published a book (The Book of Mormon) of nearly 600 pages of what he claimed to be additional Holy Scripture written by ancient prophets of God. Today, millions of people worldwide hold this book to be the Word of God alongside the Bible.
Claims About Melchizedek’s Genealogy
One of the more daring claims that can be made about Joseph is that through revelation he knew more about the Biblical figures than the Bible itself tells us. Examples of this are very many, however, I wish to focus on just one aspect of Joseph’s contribution to our understand of the mysterious figure of Melchizedek–his background and genealogy, which are notably absent in both the Old and New Testaments.
What the Bible Tells Us
Biographical information on Melchizedek is peculiarly limited in the Bible. In the Old Testament, besides Ps 110:4 (which mentions only the priesthood ”after the order of Melchizedek,” KJV), the only mention we have of this figure is in Gen 14:18-20:
18 And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God.
19 And he blessed him, and said, Blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth:
20 And blessed be the most high God, which hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand. And he gave him tithes of all.
In this passage, we learn that Melchizedek was king of “Salem” (probably Jerusalem), and was “priest” of the most high God (El Elyon). Melchizedek seem to have seniority over Abram as he is the one who brings out the offering and blesses Abram. The phrase “he gave him tithes of all” is rather ambiguous, and doesn’t clearly tell us who gave tithes to whom. It seems that it is Abram who would be giving tithes to the priestly Melchizedek, but this detail is not clear from the text. More to the point, we are simply not told in clear terms who Melchizedek is and how he fits into the overall narrative. He simply appears in this scene and is not mentioned again until his name/title is used in Ps 110.
In the New Testament, the only place he is mentioned is in the Epistle to the Hebrews. The main clues, as far as biographical info goes, are to be found in Heb 7:
1 For this Melchisedec, king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him;
2 To 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;
3 Without 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.
4 Now consider how great this man was, unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils.
The author of Hebrews makes it much more clear that it was Abraham that paid tithes to Melchizedek, emphasizing Melchizedek’s priestly authority over the great patriarch. However, we are still left quite clueless as to who this figure really is. Verse 2 gives us the strange formula about “without father, without mother, without descent…”, which makes it seem like he simply has no geneology. Did he really have no geneology, or, because the author was borrowing from Genesis 14, did he simply not know of any genealogy? That is certainly possible–however, it makes more sense to conclude that, as Joseph Smith suggested, the author is referring to the priesthood here, or at least that Melchizedek could be considered an eternal/immortal figure (”nor end of life”) by virtue of the priesthood that he held.
Joseph Smith’s Inspired Contribution
Through his translation of the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith gave us some interesting “extra-biblical” insight into who Melchizedek was. In Alma 13:14-15, 17-18, the prophet Alma gives some background for the figure of Melchizedek, after whom the order of the high priesthood was named:
14 Yea, humble yourselves even as the people in the days of Melchizedek, who was also a high priest after this same order which I have spoken, who also took upon him the high priesthood forever.
15 And it was this same Melchizedek to whom Abraham paid tithes; yea, even our father Abraham paid tithes of one-tenth part of all he possessed.
• • •
17 Now this Melchizedek was a king over the land of Salem; and his people had waxed strong in iniquity and abomination; yea, they had all gone astray; they were full of all manner of wickedness;
18 But Melchizedek having exercised mighty faith, and received the office of the high priesthood according to the holy order of God, did preach repentance unto his people. And behold, they did repent; and Melchizedek did establish peace in the land in his days; therefore he was called the prince of peace, for he was the king of Salem; and he did reign under his father.
Here we have Alma borrowing from the story in Genesis, but with much greater detail into the fact that he was a “high” priest and how he received that priesthood. Also, we get an important detail that the biblical texts weren’t willing to concede–that Melchizedek had a father.
As he was revising the Bible, Joseph felt inspired to add the following passages to the account in Gen 14, giving us much more details concerning Melchizedek’s background, from which I quote a few:
25 And Melchizedek lifted up his voice and blessed Abram.
26 Now Melchizedek was a man of faith, who wrought righteousness; and when a child he feared God, and stopped the mouths of lions, and quenched the violence of fire.
27 And thus, having been approved of God, he was ordained an high priest after the order of the covenant which God made with Enoch,
28 It being after the order of the Son of God; which order came, not by man, nor the will of man; neither by father nor mother; neither by beginning of days nor end of years; but of God;
32 And men having this faith, coming up unto this order of God, were translated and taken up into heaven.
33 And now, Melchizedek was a priest of this order; therefore he obtained peace in Salem, and was called the Prince of peace.
34 And his people wrought righteousness, and obtained heaven, and sought for the city of Enoch which God had before taken, separating it from the earth, having reserved it unto the latter days, or the end of the world;
35 And hath said, and sworn with an oath, that the heavens and the earth should come together; and the sons of God should be tried so as by fire.
36 And this Melchizedek, having thus established righteousness, was called the king of heaven by his people, or, in other words, the King of peace.
