But indeed what these were, and how they were in the rational, [and] how through them God was consulted and responded, St. Augustine (quest. 117 on Exodus) and Cyril (bk. 11 On Adoration) say [is] exceedingly difficult of discovery; but others also [say it is] ἀδύνατον [adynaton, “impossible”]. Rabbi Kimchi confesses the utter ignorance of these things among his own Hebrews. For “in the root Ur,” he says, “what Urim and Thummim be, is not known among us.” And Rashi says that Scripture was “the ineffable name.” “Nevertheless,” he says, “the explained truth of this thing is not [known].” Similar [things say] R. Alfasi, and R. Azariah [de’ Rossi] (bk. 3, Imrei Binah, ch. 60, fol. 57b). Our Cajetan: “What,” he says, “is understood by the names Urim and Thummim, no one (as far as we know) has hitherto explained.” Yet not, [being] broken by desperation, must we cease from the investigation of these [things]. “By Urim and Thummim are illumined and perfected those praying and laboring.” “All,” says Alexis, “the things sought, come — if a man shrink not from the toil” [ἅπαντα τὰ ζητούμενα ἔρχεται, ἐὰν μὴ προαπόστῃς, μηδὲ τὸν πόνον φύγῃς]. “And it is better to see very obscure things even in a mirror, than to take no understanding of them at all,” says B. Cyril, in the cited bk. 11 On Adoration.
A twofold kind of opinions about these [Urim], therefore, I see. The former opines [them to be] something diverse from the gems enumerated in the pectoral. But what? [There are] many opinions. The first: [that they are] the double texture itself of the epomis [ephod], of which Exod. 28, v. 16. And this seems to me to be the opinion of Philo (bk. 2 On the Monarchy): “The rational,” he says, “the twin text varies, of which the one is called clarity*, the other* truth*.”* The second: [that they are], between that double texture, certain notable plates [laminae] — one golden, the other silver. But variously. For, first, in these R. Solomon [Rashi] says the ineffable name of God, IEHOVA, was inscribed; and this Vatablus, Eugubinus, and others embrace. Secondly, R. Abraham [says they] were composed after the fashion of an Astrolabe — so that even thence the Astrologers received the exemplar and invention of Astrolabes. Thirdly, a certain Hebrew gloss (in Abulensis, on Exod. 28, after quest. 12) [says] that on these were inscribed the names of the 12 tribes, and, with each, some [name] of a star or heavenly body, or [the] name of an Angel; and that [so], by the power of those stars or Angels, the memory of those 12 tribes might be kept in the divine mind. Fourthly, [that] on these same were the names of God — [names] partly of 72 letters, partly of 30, of 28, and of 4 [letters]. So R. Abraham the Frank, in the declaration of the secrets of R. Abraham Aben-Ezra. The third [view of this former kind]: that these very words, Urim, Thummim, were fixed in that pectoral. And this Philo seems to say (bk. 3 On the Life of Moses): “There was,” he says, “a quadrangular rational, doubled, destined for the bearing of the two virtues which are Revelation and Truth; and again afterward, [he] said two—
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—two virtues it names” [Revelation and Truth]. And this pleases, from the Jews, R. David Kimchi; from the Catholics, St. Augustine (on Exodus, quest. 18), Hugh of St. Victor (in Lippomanus, on Exodus), Radulphus (bk. 6 on Leviticus), Bellarmine (bk. 4 On the Pontiff, ch. 3); and, from the heretics, Calvin himself. The fourth [view]: [that it] is an adamant [diamond], by whose brightness and variation of color would be indicated the [things] which anyone might ask of God. So [in] the book On Gems, St. Epiphanius; Suidas (under the word Ephod); Anastasius the Nicene (quest. 38), who also compares [it] to a golden little star. The fifth, of Cajetan, who wishes there to be two conditions of putting on the pectoral — namely, that it be put on without wrinkles, and fitly to the whole body. For in Exod. 28 (fol. 266), when he had noted more about these, he adds: “If there be joined to these [the requirement] which the pectoral needed, in that very act by which it was accommodated to the Pontiff’s breast — [namely] the two conditions — it will appear that those two conditions are signified by the names Urim and Thummim. For the pectoral was constructed not from gold, but woven from threads of linen, silk, and gold; and therefore, from the [nature of the] material, it could have many wrinkles, and many obliquities. Nor were its four sides stretched by golden pegs (that so it might escape wrinkles), but it was bounded on every side by golden chains, which do not suffice for taking away the wrinkles from the pectoral. And therefore the pectoral needed to be so accommodated to the breast, according to [its] chains and laces, and [needed such] extension and direction, that both according to all its parts it might lie manifest, and according to all its parts might have rectitude of position, and commensuration to the arms, to the beard, and the rest — and these two conditions are signified, to the letter, by the names Urim and Thummim. And the sense is: ‘And thou shalt give — in accommodating the pectoral itself to the Pontiff’s breast — Urim, that is, “lights” (that is, that all its parts may shine clearly, may lie clearly open, with no covering, [so that] no wrinkle of any part of it lie hidden or be darkened), and Thummim, that is, “perfections” (that is, that the whole, and any part of it, be disposed so rightly and commensurately, in relation to the arms and the hairs of the beard, to the chains and laces, to the belt, &c., that they may have all the requisites for the perfect disposition of the whole and of the several parts).’”
