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The sacred historian having here met with what I may call a lily among thorns, stops, as it were, to describe it. Let us stop with him, and observe the description.

1. He was doubtless a very holy man; and if a Canaanite by descent, it furnishes a proof among many others, that the curse on Canaan did not shut the door of faith upon his individual descendants. There never was an age or country in which he that feared God, and worked righteousness, was not accepted.

2. He was a personage in whom was united the kingly and priestly offices, and as such was a type of the Messiah and greater than Abram himself. This singular dignity conferred upon a descendant of Canaan shows that God delights, on various occasions, to put more abundant honour upon the part that lacketh.

3. He was what he was, considered as a priest, not by inheritance, but by an immediate Divine constitution.

(A. Fuller.)

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KJV: And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God.

WEB: Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine: and he was priest of God Most High.