In these passages, Joseph gives us some original details concerning Melchizedek’s life, including his childhood and ordination to the high priesthood. It also emphasizes the idea that it was the priesthood that did not have beginning of days nor end of years because it was of God.
Even greater insight into the genealogy of Melchizedek comes by way of Joseph Smith’s revelations, as recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants. Doctrine and Covenants 84:14-17 gives us the lineage of the priesthood of Melchizedek, which priesthood was passed on to Abraham by Melchizedek himself:
14 Which Abraham received the priesthood from Melchizedek, who received it through the lineage of his fathers, even till Noah;
15 And from Noah till Enoch, through the lineage of their fathers;
16 And from Enoch to Abel, who was slain by the conspiracy of his brother, who received the priesthood by the commandments of God, by the hand of his father Adam, who was the first man-
17 Which priesthood continueth in the church of God in all generations, and is without beginning of days or end of years.
Melchizedek then, according to this passage, was part of the line of the Patriarchs, who were his fathers. This lineage extended from Adam through Abel, down to Enoch, on to Noah, and included Melchizedek, as well. Indeed this is an great insight and, again, one that the Bible does not include. This was truly a bold claim by Joseph, one that did not have support anywhere in the biblical text.
In fact, many biblical scholars would claim that Melchizedek appears to be a Canaanite king/priest of El Elyon in the non-Israelite city of Salem [1]. If this were the case, then Joseph Smith’s idealized connection of Melchizedek to the biblical patriarchs is very much misplaced. Is there no more information to be had on the origins of this mysterious figure? To answer that question, I now turn to pertinent ancient documents.
The Ancients on the Genealogy of Melchizedek
Extant documents of ancient origin which mention Melchizedek are by no means unanimous on the issue of his descent. There are a few available, however, that give great insight into the validity of Joseph Smith’s “theory.”
The Book of the Bee, a Syriac text, demonstrates that there were a number of ancient theories, making the issue complicated:
“NEITHER the fathers nor mother of this Melchizedek were written down in the genealogies; not that he had no natural parents, but that they were not written down. The greater number of the doctors say that he was of the seed of Canaan, whom Noah cursed. In the book of Chronography, however, (the author) affirms and says that he was of the seed of Shem the son of Noah. Shem begat Arphaxar, Arphaxar begat Cainan, and Cainan begat Shâlâh and Mâlâh, Shâlâh was written down in the genealogies; but Mâlâh was not, because his affairs were not sufficiently important to be written down in the genealogies. When Noah died, he commanded Shem concerning the bones of Adam, for they were with them in the ark, and were removed from the land of Eden to this earth. Then Shem entered the ark, and sealed it with his father’s seal, and said to his brethren, ‘My father commanded me to go and see the sources of the rivers and the seas and the structure of the earth, and to return.’ And he said to Mâlâh the father of Melchizedek, and to Yôzâdâk his mother….” (Ch. XXI, Of Melchizedek)
Amazingly, this early Christian text gives a theory very similar to Joseph’s–that Melchizedek was of the lineage of the Patriarchs through Noah.
Likewise, other “non-biblical” sources include him in the line of the Biblical patriarchs, either as a descendent of Noah or of Noah’s brother, Nir (2 Enoch 71:32-33). In the Nag Hammadi texts, he is placed in the line “of Adam [Abel], Enoch, [Noah] you, Melchizedek, [the Priest] of God [Most High]” [2]. In the Targumic and Rabbinic materials, Melchizedek is often specifically named as Shem, the Great High Priest, the eldest son of Noah [3]. The Rabbis understood that Shem-Melchizedek had received his priesthood from his fathers, the Patriarchs, and had passed that priesthood on to Abraham, from whom the Levites would eventually have claim to it [4].
This is by no means a comrehensive commentary on all mentions of Melchizedek in “extra-biblical” religious literature. Interestingly, although the biblical texts have so little to say about him, he was a very popular and intensely studied figure in the intertestamental and early Christian periods. I would venture to say that he was a very important figure in Old Testament times as well, although his significance has been obscured in our texts.
As for Joseph Smith, instead of being far off the mark or obviously inventing preposterous and unsupportable lore about the figure of Melchizedek, his contribution is very much in line with what many of the ancients believed about him. He was a descendant of Noah, Enoch, and Adam. He received the ordination to the high priesthood, as his fathers did, and passed that priesthood on to Abraham. Joseph Smith’s theory is suprisingly well supported by the ancient evidence, although this evidence is not to be found in the Bible anywhere.
References
[1] See arguments in James R. Davila, “Melchizedek: Priest, King, and God,” in The Seductiveness of Jewish Myth: Challenge or Response? (Albany: SUNY Press, 1997), pp. 218-219.
[2] Birger A. Pearson (ed.), Nag Hammadi Codices IX and X, p. 63.
