Timothy to Hebrews - The Preterist Archive

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Hebrews VII. 1-3. 445
according to Ps, ex. he must be a high priest after the order of
Melchisedec, was greatly superior to the Levitical priesthood as well
as to the Mosaical law.
The first of these three parts divides itself again into two lines
of thought ; in ver. 1-3 it is shewn that the priesthood of Melchisedec
is an eternal priesthood, in ver. 4-10 that Melchisedec tooh tithes
from Levi.
Vers. 1-3. Ovrog points back to chap. vi. 20. This Melchisedec,
namely, he who is spoken of in Ps. ex. The principal nerve of the
passage lies, of course, in the principal verb piivsL elg to dLrjveKsg (not
as Storr would have it in the words t:pfir]VEv6iJ.evog j3aGiXevg diKaioavvrjg).
It was already intimated in chap. vi. 20, that Christ is like Melchisedec
an eternal high priest. And now in vers. 1-3, it is ex
plained in how far Melchisedec's priesthood was eternal, and in like
manner it is then shewn in vers. 20-28 in how far Christ's priesthood
was eternal. It can therefore not be doubted that the words
abideth for ever contain the principal idea of the sentence. All
the other parts from vers. 1-3 are only accessary members of an explanatory
kind.
The question, however, still remains in what relation does this
principal idea stand to the thesis chap, iv. 20. Are we to take the
yap in an argumentative sense, and is it the intention of the author
to prove in vers. 1-3 that Christ was a high priest after the order
of Melchisedec ? And does the proof consist in this, that Melchisedec
was an eternal priest, and that, in like manner, an eternal
priesthood belongs also to Christ, so that in virtue of this tertium
comparationis—eternity—Christ can be called a high priest after the
order of Melchisedec.?
This cannot possibly have been the author's
intention. He must in this case have left out the words dg rov
aldva in the thesis chap. vi. 20, and, instead of this, must have introduced
immediately after ver. 3 what he says from vers. 20-28.
(The train of thought must then have been : Christ is a high priest
after the manner of Melchisedec; for, Melchisedec's priesthood was
eternal, Christ's priesthood was also eternal, ergo.)—In reality, however,
the author was under no necessity whatever of proving that
Christ's priesthood was and must be after the order of Melchisedec.
This had already been settled at chap. v. 1-10, and settled on the
ground that the prophetical psalm, Ps. ex., contains the calling of
the Messiah to the priestly dignity, and that the psalmist had
therefore before-hand ascribed to the Messiah the priestly in conjunction
with the kingly honour. No, it is not the aim of the author
to prove in chap. vii. 1-3 that the priesthood of Christ is of the same
order as that of Melchisedec, but, from the thesis already established,
chap. vi. 20, to draw inferences, the inference, namely that the p'iesthood
of the Messiah is superior to the Levitical priesthood.