Genesis 14:16-18

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Genesis 14:16 tn The word “stolen” is supplied in the translation for clarification.
2. Genesis 14:16 tn The phrase “the rest of “ has been supplied in the translation for clarification.
3. Genesis 14:17 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Abram) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
4. Genesis 14:17 tn Heb “him”; the referent (Abram) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
5. Genesis 14:17 sn The King’s Valley is possibly a reference to what came to be known later as the Kidron Valley.
6. Genesis 14:18 sn Salem is traditionally identified as the Jebusite stronghold of old Jerusalem. Accordingly, there has been much speculation about its king. Though some have identified him with the preincarnate Christ or with Noah’s son Shem, it is far more likely that Melchizedek was a Canaanite royal priest whom God used to renew the promise of the blessing to Abram, perhaps because Abram considered Melchizedek his spiritual superior. But Melchizedek remains an enigma. In a book filled with genealogical records he appears on the scene without a genealogy and then disappears from the narrative. In Ps 110 the Lord declares that the Davidic king is a royal priest after the pattern of Melchizedek.
7. Genesis 14:18 tn The parenthetical disjunctive clause significantly identifies Melchizedek as a priest as well as a king.sn It is his royal priestly status that makes Melchizedek a type of Christ: He was identified with Jerusalem, superior to the ancestor of Israel, and both a king and a priest. Unlike the normal Canaanites, this man served “God Most High” (אֵל עֶלְיוֹן, ʾel ʿelyon)—one sovereign God, who was the creator of all the universe. Abram had in him a spiritual brother.