[3] See Tg. Neof. on Gen. 14:18 in M. McNamara (tr.), Targum Neofiti 1:Genesis (AB, 1A; Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1992), p. 92; Tg. Ps.-J. in M. Maher (tr.), Targum Pseudo-Jonathan: Genesis (AB, 1B; Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1992), 58. See also Gen. Rab. 43:1, 44:7; Abot R. Nat. 2, Pirque R. El. 7, 27; b. Ned. 32b;
[4] See arguments in Andrei Orlov, “The Heir of Righteousness and the King of Righteousness: The Priestly Noachic Polemics in 2 Enoch and the Epistle to the Hebrews,” in Journal of Theological Studies, NS, vol. 58, Pt 1, April 2007, pp. 55-57.
10 Comments
You’re certainly correct that the figure of Melchizedek is enigmatic and important to ancient interpreters.
When you remark that biblical scholars think him to be a Canaanite king, but that Joseph Smith’s interpretation is backed up by ancient interpreters, aren’t you collapsing at least a millennium of distance between the early Christian texts and the Canaanite milieu? To really establish this, you’d have to show that Joseph didn’t know of these early Christian traditions, and that he wasn’t simply existing in the same interpretive mode as the interpreters. And how do you know that what exists in, e.g. Syriac manuscripts, represents knowledge “lost” to the Bible, and not simply an attempt to make sense of the enigmas presented in the Bible? James Kugel’s works on interpretation are particularly relevant here, in which he shows (by thousands of examples) that much of ancient interpretation is derived from problems in the Bible, and not (necessarily) representative of authentically ancient (=Biblical) traditions.
Jupiterschild,
Thank you for the great questions! You raise some very important points. How do we know that the explanations given for Melchizedek’s genealogy are not simply creative interpretations of the biblical story? Well, that is certainly a difficult question. I think I would probably agree with Kugel that many of them are. I think many tales and genealogies were created as polemics against other perspectives. I think A. Orlov’s article on priestly polemics that I cited above is a great exploration of that possibility. It is virtually impossible for us to know how ancient these traditions were, or if these ancient authors were just making it all up. The fact that the same traditions are found in multiple and varied sources gives them some weight, I believe, although I realize that this does not prove their antiquity. However, it does not disprove it either. The Bible itself is obviously a compilation/redaction of available sources and the fact that so many details are not included is curious. Perhaps we will never know what details were available to the biblical authors/redactors, but it seems reasonable and, indeed, probable that there were details known to them that they decided to leave out. If you look at J. Davila’s above-cited article, he is certainly of the opinion that there is much info about Melchizedek that was suppressed in the biblical record.
As for Joseph Smith, I think the burden of proof would be on the individual who would claim that he did have access to these ancient documents. The Book of the Bee, for example, wasn’t translated into English until 1886, as far as I know. Likewise, 2 Enoch wasn’t available until long after his time. I don’t have the dates the other sources were published in English at the moment, but I seriously doubt that most of them were available to Smith. Again, I would say that the burden of proof would be on the individual who would claim that a largely uneducated farm boy who spent most of his life on the frontiers of 19th century America would have access to such documents in English. I certainly know of no such proof. It is quite remarkable, if he was simply in an “interpretatiave mode,” that he would come up with an interpretation that finds so much support in ancient documents with which he was likely not familiar.
I am grateful for your input. My post could have paid more attention to some of these details.
Thanks for laying out your thoughts. A perpetual question of mine is whether publication dates for pseudepigraphic texts bear on Joseph Smith’s interpretations, since these things circulated widely and were passed down and became standard ways of looking at the Bible and its problematic interpretations (Kugel’s whole point in _The Bible as it Was_). I think we shouldn’t rely on the weight of “multiple and varied sources”, especially late ones, in positing the antiquity of an interpretation, because of the way these things circulated (again, see Kugel’s thousands of examples of circulating (late) traditions).
It’s interesting to look at the long JST in the Melchizedek passage, because the “stopping the mouths of lions” and “quenching the violence of fire” language comes straight out of Hebrews 11 (KJV), which also deals with Melchizedek. This suggests to me that he drew on other extant interpretations, at least in this small case. And I wouldn’t be surprised to find other similar instances.
What makes ferreting out what Joseph knew and what is authentically ancient difficult is the fact that he’s largely operating in the same mode as the ancient interpreters: he’s a careful reader asking questions of the difficult passages.
Maybe we should not buy so quickly what Kugel has to sell. From what I’ve read, his point of view, at least in some aspects, may be becoming outdated. I don’t think Margaret Barker is the only one who would argue that some of these pseudepigraphal traditions could very well be much older than their supposed date of authorship would indicate. 1 Enoch is a good example of a document for which the date of origin keeps getting pushed back–now it is supposed to have been written in the third or fourth century BC. Barker suggests that the themes found therein are even more ancient, taking them back to the time of Solomon’s Temple. This would make these themes older than much of what we have in the Old Testament.
