MELKI-TSEDEQ

EASTERN traditions relate that at a certain time the Soma became unknown, so that in sacrificial rites it was necessary to substitute for it another beverage that was no more than a symbol of the original;^[1] this was the role played principally by wine, to which a large part of the Greek legend of Dionysos is devoted.^[2] Now wine is often taken to represent the authentic initiatic tradition. In Hebrew the words yayin, 'wine', and sod, 'mystery', share the same number^[3] and are thus interchangeable, and among the Sufis, wine symbolizes esoteric knowledge, that is, the doctrine reserved for the elite and not suitable for everyone, just as everyone cannot drink wine with impunity. It follows from this that the use of wine in a rite confers upon that rite a clearly initiatic character; such is the case notably of the 'eucharistic' sacrifice of Melchizedek, which is the essential point upon which we shall now dwell.^[4] The name Melchizedek, or more precisely Melki-Tsedeq, is in fact none other than the title used in the Judeo-Christian tradition to expressly designate the function of the 'King of the World'. We were somewhat hesitant to mention this fact a fact that can help explain one of the most enigmatic passages of the Hebrew Bible—but once we decided to treat the question of the 'King of the World', we could hardly pass over it in silence. In this regard let us recall here the words of Saint Paul: ‘About this we have much to say which is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.'^[5] The biblical text which prompts us to make these remarks is the following: 'And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was priest of God Most High [El Elion]. And he blessed him and said, "Blessed be Abram^[7] by God Most High, maker of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand!" And Abram gave him a tenth of everything. Melki-Tsedeq is thus both king and priest: his name means 'King of Justice', and he is at the same time king of Salem, that is to say of 'Peace', so here again we find above all 'Justice' and 'Peace', which are precisely the two fundamental attributes of the 'King of the World'. It should also be pointed out that contrary to common opinion, the word Salem never actually designated a city, even though, taken as the symbolic name of the residence of Melki-Tsedeq, it can be considered the equivalent of Agarttha. In any case it is an error to see in it the primitive name for Jerusalem, as the latter was originally called Jebus; on the contrary, if the name Jerusalem was given to that city when a spiritual center was established there by the Jews, this was to indicate that from that point on it was a sort of visible image of the true Salem; and it should be noted that the Temple was built by Solomon, whose name (Shlomoh) is also derived from Salem, and means 'the Peaceable One'.^[8] Let us see how Paul comments on what is said of Melki-Tsedeq: 'For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him; and to him Abraham apportioned a tenth part of everything. He is first, by translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then he is also king of Salem, that is, king of peace. He is without father or mother or genealogy, and has neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God he continues a priest for ever.'^[9] Now Melchizedek is here represented as superior to Abraham, for he blesses him, and 'it is beyond dispute that the inferior is blessed by the superior';^[10] and for his part Abraham recognizes this superiority by giving the tithe, a mark of his dependence. We have here a veritable 'investiture', almost in the feudal sense of the word, but with the difference that it is a spiritual investiture; and it is here, let us add, that we find the exact point of juncture between the Hebraic tradition and the great primordial tradition. The 'blessing' spoken of is properly the communication of a 'spiritual influence' in which Abraham is henceforth to participate; and we can note that the formula that was used placed Abraham in direct relationship with the 'Most High God', whom the same Abraham afterward invokes under the name of Jehovah.^[11] If Melki-Tsedeq is thus superior to Abraham, it is because the 'Most High' (Elion), who is the God of Melki-Tsedek, is himself superior to the 'All-Powerful' (Shaddai), who is the God of Abraham, which is to say that the first of these two names represents a divine aspect higher than the second. Moreover, an extremely important point that seems never to have been noticed is that El Elion is the equivalent of Emmanuel, these two names having exactly the same numerical value;^[12] and this links the story of Melki-Tsedeq directly with that of the 'Magi-Kings', whose meaning we have already explained. This becomes even more evident when we recall that the priesthood of Melki-Tsedeq is that of El Elion, while the Christian priesthood is that of Emmanuel; if, then, El Elion is Emmanuel, these two priesthoods are in fact one, and so the Christian priesthood, which, moreover, essentially entails the eucharistic offering of bread and wine, is truly 'after the order of Melchizedek'.