Hebrews 7:3

Without father, without mother, without descent,.... Which is to be understood not of his person, but of his priesthood; that his father was not a priest, nor did his mother descend from any in that

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.

In this verse is a mystical description of the eternity of Christ’ s person and priesthood, set out by the Spirit in the silence and omission of things that concerned Melchisedec and his glory; so that what here is represented to be typically and in shadow, that was Christ really and substantially; for he gives no account of his father, mother, genealogy, birth, or death; the Spirit either not revealing it to him, or ordering him to leave it out, that he might appear the more lively and perfect type of Christ, being represented in all things different from all the men that ever were, or shall be: such a priest therefore as he was, was Christ to be; not deriving his priesthood from any by birth, nor leaving it to any after him. As Melchisedec was without father, that was a priest before him, or is recorded, from whom he should derive, as the Levitical priesthood had; so Christ, as to his humanity, was without any human father, conceived only by the power of the Holy Ghost. Without mother: as to any Scripture records of it, or to any title of the priesthood by her, as those of Aaron’ s family had: so Christ, as to his Deity, was without a mother, being the eternal Son of the Father only, and without any title in his humanity to the priesthood from the virgin, she being of David’ s family, and not of Aaron’ s. Without descent; there is no line of him described in the Scripture, mentioning from whence he descended, or by what genealogy he came to the priesthood, as the Aaronites did clear their right, . As to Christ, who shall declare his generation, or produce the lineal roll by which he claimeth the priesthood? ; compare ,15. Having neither beginning of days, nor end life: there is no record of his birth or death, though he had a father or mother, as there is of Adam’ s beginning and end, who had neither: so Christ, as to his priesthood, had no predecessor, nor shall have any successor, ,24,28. As a sacrifice and the Lamb of God, he had his time of entrance into the world, and of his leaving it; yet, as God’ s Priest, he had neither beginning nor end of days. Pure eternity is its rise, and its end shall not be till God be all in all. But made like unto the Son of God; afwmoiwmenov he was in these things the shadow, picture, and resemblance of what Christ should be in his royal priesthood; in these singular prerogatives a visible type of God-man; he was the sign likening, and Christ was the truth and substance of it. Abideth a priest continually: these words are the key to all the description before.

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. Ver. 3. Without father] viz. That we find mentioned in the Holy Scripture. Hence the Melchisedechian heretics held that he was the Holy Ghost; or at least some created angel. See Cunaeus de Rep. Hebrews 3:3. Without father and mother he was not in respect of generation, but in respect of commemoration; his parents are not mentioned: no more are Job’ s, or the three children’ s. Like unto the Son of God] As having neither fellow nor successor. And being a lively type of Christ, who is the true Trismegist, in regard of his three offices. The heathens called their Mercury (haply the same with Melchisedec) Trismegist, or thrice great; because he was the greatest philosopher, the greatest priest, and the greatest king. (Marcil. Ficin. in arg. ad Tris. Pimandr.)

(3) Without father, without mother, without descent.—The last words, “without descent” (or rather, without genealogy), throw light on the meaning of those which precede. Not because we find no mention of the parents of Melchizedek is he thus spoken of as fatherless and motherless, but because he is suddenly introduced as priest, without any token whatever that he held the office by right of genealogy, the only claim familiar to Hebrew readers. It is not necessary to adduce proof of the care with which inquiry was made into the parentage of the Jewish priests (Nehemiah 7:64): in their marriages they were subject to strict restraints (Leviticus 21:13-14); their statement of pedigree (in which was given the name not of father only, but also of every mother) must be complete, ascending to Aaron, and containing no doubtful link. He who is a priest “like Melchizedek” holds a priesthood that rests on no such rights or claims. The words that follow are of similar character. No commencement and no close of priestly position or function are recorded in the sacred history. As the Scripture is silent as to his reception of the office, so also as to any transmission of it to another. In these respects “made like (as a divinely ordained type) unto the Son of God,” he bears perpetually the character of priest. There have from the first been many who have been dissatisfied with such an explanation of these remarkable words, and have understood them to ascribe to Melchizedek a mysterious and superhuman existence and character. It has been maintained that he was the Son of God Himself, or the Holy Spirit,—an angel or a Power of God. The last tenet was the distinguishing mark of a sect bearing the name of Melchizedekians in the third century. The feeling that the most startling of the expressions here used must surely be intended to point to more than the silence of Scripture on certain points, is not at all unnatural; but perhaps it is not too much to say that every such difficulty is removed by the consideration that here the writer is simply analysing the thought of the inspired Psalmist. Such an oracle as that of Psa 110:4 must yield up to him its full significance. The divine words are not to be measured by the meaning which man may at first assign to them. The true import of the prophecy which declared that the future priesthood would bear the likeness of Melchizedek’s can only be known when all the characteristics of that priesthood have been traced. The narrative of Genesis was the basis of the prophecy; all that the history presented was taken up in the Psalm.

