With regard to the word caphul—duplicatum: “it shall be square and doubled [or double]”—it is, with our present knowledge, impossible to say whether Moses intended to direct that the ornamentation of the back of the pectoral was not to be neglected, or that the stuff was to be doubled, so as the better to support the weight of the precious stones.
Some of these stones it is now difficult to identify; but we cannot leave this part of the subject without giving an abridged quotation from the ingenious work of M. de Charancey, Actes de la Société philologique, v. iii. No. 5: “De quelques Idées symboliques,” etc.
According to M. de Charancey, the twelve stones of the pectoral ought to be divided into two series,[71] the first of seven stones, answering, in accordance with Judaic symbolism, to the celestial spheres and the seven planets; while the second, of five stones, related to the terrestrial sphere, to the five regions of space, including the central point; the whole creation being gathered up, as it were, into this microcosm, resplendent with the wisdom and goodness of God in the oracles of the urim and thummim.
It is in any case certain that the church, in her liturgy, makes occasional allusion to this symbolism;
as, for instance, in the second response for the Tuesday following the third Sunday after Easter we find: “In diademate capitis Aaron magnificentia Domini sculpta erat.… In veste poderis quam habebat totus erat orbis terrarum et parentum magnalia in quatuor ordinibus lapidum sculpta erant” (Brev. Romanum).
The Egyptian pectorals, being usually made with a ground-work of metal, were simply suspended from a gold chain which passed round the neck; but the foundation of the Aaronic pectoral, being of woven material, needed a different kind of support to keep it stretched out and in place. We accordingly find exact directions given that to each of the two upper corners should be fastened a ring of pure gold, and to each ring a chain, the other end of which should be fixed to one of the gems on the shoulders. These gems are also directed to be placed, not on the top of the shoulders, but a little lower and towards the front, exactly as we see them in the sculptures and paintings of Egypt. To the lower corners of the pectoral rings were also attached, and again at the joining, in front, of the bands with the ephod, while a violet-colored fillet passed through the two on the right, and tied, and another similarly through the two on the left. The directions (Exod. xxviii. 13, 14, 23, 25) are so explicit as to give evidence that we have here some departure from the well-known arrangements with which the Israelites were familiar.
We must now consider the question of the urim and thummim, celebrated for its inextricable difficulties; but as no authoritative document has as yet given the solution of this problem, it is impossible
to explain it with certainty. It would be useless to take up the reader’s time with all the opinions of the learned upon this subject, especially as they are for the most part as unsatisfactory as they are diverse. The hypothesis advanced by the Abbé Ancessi appears to rest upon the most reasonable foundation. We give it in his own words:
“Without entering into lengthy philological discussions, it is easy to show that the word urim must have originally signified light. This is the sense of aor, to sparkle, to shine; it is the sense of iara, which has a relationship with iara to see, and with the analogous root of the Indo-Germanic languages from which come ordo, orior, Iris, Jour, Giorno, etc., etc. In Egyptian we also find this radical in the name of Horus, the Shining One, the Morning Sun. With this root again is connected iara, the river, the sparkling, and in Hebrew nahar,[72] which has the same sense.
“Besides, the meaning of the word urim is scarcely contested, and it is generally admitted that its original signification is lights, or beams.