^[13] Judeo-Christian tradition distinguishes two priesthoods, one 'after the order of Aaron,' and the other 'after the order of Melchizedek'; the latter is superior to the former, just as Melchizedek is superior to Abraham, from whom issues the tribe of Levi, and consequently the family of Aaron.^[14] This superiority is clearly affirmed by Paul, who said that 'One might even say that Levi himself, who receives tithes [from the people of Israel], paid tithes through Abraham.'^[15] Although we shall not pursue this question of the significance of the two priesthoods here, these additional words of Saint Paul are worth quoting: 'Here [in the Levitical priesthood] tithes are received by mortal men; there, by one of whom it is testified that he lives.^[16] This one that 'lives', who is Melki-Tsedeq, is also Manu, of whom it can indeed be said that he 'continues a priest for ever' (in Hebrew, le-ōlam), that is, for the entire duration of his cycle (Manvantara), or of the world over which he specifically rules. That is why he is without 'genealogy', for his origin is 'non-human' since he is himself the prototype of man, truly 'resembling the Son of God' since by virtue of the Law that he formulates he is for this world the very image of the divine Word.^[17] Foremost among other points that we could raise is the observation that the story of the 'Magi-Kings' presents three distinct personages, who are the three heads of the initiatic hierarchy, whereas that of Melki-Tsedeq presents only one, though one able to unite in himself aspects corresponding to the same three functions. This is why some have made a further distinction by identifying Adoni-Tsedeq, the 'Lord of Justice', as he who divides as it were into Kohen-Tsedeq, 'Priest of Justice', and Melki-Tsedeq, 'King of Justice'—these three aspects being in fact assimilable, respectively, to the functions of the Brahātmā, the Mahātmā, and the Mahānga.^[18] Although Melki-Tsedeq is properly only the name of the third aspect, it is usually applied by extension to the three as a whole, and, if it is thus employed in preference to the others, this is because the function it expresses is nearest to the outer world and thus that which is manifested most immediately. It can be said moreover that the expression 'King of the World', as well as 'King of Justice', refers directly to the royal power only, and in India we also find the expression Dharma-Rāja, which is the literal equivalent of Melki-Tsedeq.^[19] If we now take Melki-Tsedek's name in its strictest sense, the attributes proper to the 'King of Justice' are the scales and the sword, the same attributes that characterize Mikaël, considered as 'Angel of Judgement'.^[20] In the social order these two emblems represent, respectively, the administrative and the military functions that properly belong to the Kshatriyas, and are the two elements constituting royal power. Considered hieroglyphically, they are also the two characters forming the Arabic and Hebraic root Haq, which signifies both 'Justice' and 'Truth',^[21] and which also served to denote royalty among various ancient peoples.^[22] Haq is the power that establishes the rule of Justice, that is, the equilibrium symbolized by the scales, whereas power itself is symbolized by the sword,^[23] which is exactly what characterizes the essential role of the royal power; in the spiritual order, on the other hand, it is the power of Truth. We must add moreover that a modified form of the root Haq also exists, obtained by substituting the sign of spiritual power for that of material power; and since this form Hak properly designates 'Wisdom' (in Hebrew, Hokmah), it is more appropriate for sacerdotal authority, just as the other is for royal power. This is further confirmed by the fact that the two corresponding forms are found with similar meanings in the root kan, which in very diverse languages signifies 'power' or 'efficacy', and also 'knowledge', ^[24] kan being above all spiritual or intellectual power, identical with Wisdom (whence Kohen, 'priest' in Hebrew), whereas qan is the material power (from which are derived many words expressing the idea of 'possession', notably the word Qain).