The latter kind of opinions is: that [the Urim and Thummim] are those very gems, which by these two names, for just causes, are marked. For they shone, and diffused from themselves the greatest splendor, since they were most noble; therefore they were called Urim. And with the greatest integrity and perfection, since of the whole kind they were the choicest that were [finest], therefore they were named Thummim. And this is the opinion of Josephus, of Lyranus, of Abulensis, of Oleaster, of Moncaeus (bk. 1 On Aaron, ch. 19), and of our Ribera. And to the truth [it] seems to me the more inclined opinion. For those higher [opinions] appear either as manifest fabrications, or certainly [as] opinions fictitious enough, without the foundation on which they rest. And some of them — most of all that Astrolabe one — is copiously refuted by Tostatus [Abulensis] in the cited place. Then, if any adamant [diamond] had been joined to those twelve, why would the names, orders, and places of those gems be so studiously noted, but this one here not even once anywhere be named, nor any place of it indicated? What of the fact that Anastasius places emeralds [Smaragdos] on either side of it? — which [emeralds] are also nowhere placed in Scripture, or certainly not except on the Pontiff’s shoulders. Thirdly, if Urim and Thummim were something other than those gems—
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—what cause could be feigned, why their material, form, quality, quantity, [and] place would nowhere be described even by a little word? And [whereas] of the other, even most minute, little things [there] is so accurate and so laborious a description, of these — which were of so great moment and so great dignity — [there is] not even one little word, or an apiculus [tiny stroke]? I know Rabbi Solomon [Rashi] refers the cause of so great a silence to the makers of these [gems], the Phrygians [embroiderers], or the jewelers — namely, because they were others than [those] of the rest of the ornaments. [Scripture] narrates [that] either God Himself, or, at His dictation, Moses, made Urim and Thummim on Mount Sinai — but with no indication, no probable conjecture. And why would that be less delivered to memory than [the fact] that the tables of the Decalogue were written by the finger of God? But we see the same stones, by the consent of all, called (Exod. 25, v. 7) “stones soham [שֹׁהַם], and stones milluim [מִלֻּאִים]” — where our [interpreter] renders “onyx stones, and gems.” What wonder, then, if Urim and Thummim be also named [for the same]? Yet perhaps it may move someone that, while God prescribes the making of the Pontifical vestments, He first accurately delivers the setting, sculpture, names, [and] order of all the stones; and then at last, as though commanding something altogether other: “But thou shalt put,” He says, “in the rational of judgment Doctrine and Truth (Urim and Thummim), which shall be on Aaron’s breast, when he shall go in before the Lord; and he shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel on his breast, in the sight of the Lord always” (Exod. 28 [v. 30]). But it is to be understood, [that] a brief summary as it were — a recapitulation [anacephalaeosis] of the [things] which He had said hitherto — is here instituted; and that not an altogether new fabric of the thing, but of the same which had already been narrated, a new use as it were, and new names, are indicated. For there is not, for inculcating the utility or the study of anything, in a divine Codex of this sort, an unwonted repetition. Fourthly and lastly, [there] is that opinion of Cajetan, [which is] well-nigh ridiculous. First, because the phrases of Scripture do not agree. For “to give Urim and Thummim” would be nothing other than to prohibit wrinkles of the ephod, and to fit [it] to the priest’s body. But to “inquire in the judgment of Urim” — what would that be? Secondly, [because] those who would make the vestments fit to the body — the tailors, who would weave the material free from wrinkles, or in whatever way impede them, and also the servants who unfold and stretch the masters’ garments — these would be said to “give Urim and Thummim.” Thirdly, in every kind of garments, if they were fit and least wrinkled, it could be said [that] “Urim and Thummim are in [them].” Fourthly, most ineptly would the 70 have rendered [it], and our [interpreter], “Doctrine, and Truth.” And yet Cajetan’s own glossator calls [that rendering] “the sound understanding.” And Cajetan himself: “This,” he says, “I would affirm to be the literal sense.”