There are a number of authors (Rachel Elior, Gabrielle Boccacini, to name two) that attribute the Enoch writings to priests who were excluded from temple worship by the corrupt Second Temple priestly caste. For Barker, these were excluded because their ideology represented the beliefs of the older temple which King Josiah’s reform and the Second Temple priests tried to suppress. It may very well be, then, that some of the major themes (of course not all) of the pseudepigraphal literature are not a Second Temple period creation, but actually recall the more ancient tradition of the First Temple. Again, this would make some of the pseudepigraphal traditions more ancient that what we have today in our Old Testament.
I think we need to be careful when judging what we think Joseph knew or not. While it may seem that “stopping the mouths of lions” may be taken directly from Hebrews 11, and perhaps it was, how do we know that the author of Hebrews wasn’t citing a more ancient source or tradition, as occurs a myriad of times in the NT? The NT authors seemed to have no problem quoting from ancient sources without citing the author. Also, just because Joseph uses some lines from scripture to describe ancient occurrences doesn’t mean that he is just being a careful reader/interpreter. He gives too many details that are just not there in the Bible. If you take the Book of Moses and the Book of Abraham and compare them with the biblical text, you would have to assume that he was making up many details. There is just no way to extract that stuff by a close interpretation of the Bible. However, when you compare them with texts like Testament/Apocalypse, etc., of Moses/Abraham you find much in common. I still think the burden of proof is on you to provide evidence that Joseph had access to these texts, or even similar traditions. Take, for example, the Enoch passages of the Book of Moses. I would have to look up the details, but there is only some material in there that even resembles 1 (Ethiopic) Enoch, which was translated into English in the early 1800s. According to Nibley, it appears that 1 Enoch wasn’t available at all in the US until the 1840s, after the Book of Moses was written. Other material from the Book of Moses is more similar to 2 Enoch, which, as far as I can tell, wasn’t available in English until at least the 1890s. One of my (non-LDS) professors specifically indicated to me that Joseph Smith had included details about Enoch that were not available until long after Joseph’s death. The Book of Abraham has even more great examples of this. Where would Joseph be getting these traditions from? You have to provide some concrete evidence–not that these traditions were floating around or being passed down. I don’t know of any evidence for what you are assuming.
While I think you make some good points, and I think you may be right in some cases, it is my firm belief that Joseph Smith was NOT largely operating in the same mode as the ancient interpreters.
I’ll try to respond in order.
Maybe we should not buy so quickly what Kugel has to sell. From what I’ve read, his point of view, at least in some aspects, may be becoming outdated. I’d love to see who takes it on. I’ve heard professors privately disagree with Kugel’s modus, but I’m interested to see what comes out in print. What evidence would you personally cite to suggest that he’s becoming outdated?
I don’t think Margaret Barker is the only one who would argue that some of these pseudepigraphal traditions could very well be much older than their supposed date of authorship would indicate. You use throughout the post “could very well be” and “Margaret Barker suggests”, and then go on to speak as if this has been demonstrated. In these cases, the burden of proof is on you/them to demonstrate how we know these are ancient. This is my main point, that Barker’s whole line of reasoning is based on a gigantic supposition that hasn’t been demonstrated. I’m not against suppositions per se; we know the field is full of them. But they must be used responsibly, and it seems like the small group of Barker followers generally isn’t circumspect enough about the hypotheticalities and suppositions. Here’s an example (with all due consideration for blog format limitations): For Barker, these were excluded because their ideology represented the beliefs of the older temple which King Josiah’s reform and the Second Temple priests tried to suppress. It may very well be, then, that some of the major themes (of course not all) of the pseudepigraphal literature are not a Second Temple period creation, but actually recall the more ancient tradition of the First Temple. Again, this would make some of the pseudepigraphal traditions more ancient that what we have today in our Old Testament. Where’s the evidence? This is heaping hypothesis upon hypothesis: a) that the authors of Enoch were priests excluded from the second temple system, b) that they were excluded because of their adherence to First-Temple themes, and c) that therefore these themes go back to First-Temple worship. At this point, then, Barker et al. are able to pick and choose those themes that they want to be early. The problem is, of course, that, just as with Joseph Smith, it becomes very difficult, if not impossible, to tell what is ancient and what is interpretation based on ancient documents. There is absolutely no control.
While it may seem that “stopping the mouths of lions” may be taken directly from Hebrews 11, and perhaps it was, how do we know that the author of Hebrews wasn’t citing a more ancient source or tradition, as occurs a myriad of times in the NT? We don’t know for sure, but the exact quotation in the English of the KJV makes it a pretty safe bet that that’s where he got it from. This is similar to the Isaiah problem. There’s pretty good evidence that Joseph had a KJV open to Isaiah when he was working on the Book of Mormon (many words italicized in his version were omitted because he knew that they “weren’t” in the Hebrew, just as we have them italicized today). In the absence of evidence of said tradition, and presence of well-known KJV treating the same exact subject, I think we’re looking beyond the mark to suggest it’s something else.
