Melchizedek was the king of Salem in Genesis 14:18-19 who offered bread and wine as a sacrifice and blessed Abram. In Psalm 110 it is prophesied that the Messiah will be “a priest forever after the order * of Melchizedek,” a prophecy that found fulfillment in the Last Supper. In the book of Hebrews (chapters 5-7), the author reflects on how Christ has fulfilled the Melchizedekian foreshadow.
One interesting aspect of the prophecy is that Melchizedek appears on the scene in Genesis without any mention of his earthly origins; Genesis, remember, being a book very concerned with ancestry (cf. chapters 4-5, 10-11). Just as Melchizedek was a man whose earthly origins were unknown, Christ would be a man who did not have an earthly father.*
