Commentaria in Exodum
Thirdly, the moral reason was that the priest, wearing urim and thummim, that is, illumination, or doctrine, and truth and perfection, might be continually admonished of his office, namely that he ought to have, first, urim, that is, illumination and doctrine, acquired both by study and still more by piety and prayer, Deut. chap. 18, verse 9, and Malachias chap. 3, verse 7. Again, urim, that is, inflammation and zeal, by which he may kindle the people to the law and love of God. For urim in Hebrew signifies both light and shining fire: whence Abraham is said to have been brought out of Ur, that is, out of the fire of the Chaldees. Hence some derive the Latin uro from the Hebrew Ur: for light illuminates, warms and burns. Such an urim was St. John the Baptist: for he was himself “a burning and a shining lamp.”
Secondly, that he ought to have thummim, that is, truth, in the heart, in the mouth, and most of all in life, namely integrity and perfection of life: for this thummim signifies. For as the mouth ought to answer to the heart, so the life to the mouth and heart, just as the Word of God (who is eternal truth) is the image of the Father: so the word and life of man ought to be the image of the heart in which it is begotten, so as to indicate and represent what is in the heart, and not something else, deceitful and different. Hence the ancients, as Pierius testifies, book 54, painted truth like a peach, to which one leaf adhered. For the peach is like a heart; the leaf is like the tongue. As the leaf, then, adheres to the fruit, so let the tongue and life adhere to the heart, and let him utter in speech and works only what is contained in the heart, not something else false and feigned.
Finally, that he ought to be the interpreter and guardian of public truth, that is, of justice; for this preserves the commonwealth more than fortitude. Whence the prince Agesilaus, being asked which of these virtues was the more excellent, answered: “Fortitude is of no use unless justice be present; but for all who cultivate justice there is no need of fortitude.” Let the high priest therefore be a Melchisedech, that is, king of justice.
Tropologically, how in our priests both urim and thummim are required, that is, both the splendour of doctrine and the truth and integrity of life, see in St. Jerome, On the Priestly Vestments, and St. Gregory, part 2 of the Pastoral Rule, chap. 3.
Let pastors and teachers, therefore, no less than princes, beware lest by the example of vices they infect the people. For, as Quintilian says, Declam. 3: “Such is the condition of superiors that whatever they do, they seem to enjoin; and he is most pernicious who is the chief author of an evil deed”; and as Claudian says, Panegyric 4 on Honorius:
The world is fashioned after the example of the king, nor can edicts so bend human minds as the life of the ruler: the fickle multitude is ever changed with the prince.
More swiftly and quickly domestic examples of vice corrupt us, when they enter our minds with great authors.
On the other hand, as St. Gregory says, hom. 26 on the Gospels: “It is hard that one who knows not how to hold the reins of his own life should become judge of another’s”; and as St. Ambrose says, epist. 6: “What is so divine as this maxim, that he should punish sins who is free from sin; for how will you bear a man to be the avenger of another’s fault and the defender of his own?” Wherefore Cassiodorus, book 6 of the Varia, rightly prescribes this form to the ruler: “Be,” he says, “continent in life, that you may be able to be a judge over others. The first equity is for rulers to begin with themselves, that offenders may have reason to fear one whom they cannot find like themselves. The guilty man fears no faults in himself which he perceives the judge to have in himself. How great a thing it is to sit free upon the tribunals!”
AND HE SHALL BEAR THE JUDGMENT OF THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL.—“Judgment,” that is, the rational of judgment, of which verse 15; it is a metonymy. So chap. 27, verse 21 and elsewhere, it calls the very ark, in which was the testimony, that is, the law or the tables of the law, the testimony.
31. THOU SHALT MAKE ALSO THE TUNIC OF THE EPHOD ALL OF BLUE.—This is the third vestment of the high priest. For the first was the ephod, the second was the rational, the third is this tunic, which is therefore called the tunic of the ephod, that is, of the superhumeral, because the ephod with the rational lay immediately upon it, so that the high priest put on the ephod immediately above this tunic. So St. Jerome.
Note first: This tunic was looser than the strait or linen tunic, of which verse 40, and descended to the ankles. Whence it is called by the Septuagint podere, from podos, because it reached to the feet.