Now my problem, as you rightly point out, is that there is other stuff in there that is obviously not an NT quotation, and so it’s not a simple step between Hebrews 11 and his entire interpretation of the Melchizedek passages. The way I think about this is with the idea (Bushman’s I think) that Joseph Smith had an interpretive “green thumb”, that is, he would weave things together from many sources in his revelations, including new material, to produce something genuinely new. In this regard, I certainly didn’t mean to say that he is just being a careful reader/interpreter, unless by “careful reader/interpreter” one intends broad and novel interpretations based on varied sources. That is, he wasn’t producing a commentary on Hebrews, Genesis, or anything else, at least not in the way we understand commentaries currently.
One also has to be careful about how one deals with the JST. Even the most conservative LDS scholars don’t hold it to be a pure restoration of an original text.
You might have misunderstood me when I say that he’s in the same mode as the ancient interpreters, because I was simply saying that many of the same things that piqued his interest piqued the interest of interpreters thousands of years before. To clarify, I’m *not* making a comment on whether these are inspired or not, but given that it is indisputable that Joseph Smith’s own experience, thoughts, etc. are a major factor in his revelations, I think it’s important to keep on the table the modes of interpretation. I was merely saying that he, like the ancients, was interested in the figure of Melchizedek, where he came from, how he fits into the genealogical picture, etc. It’s no accident that he, like the ancients, asked these questions, because he was reading carefully.
I still think the burden of proof is on you to provide evidence that Joseph had access to these texts, or even similar traditions. Fair enough, and this is part of a longer-term project I’m working on. One must recall, however, that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, and even though I agree that to make my argument cogent I need to back it up with a detailed treatment of exactly what we know was available when, all the same we shouldn’t base our supposition of the antiquity of Joseph’s interpretations on an argument from silence.
This is why I brought up Kugel. One may dispute his methods and conclusions, but I think what is beyond dispute (and it’s actually not his original argument) is that the interpretive texts began to flourish in the Second Temple period. It is during this time that some kind of canonical status began to be achieved for texts of the Hebrew Bible and that people began asking questions of these received texts, and offering their answers. What Kugel tried to show was the varied answers that were given to the same (or very similar) questions (viz., who was Melchizedek, etc.).
Where would Joseph be getting these traditions from? You have to provide some concrete evidence–not that these traditions were floating around or being passed down. I don’t know of any evidence for what you are assuming. Didn’t you just say the opposite when you argued for Barker’s assumptions in the face of no evidence? Where’s the concrete evidence? (For her, the evidence was destroyed, at least the “original” evidence.) And this brings me back to my main point:
In your post we have an example of the common practice of building suppositions on assumptions and then using it as evidence that some interpretation of Joseph Smith’s is ancient. In order to get his take on Melchizedek back even to the early first millennium BC, and to the “original details” you suppose Joseph Smith to have been restoring, you have to assume 1) that Joseph Smith could not have come up with the same things as the ancient interpreters, such as the tradition you cite from the Book of the Bee, 2) that the ancient interpreters, all of whom wrote long after the bulk of the Hebrew Bible was written, represent an authentically old (i.e. second-first millennium) tradition, 3) that Joseph Smith and these authors are drawing on that authentically ancient tradition and not the former on the latter, and that 4) even if it goes back into first temple times, it can be taken back even further into premonarchic Israel. Is this really more reasonable than saying that the biblical text constrained the possible interpretations of its more problematic texts (see next comment) and that the reasons Joseph Smith came to some of the same conclusions as the ancient interpreters was because he was asking the same questions and bound by the same constraints?
A good analogy, in my opinion, is of the (re)examinations of Jesus’ life represented in the Gospel of Judas, the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, of Philip, and the Apocryphon of John. Who supposes that these represent some authentic biographical information instead of a rethinking of Jesus’ life and an interpretation thereof? Probably those who want to see some aspect of these works as authentic. Just like the traditions about Melchizedek, these works riff on the murkier traditions of the canon, on those characters about whom less is known, and where there’s room (and a need) for interpretation.
Since this comment is already way, way too long, I’ll break here and offer a response to the data cited in the original post in the next comment.
Okay, I started working up a detailed exposition on Melchizedek, Joseph Smith, and Hebrews, and realize it’s not going to be possible to lay it out and keep the comment to a reasonable length. More important, I really need to be able to use tables, and I can’t figure out how to do that in a comment. I may put up something on FPR if I get to it.
But here’s the gist of my argument:
We can’t dismiss the idea that Alma 13 and JST Gen 14 grew out of a dialogue with Genesis 14, Psalm 110:4, and Hebrews 6, 7, 11.
Here are some points to be made from these chapters: In Hebrews Melchizedek isn’t specifically called a High Priest, but Jesus, operating after the Order of Melchizedek, is (see the end of Hebrews 6, etc.). I don’t think it bolsters the case for antiquity at all that Joseph Smith understood Melchizedek as High Priest. “High Priest” is used over and over in Hebrews.
The themes of men of faith and righteousness, of whom Melchizedek is named as one in JST Gen 14:26, is central in Hebrews (see 7:2 and all of 11). Beyond this, as I mentioned previously, the exact wording of JST 14:26 comes from Heb 11:33-34, namely “wrought righteousness,” and “stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire”.