Verse 3. Without father, without mother] The object of the apostle, in thus producing the example of Melchisedec, was to show, 1. That Jesus was the person prophesied of in the 110th Psalm; which psalm the Jews uniformly understood as predicting the Messiah. 2. To answer the objections of the Jews against the legitimacy of the priesthood of Christ, taken from the stock from which he proceeded. The objection is this: If the Messiah is to be a true priest, he must come from a legitimate stock, as all the priests under the law have regularly done; otherwise we cannot acknowledge him to be a priest: but Jesus of Nazareth has not proceeded from such a stock; therefore we cannot acknowledge him for a priest, the antitype of Aaron. To this objection the apostle answers, that it was not necessary for the priest to come from a particular stock, for Melchisedec was a priest of the most high God, and yet was not of the stock, either of Abraham or Aaron, but a Canaanite. It is well known that the ancient Hebrews were exceedingly scrupulous in choosing their high priest; partly by Divine command, and partly from the tradition of their ancestors, who always considered this office to be of the highest dignity. 1. God had commanded. Leviticus 21:10, that the high priest should be chosen from among their brethren, i.e. from the family of Aaron; 2. that he should marry a virgin; 3. he must not marry a widow; 4. nor a divorced person; 5. nor a harlot; 6. nor one of another nation. He who was found to have acted contrary to these requisitions was, jure divino, excluded from the pontificate. On the contrary, it was necessary that he who desired this honour should be able to prove his descent from the family of Aaron; and if he could not, though even in the priesthood, he was cast out, as we find from Ezra 2:62, and Ne 7:63. To these Divine ordinances the Jews have added, 1. That no proselyte could be a priest; 2. nor a slave; 3. nor a bastard; 4. nor the son of a Nethinim; 5. nor one whose father exercised any base trade. And that they might be well assured of all this, they took the utmost care to preserve their genealogies, which were regularly kept in the archives of the temple. When any person aspired to the sacerdotal function, his genealogical table was carefully inspected; and, if any of the above blemishes were found in him, he was rejected. He who could not support his pretensions by just genealogical evidences, was said by the Jews to be without father. Thus in Bereshith Rabba, sect. 18, fol. 18, on these words, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, it is said: If a proselyte to the Jewish religion have married his own sister, whether by the same father or by the same mother, they cast her out according to Rabbi Meir.

3. without father, without mother, without descent] Rather, “without lineage” or “pedigree” as in Hebrews 7:6. The mistake is an ancient one, for in consequence of it Irenæus claims Melchisedek as one who had lived a celibate life (which in any case would not follow). The simple and undoubted meaning of these words is that the father, mother, and lineage of Melchisedek are not recorded, so that he becomes more naturally a type of Christ. In the Alexandrian School, to which the writer of this Epistle belonged, the custom of allegorising Scripture had received an immense development, and the silence of Scripture was regarded as the suggestion of mysterious truths. The Jewish interpreters naturally looked on the passage about Melchisedek as full of deep significance because the Psalmist in the 110th Psalm, which was universally accepted as a Psalm directly Messianic (Matthew 22:44) had found in Melchisedek a Priest-King, who, centuries before Aaron, had been honoured by their great ancestor, and who was therefore a most fitting type of Him who was to be “a Priest upon his Throne.” The fact that he had no recorded father, mother, or lineage enhanced his dignity because the Aaronic priesthood depended exclusively on the power to prove direct descent from Aaron which necessitated a most scrupulous care in the preservation of the priestly genealogies. (See Ezra 2:61-62; Nehemiah 7:63-64, where families which could not actually produce their pedigree are excluded from the priesthood.) The idiom by which a person is said to have no father or ancestry when they are not recorded, or are otherwise quite unimportant, was common to Greek, Latin, and Hebrew. In a Greek tragedy “Ion” calls himself “motherless” when he supposes that his mother is a slave (Eurip. Ion, 850). Scipio taunted the mob of the Forum as people “who had neither father nor mother” (Cic. De Orat. ii. 64). Horace calls himself “a man sprung from no ancestors” (Hor. Sat. i. 6, 10). In the Bereshith Rabba we find the rule “a Gentile has no father,” i.e. the father of a proselyte is not counted in Jewish pedigrees. Further the Jews mystically applied the same sort of rule which holds in legal matters which says “that things not producible are regarded as non-existent.” Hence their kabbalistic interpretation of particulars not mentioned in Scripture. From the fact that Cain’s death is nowhere recorded in Genesis, Philo draws the lesson that evil never dies among the human race; and he calls Sarah “motherless” because her mother is nowhere mentioned. There is then no difficulty either as to the idiom or its interpretation.without mother] The mention of this particular may seem to have no bearing on the type, unless a contrast be intended to the Jewish Priests who were descended from Elisheba the wife of Aaron (Exodus 6:23). But “Christ as God, has no mother, as man no Father.” The early Church neither used nor sanctioned the name Theotokos “Mother of God” as applied to the Virgin Mary.without descent] Rather, “without a genealogy.” Melchisedek has no recorded predecessor or successor.

Without father - The phrase “without father” - ἀπάτωρ apatōr - means literally one who has no father; one who has lost his father; one who is an orphan.

3. Without descent—Without place in any priestly genealogical table, and so without father, without mother, as a priest, showing his unlikeness to, and superiority over, the Aaronic priest, and his likeness to Christ.