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    Melchizedek at Qumran

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    Estudio LucaRecords
    The document discusses 11QMelchizedek, a scroll found at Qumran that features a figure named Melchizedek playing a central role in end times events. In the text, Melchizedek takes on the roles of God and brings spiritual and material release to God's people. The document analyzes how the text illustrates the connection between temple theology and messianic expectations in the late Second Temple period.

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    Melchizedek at Qumran

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    Estudio LucaRecords
    205 views1 page
    The document discusses 11QMelchizedek, a scroll found at Qumran that features a figure named Melchizedek playing a central role in end times events. In the text, Melchizedek takes on the roles of God and brings spiritual and material release to God's people. The document analyzes how the text illustrates the connection between temple theology and messianic expectations in the late Second Temple period.

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    Melchizedek at Qumran

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    The document discusses 11QMelchizedek, a scroll found at Qumran that features a figure named Melchizedek playing a central role in end times events. In the text, Melchizedek takes on the roles of God and brings spiritual and material release to God's people. The document analyzes how the text illustrates the connection between temple theology and messianic expectations in the late Second Temple period.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    205 views1 page

    Melchizedek at Qumran

    Uploaded by

    Estudio LucaRecords
    The document discusses 11QMelchizedek, a scroll found at Qumran that features a figure named Melchizedek playing a central role in end times events. In the text, Melchizedek takes on the roles of God and brings spiritual and material release to God's people. The document analyzes how the text illustrates the connection between temple theology and messianic expectations in the late Second Temple period.

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    Dr Crispin Fletcher Louis

    Westminster Theological Centre

    MELCHIZEDEK AT QUMRAN
    (abstract)
    11QMelchizedek is one of the more important scrolls found in the library of the Qumran
    community. Although fragmentary and only a small part of what was probably a much longer
    scroll, column 2 preserves a vital piece of evidence for the messianic hopes of ordinary Jews at the
    turn of the eras. In this text a mysterious Melchizedek ( ) takes centre stage in the drama
    of the end-times. The text has received much scholarly comment, though most have probably
    misinterpreted it by reading it through a dualistic lens. Melchizedek takes the role of Israel's God in
    Isaiah 61:2 the year of the LORD's favour' becomes 'the year of Melchizedek's favour' and
    Melchizedek wreaks God's vengeance. The 'God' ( )of Psalm 82:1 is also identified as
    Melchizedek. This does not mean Melchizedek is an 'angel' in the normal, twentieth-century
    understanding of that word in a purely spiritual, non-physical sense. Rather, Melchizedek's 'divine'
    identity must be understood as a witness to the much older biblical notion of divine kingship.
    Melchizedek is very much the human king and priest of Genesis 14 and Psalm 110 as much as a
    heavenly, divine figure. His appearance takes place at the Day of Atonement of an eschatological
    jubilee. He brings spiritual (forgiveness) and material release to God's people. The Day of
    Atonement setting is important because on this day Israel's high priest enters the holy of holies and,
    thereby, goes beyond space and time, back to the reality 'before creation' (of Genesis 1:2). The text
    therefore illustrates very nicely the way in which in the late Second Temple period temple theology
    and messianic expectations were inextricably connected. It is unlikely that Jesus' quotation of Isaiah
    61 at the start of his ministry (according to Luke 4) and his interest in Psalm 110 which describes a
    sacral kingship 'after the cause (or 'order') of Melchizedek' was unconnected to the hopes expressed
    in 11QMelch. Even if Jesus had not read this Qumran text, it witnesses to the ideas which surely
    nurtured his own self-understanding and mission.
    Melchizedek here and elsewhere must also be understood as a figure that represents a particular
    political theology: he is a king who is also a priest, something which the Sinaitic, Mosaic covenant
    prohibits. The presence of this text in the Qumran library may reflect an early stage in the
    community's developing messianic thinking, before they insisted on the separation of royal and
    priestly offices. Jesus apparently took an interest in Psalm 110 because, as one from the royal house
    of David, he believed he was also called to fulfil a priestly office.

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