JST Gen 14:28 and Heb 7:3 share language as well. Heb 7:3: “Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God.” JSTGen 14:28: “It being after the order of the Son of God; which order came, not by man, nor the will of man; neither by father nor mother; neither by beginning of days nor end of years; but of God;”
This passage gets us to the heart of what Hebrews is trying to say, and how the JST of Gen 14 takes a different tack. The crux of Hebrews 7 (really beginning at the end of 6) is to show the link between Jesus and the High Priesthood. It takes two important pieces of information from the Hebrew Bible, namely, that there was a guy Melchizedek who shows up out of nowhere in Genesis 14, and he’s called both a King and a Priest. He administers food (Heb “lechem” probably means food here) and wine to Abraham, and Abraham pays him a tithe. In this story, Melchizedek is clearly the superior. Then, in Ps 110, we have the enigmatic phrase, sworn by God “thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek”. Hebrews uses this to say that the Melchizedek priesthood, which does not appear to be patrilineal (”without father or mother…”, compare the Aaronid/Levitical priesthood), must then be superior to the Aaronid priesthood. Since Christ is not of Levi/Aaron, this is how he can be a high priest. And this allows the author of Hebrews to make the connection between Christ and the High Priest who enters the Holy of Holies. Thus the point of saying “without father and mother” is not so much an argument about Melchizedek’s lack of parents as it is to make a statement about the type of priesthood he held, and therefore the type held by Christ. (Of course, it does relate to the question about who his parents were, how he fit into the genealogical schema).
Joseph Smith makes a similar argument, though he argues that it was the Priesthood itself that was “without father or mother”, not having been established by anyone but God. This is a very subtle differentiation from and slight disagreement with (or perhaps clarification of) Hebrews. The business about the oath and covenant is also found in Hebrews, which relies on the oath language of Ps 110. The author of Hebrews uses this language to differentiate further these two priesthoods, since Levitical priests didn’t apparently take an oath on entering the priesthood, but there is an oath attached to the order of Melchizedek. (See Heb 7:20-28).
In Hebrews, the purpose of this High Priest after the order of Melchizedek was to cause people to enter the presence of God. This is similar to what the JST has, though he takes it a step further and connects Melchizedek’s priesthood to Enoch and the covenant the JST tells us God made with Enoch (=not to destroy the earth by flood and that he would call upon the children of Noah to come to Him). Enoch is of course the archetype of those who enter God’s presence, and I think that this is where the brilliance of the JST lies.
To conclude this dash through a fraction of the evidence, I think that the overt similarities not just in the language shared by Alma/JST/D&C 84 and Gen 14/Ps110/Hebrews, but also in the primary concerns of each text and the way they think of the priesthood, makes it difficult to posit the interaction of any other source. The primary themes in the JST/Alma/D&C84 are well established in Hebrews, and though Joseph Smith took them to new ends, these texts are clearly related to one another.
The things that you use to connect Alma/JST to ancient sources like the Book of the Bee, namely the lineage of Melchizedek and his being a high priest are quite weak. All of these sources (Alma/JST/Book of the Bee) knew Hebrews or traditions like it. It’s not astonishing that given the texts of the Bible that two interpreters come up with a very similar solution. Especially when those interpreters believe the Bible to be the word of God. So unless one wants to condemn Abraham’s almsgiving as a pagan rite, there are very few choices for where Melchizedek came from. He couldn’t have come through Ham or Japheth. And as for his High Priesthood, adding the word “high” to “priest” can’t prove anything, especially when it’s used all over Hebrews. That both JST and Book of the Bee disagree with what Hebrews seems to say about Melchizedek’s spontaneous generation is not surprising–I’d disagree with this reading of Hebrews too, along similar lines.
This is not to reduce, however, the JST (etc.) to Hebrews. If I, as a believer, had to summarize the JST, it would be “inspired interpretation” (again, you’d be hard pressed to find a careful LDS scholar who thinks the JST restores an ancient record). That is, what Joseph Smith does with the information available to him is complex and spiritually interesting. As with most interpretations, he takes old material and weaves it with a new perspective, making something new altogether. Just as Hebrews did with Gen 14 and Ps 110 and the knowledge of Jesus’ life. Just as the Book of the Bee did. I just happen to be taken in more by Joseph Smith’s revelation on priesthood, no matter how he got that revelation. We do ourselves and other believers a disservice when we use “parallels” to posit “original details” or some kind of scientifically verifiable antiquity.
All right, so that wasn’t a very reasonable length. Sorry.
By the way, the Book of the Bee, while a very interesting read, not an early Christian text. It is dated by Budge to the 13th century a.d. (!).
Thank you for expressing your opinions, Jupiterschild. Your points are well taken and I think you are not incorrect on many of your ideas. On some points, such as the late date of the Book of the Bee, I accept blame for–I was kind of rushing when I wrote this post. On the idea that Joseph Smith was an inspired interpreter–surely he was. However, I believe that his genius came from his vision of the big picture–and I think that is what you are missing.
