the Son of God, when He
inquired of the Pharisees, "What think ye of Christ? Whose son is
he?" on their saying, "The son of David," asked, "How then
can David in spirit call him Lord, saying, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit thou
on my right hand"? practically interpreting the text as not only calling
Him the Lord of David, but the Lord also of the Spirit in the prophet. And if
the prophetic Spirit, which we believe to be the Holy Spirit, confesses Him to
be Lord, Who He teaches shares the Father's Throne, and not generally but as
"His own Lord," how incomparably more certain is it that the rational
powers, who corne after the Holy Spirit, must say the same, and the whole
visible creation, embodied and unembodied, of which of course the only Sharer
of the Father's Throne would be marked out as Lord, by Whose agency all things
came into being, as the holy apostle says: "In him all things were
created, of things in heaven, and things in earth, visible and invisible."
For He alone would have the authority of likeness to the Father, as being the
only Person shewn to be throned with Him.
It is therefore plain
that it would be wrong to allot to any among begotten beings the sitting at the
right hand of the Almighty's rule and kingdom, except to Him alone Whom I have
shewn in many ways, by what I have laid before you, to be God. Understand then,
that the Highest and Almighty Lord bestows on one and the same being the words,
"Sit thou on my right hand," and also, "Before the morning-star
I have begotten thee," and He delivers with an oath of confirmation the
honour unshakeable and immutable of the continuous priesthood for ever and
ever, "The Lord swore and will not repent, Thou art a priest for
ever." And who could be supposed—leaving human beings out of account —
even of those of the nature of
angels, to have been
begotten of God, and made a priest for ever, but He alone Who also said in the
former (b) prophecy, "The Lord created me as the beginning of the way for
his works, before the ages he established me, in the beginning before the
mountains were established, before all the hills he begets me." Give your
careful attention to understanding the relations of the present Psalm to the
words quoted in the previous passage; in this one the Most High God establishes
to share His own throne the Second Lord, who is our Lord, saying, "Sit
thou on my right hand," while in the preceding one the Scripture said that
(c) His throne would remain for ever and ever, calling Him at the same time God
when it says, "Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever." Again, in
the passage before us, it says, "The Lord shall send the rod of thy power
out of Sion," and in the other, "The sceptre of righteousness is the
sceptre of thy kingdom"; and once more this passage says, "Sit thou
on my right hand, until I make thine enemies the footstool of thy feet, and
thou shalt rule in the midst of thine enemies," and the former one,
"Thy arrows are sharp, O mighty one, in the heart of the (d) king's
enemies." So that what is said about His enemies in both is in agreement.
Who, then, seeing with his eyes in the midst of cities, villages and countries
throughout the world the Churches of our Saviour, the peoples ruled by Him, and
the vast multitudes of those sanctified by Him encircled on all sides by
enemies and foes of the teaching of Christ, some visible among men, some
invisible and beyond the power of sight, would not wonder at this oracie
addressed to the person of the subject of the prophecy, which says, "Rule
in the (222) midst of thine enemies"? And while in the previous passage we
read, "Anointed with the oil of gladness above thy fellows"—it being
the Hebrew custom to anoint priests —the passage before us now pronounces Him
priest in clearer terms, adding more teaching about Him, by which we learn that
He unlike all previous priests is the Eternal Priest, an idea which cannot be
associated with mere (b) humanity. He says that He is made a priest after the
order of Melchizedek, in contradistinction to the ordinance of
the Mosaic priesthood,
held either by Aaron or any of his descendants, none of whom were priests until
they had been anointed with a prepared ointment, and so became, as by type and
symbol, a kind of shadowy and symbolical Christ. He was one of course that
because of his mortality could not extend his priesthood long, and moreover was
only consecrated for Jewish people, not for the other nations. He did not enter
on his priestly duty under an oath of God, but was only honoured by the
judgment of men, so that it was sometimes the case that something unworthy of
God's service was found in them, as is recorded of Eli. And moreover besides
all this, that ancient priest of the Mosaic order could only be selected from
the tribe of Levi. It was obligatory without exception that he should be of the
family descending from Aaron, and do service to God in outward worship with the
sacrifices and blood of irrational animals. But he that is named Melchizedek,
which in Greek is translated "king of righteousness," who was king of
Salem, which would mean "king of peace," without father, without
mother, without line of descent, not having, according to the account,
"beginning of years, nor end of life," had no characteristics shared
by the Aaronic priesthood. For he was not chosen by men, he was not anointed
with prepared oil, he was not of the tribe of those who had not yet been born;
and strangest of all, he was not even circumcised in his flesh, and yet he
blesses Abraham, as if he were far better than he; he did not act as priest to
the Most High God with sacrifices and libations, nor did he minister at the
Temple in Jerusalem. How could he? it did not yet exist. And he was such of
course because there was going to be no similarity between our Saviour Christ
and Aaron, for He was neither to be designated priest after a period when He
was not priest, nor was He to become priest, but be it. For we should notice
carefully in the words, "Thou art a priest for ever," He does not
say, "Thou shalt be what thou wert not before," any more than,
"Thou wert that before, which thou art not now"—but by Him Who said,
"I am that I am," it is said, "Thou art, and remainest, a priest
for ever."