Secondly, this tunic was blue, that is, made of blue wool, or of violet colour; for it signified that the priest’s life ought to be heavenly, and that to the end: it admonished the priest, therefore, that beholding this colour he should lift his mind to heavenly things, says Theodoret, and consequently take care to have a body light and airy through sobriety and slenderness of diet, says Nyssen.
Thirdly, St. Jerome teaches that this tunic had sleeves, nor does Josephus oppose, if rightly examined.
Fourthly, this tunic had below, on the hem, which was near the feet, seventy-two pomegranates and as many bells, that by their sound the high priest, entering the Holy of Holies, might go with a voice, since otherwise he would die, of which verse 33.
Fifthly, it had a neck-opening with a border, or woven hem, of which now follows.
32. IN THE MIDST ABOVE SHALL BE A HOLE FOR THE HEAD.—“Hole for the head,” that is, an opening; in Hebrew it is the mouth of the head, that is, an aperture at the top through which the head is passed. “This tunic,” says St. Jerome, “was open in the upper part where it is put over the neck, which is called the capitium.”
AND A BORDER WOVEN ROUND ABOUT IT.—The “border” was the fringe or hem of the aperture already mentioned, or covering and strengthening round about the sides of the neck-opening, that they might not be torn. Whence the Hebrew is, as the hem of a breastplate it shall be to it, that it be not rent, as if to say: It shall fortify it like the hem of a breastplate, that it be not rent.
This border was “woven,” that is, made not with the needle but by weaving. The Septuagint render, work of the weaver, a joining woven out of the same. Whence St. Augustine, Question 118, and St. Jerome teach that this border or fringe was woven on to the neck-opening in one weave, and was not sewn to it; Josephus, however, says it was sewn on; but perhaps he only means that it was attached, which may be understood of weaving as well as of sewing.
33. AND BENEATH AT THE FEET OF THE SAME TUNIC, ROUND ABOUT, THOU SHALT MAKE AS IT WERE POMEGRANATES, OF BLUE, AND PURPLE, AND TWICE-DYED SCARLET, WITH LITTLE BELLS SET BETWEEN.—Josephus describes these thus: “The lowest part of the garment,” he says, “was adorned with a hem distinguished with the figure of pomegranates, from which golden bells also hung in such a way that each pomegranate was set between two bells, and each bell between two pomegranates”: they were placed, therefore, alternately, a pomegranate and a bell. Ecclesiasticus chap. 45, verse 10, says they were very many; St. Jerome and Isidore, book 1 of the Etymologies, chap. 21, precisely number seventy-two pomegranates and as many bells.
35. THAT THE SOUND MAY BE HEARD WHEN HE GOETH IN AND COMETH OUT OF THE SANCTUARY IN THE SIGHT OF THE LORD, AND THAT HE MAY NOT DIE,—that is, that he die not for disobedience: for I will and command that the sound of the high priest, namely the ringing of his bells, be heard at the entrance and exit of the tabernacle, to the excitation of due reverence, namely that he enter not my house without a previous sound, not that I desire to hear it, but that he himself, as well as the people, hearing it, may be admonished of my majesty, whose temple he enters, and at the same time of reverence and of his office.
Hence the Wise Man says, chap. 18, verse 24: “In the garment of the high priest (in this blue tunic, under which with Lyranus, Dionysius and Hugo understand by synecdoche all the other vestments of the high priest) was the whole world.” And that firstly, that by this his dress and ornament the high priest might show himself to be the minister of the Creator of the world, and indicate that every creature needs the mercy of God, and himself pray for it, both by habit and garment and by voice and mind. Secondly, that, considering the image of the universe which he wears, he might show a life not degenerate from nature; but as the elements and other created things obey God in all things, so he too should obey. So Philo. Thirdly, that by performing sacred things he might enlist the whole world, which he as it were wears in his garment, as an intercessor with himself before God. All these things St. Jerome has almost from Josephus and Philo, and briefly adds also the tropology with equal brevity. The breeches, he says, signify chastity; the linen tunic the purity and innocence of the whole life, the girdle moderation of discretion, the tiara right intention, and these are common to all priests. But proper to the high priest besides was the golden plate with the name Jehovah, signifying the constant remembrance of God in contemplation which the high priest ought to have. Secondly, the ephod, that is, compassion, by which he bears as on his shoulders the infirmities of the people. Thirdly, the blue tunic, that is, heavenly conversation. Fourthly, the rational, that is, care and the bowels of charity toward his subjects.