Joseph Smith knew how the plan of salvation worked and how God worked in history in much greater detail than the Bible explains to us. I think he searched for ways to express that vision through Biblical passages and terms that people were familiar with–but he could see beyond the Bible’s limitations. The Bible gives us excerpts-pieces of the whole puzzle. Joseph put the best pieces together and gave us more.
The example of Melchizedek is a good one. There is a whole lot going on in Hebrews that cannot be drawn from Genesis or Psalm 110. But the author of Hebrews isn’t just taking “old material and weav[ing] it with a new perspective, making something new altogether,” as you suggest. This is a very narrow view. There are many contemporary and pre-Christian traditions that indicate that people knew a whole lot more about Melchizedek than what is expressed in the canonized Scriptures. It is likely that the Christians had access to materials that presented Melchizedek not simply as a mortal priest, but as a divine being, a Heavenly High Priest. The writers at Qumran saw Melchizedek as a divine being, who in 11QMelchizedek is described as one of the elohim, administers the final judgment, is a divine warrior, and is closely tied to the Day of Atonement. In the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, he seems to be described as part of the angelic priesthood, a heavenly priest of the assembly of God. The Second Book of Jeu, the Pistis Sophia, and many Gnostic texts found at Nag Hammadi also describe him as an angelic figure. Such traditions serve to make a logical connection between Jesus Christ and Melchizedek for early Christians. Dr. James Davila follows the development of these traditions:
He continues by asking, “How do we get from Melchizedek the priest-king to Melchizedek the god?”
I’m telling you jc, this type of theory is becoming more and more prevalent. These “interpreters” weren’t always just building on what little material they could find in what would become our Bible. I believe that many had a much larger arsenal of ancient traditions that they were working with. Much of the Old Testament was written by such “interpreters.” The writers of the Deuteronomic history and Chronicles–where did they get their information, centuries after the fact? They had documents and traditions at hand that are only summarized (or are absent) in our Scriptures today. Surely you wouldn’t suggest that such texts, or at least oral traditions, never existed. Why can’t some of the material in the Second Temple extra-canonical writings be based on such traditions–which could make them older than some of what we have in the OT? There is more and more evidence that this could be the case. Why, for example, does the theology of, say, 1 Enoch, match better the theology of J than that of the Deuteronomists? Why can Enoch–like Jacob, Abraham, Moses and Isaiah–see God when the Deuteronomists would have no one see Him? Some of the oldest traditions perceptible in the OT begin to be supressed by the time of the return from exile–only to turn up again in the pseudepigraphal/apocalyptic literature.
You mention that even mainstream theories are dealing with many suppositions–such is the nature of doing research in ancient studies. I think it is important to remember that even well-accepted theories are hypotheses that must be tested against the evidence. Theories like those of Kugel may hold weight for a time, but they must always be tested against new evidence–and they are having to accomodate a whole lot of new evidence now. And if you think Barker doesn’t have evidence to back up her ideas, you haven’t read her material. Take, for example, her book “The Great Angel: A Study of Israel’s Second God.” You cannot read a book like that and say that the woman does not have evidence.
What were scholars saying with absolute confidence about Melchizedek before the Dead Sea Scrolls were found? Likewise, many thought it impossible for a Jew to have used the title “son of God”, assuming it must have been imported from Hellenistic thought. Jesus cannot possibly have been seen as ’son of God’ by Jews. And then the Dead Sea Scrolls were found…
This recalls Thomas Kuhn’s “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.” People become hostile to new ideas. How many scholars, clergymen, etc., refused to take seriously the Dead Sea Scrolls or Nag Hammadi texts for so long? New evidence often requires the creation of new hypotheses. You might want to consider how much of the current “knowledge” in the field is just a “hypothesis” based on a very limited view of the big picture. In the world of biblical studies, these “other texts” are part of the bigger picture now. If you want to stay focused on the smaller picture, be my guest. Just don’t be shocked when views like those of Margaret Barker’s are suddenly the mainstream and the old hypothesis, just like the flat earth theory, fade away like other limited views of the past. Forgive me if I choose to be on the boat that’s moving forward.
Thanks for your measured and more detailed response. I want to say up front that I’m enjoying this conversation and hope I’m being civil (I’ve gotten a little overheated in the past–so I trust you’ll let me know if I cross any lines). It’s a topic I’ve worked on in my head a lot but it’s rare that I find conversation partners who are dealing in Second Temple interpretation.
Let me say up front that it’s apparent that I didn’t make the point clearly enough that I was speaking specifically to the particular case of JST-Hebrews in my exposition of what I think is going on in those specific chapters. I wasn’t asserting that everything in the NT and other II-Temple writings only goes back to the Hebrew Bible as we have it. I just don’t see what in Hebrews 7 relies on other texts. The main points are being made from the Hebrew Bible because I think the author of Hebrews is prooftexting to make his case. And I think he does it elegantly. What in Hebrews 7 would you see coming from other traditions?
