Footnotes

1. Genesis 14:17 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Abram) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
2. Genesis 14:17 tn Heb “him”; the referent (Abram) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
3. Genesis 14:17 sn The King’s Valley is possibly a reference to what came to be known later as the Kidron Valley.
4. 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.
5. 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.
6. Genesis 14:19 tn The preposition ל (lamed) introduces the agent after the passive participle.
7. Genesis 14:19 tn Some translate “possessor of heaven and earth” (cf. NASB). But cognate evidence from Ugaritic indicates that there were two homonymic roots קָנָה (qanah), one meaning “to create” (as in Gen 4:1) and the other “to obtain, to acquire, to possess.” While “possessor” would fit here, “Creator” is the more likely due to the collocation with “heaven and earth.”
8. Genesis 14:19 tn The terms translated “heaven” and “earth” are both objective genitives after the participle in construct.
9. Genesis 14:20 tn Heb “blessed be.” For God to be “blessed” means that he is praised. His reputation is enriched in the world as his name is praised.
10. Genesis 14:20 sn Who delivered. The Hebrew verb מִגֵּן (miggen, “delivered”) foreshadows the statement by God to Abram in Gen 15:1, “I am your shield” (מָגֵן, magen). Melchizedek provided a theological interpretation of Abram’s military victory.
11. Genesis 14:20 tn Heb “him”; the referent (Melchizedek) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
12. Genesis 14:22 tn Abram takes an oath, raising his hand as a solemn gesture. The translation understands the perfect tense as having an instantaneous nuance: “Here and now I raise my hand.”
13. Genesis 14:22 tn The words “and vow” are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied in the translation for clarification.
14. Genesis 14:23 tn The oath formula is elliptical, reading simply: “…if I take.” It is as if Abram says, “[May the Lord deal with me] if I take,” meaning, “I will surely not take.” The positive oath would add the negative adverb and be the reverse: “[God will deal with me] if I do not take,” meaning, “I certainly will.”
15. Genesis 14:23 tn The Hebrew text adds the independent pronoun (“I”) to the verb form for emphasis.
16. Genesis 14:24 tn The words “I will take nothing” have been supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.
17. Genesis 14:24 tn Heb “except only what the young men have eaten.”