Since, then, Christ
neither entered on His priesthood in time, nor sprang from the priestly tribe,
nor was anointed with prepared and outward oil, nor will ever reach the
end of His priesthood,
nor will be established only for the Jews but for all nations, for all these
reasons He is rightly said to have forsaken the priesthood after Aaron's type,
and to be a priest after the order of Melchizedek. And the fulfilment of the
oracle is truly wondrous, to one who recognizes how our Saviour Jesus the
Christ of God even now performs through His ministers even to-day i sacrifices
after the manner of Melchizedek's. For just as he, who was priest of the
Gentiles, is not represented as offering outward sacrifices, but as blessing
Abraham only with wine and bread, in exactly the same way our Lord and Saviour
Himself first, and then all His priests among all nations, perform the
spiritual sacrifice according to the customs of the Church, and with wine and
bread darkly express the mysteries of His Body and saving Blood. This by the
Holy Spirit Melchizedek foresaw, and used the figures of what was to come, as
the Scripture of Moses witnesses, when it says:
"And Melchizedek,
king of Salem, brought out bread and wine: and he was priest of the Most High
God, and he blessed Abraham."
And thus it followed
that only to Him with the addition of an oath:
"The Lord God
sware, and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of
Melchizedek."
Hear, too, what the apostle
also says about this:
"17. Wherein God
willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of the kingdom the immutability
of his counsel mediated it by an oath: 18. That by two immutable things, in
which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong encouragement,
who have fled for refuge to lay hold on the hope set before us."
And he adds:
"23. And they
indeed have been made priests many in number, because that by death they were
hindered from continuing. 24. But he, because he abideth, hath an unchangeable
priesthood. 25. Wherein he is able to save to the uttermost them that come unto
(b) God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession
for them. 26. For such
an high priest became us, who is holy, guileless, undefiled, separated from
sinners, and made higher than the heavens."
And he adds:
"1. Now in the
things which we are saying the chief point is this: We have such an high
priest, who sat down on the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens, 2. a
minister of the holy things, and of the true tabernacle, which God has pitched,
and not man."
So says the apostle.
The Psalm too,
continuing, shews in veiled phrase even the Passion of the Subject of the
prophecy, saying: "He shall drink of the brook in the way, therefore shall
he lift up his head." And another Psalm shews "the brook" to
mean the time of temptations: "Our soul hath passed through the brook,
yea, our soul has passed through the deep waters." He drinks, then, in the
brook, it says, that cup, evidently, of which He darkly spoke at the time of
His Passion, when He said: "Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass
from me." And also, "If it be not possible for it to pass from me,
except I drink it, thy will be done."
It was, then, by
drinking this cup that He lifted up His head, as the apostle also says, for
when he was "Obedient to the Father unto death, even the death of
the cross, therefore," he says, "God hath highly exalted him,"
raising Him from the dead, and setting Him at His right hand, far above all
rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name which is named, not
only in this world, but in that which is to come. And He hath put all things in
subjection under his feet, according to the promise made to Him, which He
expresses through the Psalmist, saying, "Sit thou on my right hand, until
I make thine enemies the footstool of thy feel. Be thou ruler in the midst of
thine enemies."
It is plain to all that
to-day the power of our Saviour and the word of His teaching rule over all them
that have believed in Him, in the midst of His enemies and foes.