There are many contemporary and pre-Christian traditions that indicate that people knew a whole lot more about Melchizedek than what is expressed in the canonized Scriptures…. It is likely that the Christians had access to materials that presented Melchizedek not simply as a mortal priest, but as a divine being, a Heavenly High Priest.
Again I say: My beef is not with the possibility that there are ancient traditions out there about Melchizedek that were “suppressed” in the Hebrew Bible, but I just don’t know how one can recognize them, when the whole endeavor of biblical interpretation incorporated, for the most part, the very text of the bible it’s interpreting. My beef is that people (esp. at FARMS) say Christian Interpreters “knew more about Melchizedek”–it’s about the rhetoric used to characterize the evidence. I agree that the Christians had access to much more material than exists in the Bible–only an ignoramus would say otherwise. I just don’t see it in Hebrews 7. Hebrews has a different agenda. I don’t deny that Hebrews could have known these other traditions (and probably did), but I see the bulk of the influences in that chapter arising from the Hebrew Bible, or at least I don’t see anything that has to be coming from an outside source.
These “interpreters” weren’t always just building on what little material they could find in what would become our Bible. I believe that many had a much larger arsenal of ancient traditions that they were working with. Much of the Old Testament was written by such “interpreters.” The writers of the Deuteronomic history and Chronicles–where did they get their information, centuries after the fact? They had documents and traditions at hand that are only summarized (or are absent) in our Scriptures today. When did I say otherwise? I think these things are the case as well. The difference between you and me is in our confidence in our ability to discern that which is old from that which is contemporary. How, for example, can you say that Melchizedek’s involvement in the Day of Atonement isn’t a secondary development from the fact that he’s called a priest?
Why can’t some of the material in the Second Temple extra-canonical writings be based on such traditions–which could make them older than some of what we have in the OT? They can. How can you tell the difference, though? There’s no really good way, because anything can be construed under Barker’s modus: if there’s no really old evidence of the tradition in question, it’s because it’s been suppressed. If it’s only fragmentary, it wasn’t successfully suppressed. So anything can be posited as ancient. This runs into the idea that traditions developed precisely as a way of explaining what was fragmentary in the received text. So when a later text elaborates on a biblical text that’s only fragmentary, Barker says that that elaboration is ancient, having been unsuccessfully suppressed by the Deuteronomists. This is not very sound methodology.
Why, for example, does the theology of, say, 1 Enoch, match better the theology of J than that of the Deuteronomists? Why can Enoch–like Jacob, Abraham, Moses and Isaiah–see God when the Deuteronomists would have no one see Him?
Uh, because 1 Enoch liked J, just like we do? Even if I didn’t know the documentary hypothesis, I could write an interpretation using only J simply because if my proclivities were bent toward an anthropomorphic god, those would be the texts I’d focus on, to the exclusion of the Deuteronomist’s stuff, because I don’t like that theology. This cannot be taken as solid evidence of a connection between 1 Enoch and J/early traditions. This is what D did–he had J and E in separate narratives before him when he was writing his own narrative, and he happened to like the E stuff more, and based his theology on it, even though he had access to J and even incorporated it into his narrative.
As for the Davila quotes, thanks for excerpting them. I’m interested to see who is buying Barker. I’ve not read the article and I’d be interested to see some of his actual argumentation and not just his “proposal”. How does he propose to differentiate the ancient from the contemporary? Does he think all of the traditions of the last judgment, divine being, etc. were suppressed in the Hebrew Bible? If so, that’s a pretty big jump, since the idea of a last judgment isn’t present in the Hebrew Bible.
I’ve read plenty of Barker, and I agree that she marshals a lot of data. I wouldn’t call it evidence, though. To be clear, I’m all for the publication and discussion of new and radical ideas. I’m glad for her emphasis on the Temple and for her incessant search for first temple traditions in second temple literature. I think people who hold a rigid division between the two are grossly overstating the situation. But I’m still waiting for her to expound on her methods, on how exactly we can tell, instead of crafting a slick narrative of how it went down. Until then, I remain a skeptic.
People become hostile to new ideas. People also become hostile to ideas that don’t hold water. I’d be careful about citing other people as evidence, rather than data as evidence. (It’s a lesson I’m still trying to learn.) It happens too often that to make our arguments we pile up names of our own contemporaries instead of the supporting evidence. That’s not to say that we shouldn’t footnote anything–on the contrary. In referencing Kugel I’ve tried to show exactly where
I’m with him and why (though I might not have done this terribly well).
Just don’t be shocked when views like those of Margaret Barker’s are suddenly the mainstream and the old hypothesis, just like the flat earth theory, fade away like other limited views of the past. And then someone smarter than Barker will come along and her views will be outdated and unfounded …
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[...] Filed under: Uncategorized This brief study was inspired by a recent post at Heavenly Ascents on the genealogy of Melchizedek. I’ve been wanting to post some of my thoughts on “the blood of righteous Abel” [...]