^[25] These roots and their derivatives could no doubt give rise to many other considerations, but we shall have to restrict ourselves here to what bears most directly on the subject at hand.We may complete this line of thought by recalling the Hebrew Kabbalah states that the Shekinah is represented in the 'inferior world' by the last of the ten Sephiroth, called Malkuth, meaning 'Kingdom', a designation of particular interest from our present point of view; but even more interesting is the fact that among the synonyms sometimes given for Malkuth, we find Tsedeq, or 'the Just'. ^[26] This convergence of Malkuth and Tsedeq, or of Royalty (the government of the world) and Justice, is met with again precisely in the name Melki-Tsedeq. In this context it represents the distributive and rightly balanced Justice found in the 'middle column' of the sephirothic tree; it must be distinguished from the Justice opposed to Mercy, which is identified with Rigor in the 'left-hand column', for these are two different aspects (which Hebrew distinguishes, respectively, by the words Tsedaqah and Din). It is the first of these that denotes 'Justice' in both the strictest and the most complete sense of the word, implying essentially the idea of balance or harmony and indissolubly linked with 'Peace'.Malkuth is the 'reservoir where the waters that flow from the river on high, that is to say all the emanations (graces or spiritual influences) that are poured out so abundantly, ^[27]reunite. This 'river on high' and the waters that descend from it are strangely reminiscent of the role attributed to the celestial river Gangā in the Hindu tradition; and one could also say that Shakti, of which the Gangā is an aspect, is not without analogy to the Shekinah, were it only by reason of the 'providential' function common to them both. The reservoir of the celestial waters is naturally identical with the spiritual center of our world, from which the four rivers of Pardes make their way toward the four cardinal points. The Jews identify the spiritual center with Mount Zion, calling it the ‘Heart of the World', a designation that is in any case common to all 'Holy Lands' and that for them becomes somewhat equivalent to the Meru of the Hindus or the Alborj of the Persians. ^[28] The Tabernacle of the Holiness of Jehovah, the residence of the Shekinah, is the Holy of Holies, that is, the heart of the Temple, which is itself the center of Zion (Jerusalem) just as Holy Zion is the center of the Land of Israel, and as the Land of Israel is the center of the world. ^[29] This can be pushed even further, not only by listing every name enumerated above in an inverse order, but also by adding after the Tabernacle in the Temple, the Ark of the Covenant in the Tabernacle, and then, on the Ark of the Covenant itself, the place where the Shekinah is manifested (between the two Cherubim)—all this representing so many successive approximations to the 'spiritual Pole'. Dante depicts Jerusalem as the ‘spiritual Pole' in precisely this way, as we have explained elsewhere, ^[30] but the moment we leave behind the strictly Judaic point of view, this Pole becomes primarily symbolic and does not constitute a localization in the strict sense of the word. All the secondary spiritual centers, constituted with a view to adaptions of the primordial tradition to determined conditions, are, as we have already shown, images of the supreme center; in reality Zion can only be one of these secondary centers, although it may still be identified symbolically with the supreme center by reason of this similarity. Jerusalem, as its name indicates, is indeed an image of the true Salem; and what has been said and will be said further about the 'Holy Land' (which is not merely the Land of Israel) will help us to understand this point without difficulty. In this connection, another very remarkable expression used as a synonym for the 'Holy Land' is the ‘Land of the Living': it obviously designates the 'abode of immortality' and so is applicable, strictly speaking, to the Terrestrial Paradise or its symbolic equivalents; but this name was also carried over to the secondary 'Holy Lands', notably the Land of Israel. It is said that the 'Land of the Living comprises seven lands', about which Vulliaud observes that 'this land is Canaan, in which there were seven peoples. ^[31] No doubt this is correct in the literal sense, but symbolically these seven lands—as also those in the Islamic tradition—could equally well correspond to the seven dvīpas which, according to Hindu tradition, have Meru as a common center, a point to which we shall return. There is also a striking resemblance, which can hardly be accidental, between the epochs of the seven Manus (counting from the beginning of this kalpa up to the present age)^[32] and the former worlds, or the creations prior to our own, represented by the 'seven kings of Edom', the number seven in this context referring to the seven 'days' of Genesis.