When I first came across the
Urim and Thummim (the meaning is uncertain, but possibly "lights and perfections", though some say they mean "illuminated and dark"), I thought "what in the world is this?" It all seemed so strange to me.
Of Levi he said, "Let Your Thummim and Your Urim belong to Your godly man, Whom You proved at Massah, With whom You contended at the waters of Meribah" (Deut 33:8).
When Saul inquired of the LORD, the LORD did not answer him, either by dreams or by Urim or by prophets (1 Sam 28:6).
Not much can be found regarding the
Urim and Thummim. The Bible simply doesn't give us enough information. However, we do know that they were part of the breastpiece of judgment (Ex 28:15-30) of the high priest.
The breastpiece was a square piece of beautiful material, folded in half and opened at the top like a pouch and adorned with 12 precious stones (in four rows), on which were engraved the names of the 12 tribes. It was placed over the front of the
ephod.
*1
Some refer to the
Urim and Thummim as simply a collective name for all the stones of the breastpiece, so that the total effect of the twelve stones were to show the "lights and perfections" of Him who is the
antitype*2 of Aaron the high priest.
You shall put in the breastpiece of judgment the Urim and the Thummim, and they shall be over Aaron's heart when he goes in before the LORD; and Aaron shall carry the judgment of the sons of Israel over his heart before the LORD continually (Ex 28:30).
However, in Leviticus 8:8 it says —
He then placed the breastpiece on him, and in the breastpiece he put the Urim and the Thummim.
— which seems to say that the
Urim and Thummim were additional to the stones of the breastpiece. So they may have been two precious, and rather mysterious, stones on or in the high priest's garments.
And the
Urim and Thummim were sometimes used to determine the will of God. Nobody is sure how this was done. Some say that the stones shone whenever God was present (or
shekhinah, meaning "a visible manifestation of the divine presence") at a sacrifice or when the army proceeded to battle. Others suggest God would cause them to light up in varying patterns to reveal His decision, or that the
Urim and Thummim were engraved with symbols identifying yes/no and true/false and cast like lots to determine God's will. But all of these are merely speculation.
However, Scripture does indicate that the
Urim and Thummim were only used for questions of great importance, usually connected to the function of the state, such as whether and when to go to war. And in the book of Numbers, when Joshua succeeded Moses as leader over Israel, we see that he was to receive answers from God by means of the
Urim through Eleazar the High Priest.
"Moreover, he shall stand before Eleazar the priest, who shall inquire for him by the judgment of the Urim before the LORD. At his command they shall go out and at his command they shall come in, both he and the sons of Israel with him, even all the congregation" (Num 27:21).
When I was researching what Ezra 2:62-63 (and Neh 7:65, which overlaps with Ezra 2:63) was all about, it seemed that by this time the
Urim and Thummim were on their way out:
Now these are those who came up from Tel-melah, Tel-harsha, Cherub, Addan and Immer, but they were not able to give evidence of their fathers' households and their descendants, whether they were of Israel: the sons of Delaiah, the sons of Tobiah, the sons of Nekoda, 652. Of the sons of the priests: the sons of Habaiah, the sons of Hakkoz, the sons of Barzillai, who took a wife from the daughters of Barzillai the Gileadite, and he was called by their name. These searched among their ancestral registration, but they could not be located; therefore they were considered unclean and excluded from the priesthood. The governor said to them that they should not eat from the most holy things until a priest stood up with Urim and Thummim. (Ezra 2:59-63).
The Jews were always very exact in their genealogies in order to preserve the distinctions of the tribes and families, which was necessary to make out their titles to inheritances and to govern themselves in the matter of marriages. This was also by special providence of God so that it would be known into which tribe and family the Messiah was born.
But in about 451 BC, when the Jewish exiles were beginning to return to Jerusalem to restore it and rebuild the Temple (Ezra 2:59-63), there were some individuals who were unable to prove that they were descended from the priesthood. So, they were set aside until priests in possession of the
Urim and Thummim were discovered, that they might determine God's mind in the matter. This seems to imply that the
Urim and Thummim had already been lost.
Talmudic sources (
the Talmud, the central text of mainstream Judaism, is a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, customs, and history) are unanimous in agreeing that the
Urim and Thummim were lost much earlier, most likely when Jerusalem was sacked by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar II in 586 BC. Indeed, because the priestly source (which scholars date to a couple of centuries prior to the captivity) doesn't appear to even know what the
Urim and Thummim looked like, and because there is no mention of the
Urim and Thummim beyond the death of David, biblical scholars suspect they fell out of use some time before the Babylonian conquest, probably due to a growing reliance on the prophets.
Additionally, by the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, the Jews had the nearly completed canon of the Old Testament, which was better than the Urim and Thummim. And the ark does not appear to have been in the second Temple. All of these shadows had disappeared by degrees as the coming of Jesus Christ drew nearer.
*1 The ephod was a beautiful, two-piece, sleeveless garment, held to the body by a woven band (Ex 28:8) and joined at the shoulders by straps. On the straps were two onyx stones (possibly emeralds), with the names of six tribes on each stone.
*2 A type is a picture or illustration that looks forward to its fulfillment in the form of a person, event, or object. For every type there is an antitype. An antitype is the fulfillment of the type — most find their fulfillment in Jesus Christ. For example, Aaron was a type because he was the first high priest, and Jesus Christ is the antitype because He is the eternal high priest and therefore the fulfillment of the type. A type is identified as such in Scripture.
This is yet another recipe from an old church (not the church I attend) cookbook, though this cookbook is even older (1981) than the last one (1992).
I got this next recipe out of an old church cookbook. I greatly reduce the amount of butter and also use reduced fat sour cream, and I think it tastes just as good, if not better.
