Besides tlie higli-priestly office, we hear in the Rabbinical literature of an exalted priestly office, that of the ^(gan ([jy), of which there is no mention
in the OT. The scgan has usually been viewed aa the high priest's substitute, wlio had to take big place if he was prevented by Levitical uncleanness from discharging the duties of his office. But the existence of a standin" vicarius for tlie high priest is rendered improbable by the statement of the Mishna (Joma i. 1) that seven days before the Day of Atonement ' another priest ' was to be set apart to act for the high })ricst in the event of his being prevented from officiating. It is not at all likely that this statement in the Mislina relates to an earlier practice, and that afterwards (subsequent to the year A.d. 63) the scgan was appointed aa substitute for the high priest (Buchler, Priester, p. 1 13), for there is nothing known of such a change. Since the LXX usually reproduces theword sigunim, which is used in the OT for non-priestly officials, by tTTpaT-qyol, Schiirer (p. 264 f.) is probably right in seeing in the segan the captain of the temple (arpa- TTiybs ToD lepou), who is repeatedly mentioned in the NT and by Josephus, and in attributing to him the principal oversight of the external order of the temple. Yet Joma 39* (Biicliler, Pricster, p. 105) looks upon the segan as in some measure the repre- sentative of the high priest. Tlie sCganim in the plural (Bikkurim iii. 3) are doubtless, like the o-rpa- T1770/ (Lk 22^- °2), heads of the temple police sub- ordinate to the sSgan. In the Mishna (Bikkurim, iii. 3) there are mentioned as going to meet the festive procession which accompanied the bikkurim — the pahuth (nins), the segdnim, and the qizbdrim. It may be inferred that by the first of these designa- tions, as by the two following, priests are intended, although pahvth is used also for secular governors. But a special priestly office can hardly be con- noted by the word, which apparentlj' corresponds to the NT dpxifpeis (Schiirer, p. 266). The gia bdrim (o-i;!:. Peak i. 6 end) or ya^o(pv\aKes (Joa Ant. XV. xi. 4, XVIII. iv. 3) had charge of the rich temple treasures. From the description of th« Chronicler, it appears necessary to hold that in his time the administration of the temple revenue and capital was in the hands of the Levites. At a later period the higher posts as treasurers appear to have been held by priests, for the gizbdrim appear as higli temple officials alongside of the segdnim (Bikkurim iii. 3), and Josephus (Ant. xx. viii. 11) names the yafo^i'XoJ, i.e. probably the head of the treasurers, immediately after the high priest. It is possible that the Chronicler, in his account of the management of the temple treasury, has, in his preference for the Levites, arbitrarily put these in the foreground (but cf. Ex 38='). But, seeing that in the matter of other duties and rights the Levitea were in point of fact displaced in later times by the priests, the same may have happened with the holding of treasury offices. Under Nehemiah (Neh 13" M) a priest was at the head of the treasurera (i.e. those who were set over the 'Czdrith, ' store- houses '), among whom only one is stated to have been a Levite. Sam. Krauss (p. 673 f.) doubts, however, whether the gizbdrim were priests, they being, as far as is known to the present writer, nowhere directly called such. To the treasury officials probably belonged also the 'dmarkHin (p'73-ox), who, without a more particular definition of the term, are mentioned in the Mishn.a only once, along with the gizbdrim (Shekalim v. 2), ana are named also in later literature, as a rule, together with the gizbdri7n (Schiirer, p. 270 f.). Sam. Krauss (p. 673) holds the 'dmarkclin also to have been lay- men, drawin" this inference from the Midrash Wajikra Rabba (Par. V. ch. v. 3 ; in A. Wiinsche'a Bibliotheca liabbinica, Liefer. 26, 1884, p. 36), according to which the 'dmarkol liad a right to par take of the holy things, but not, like the high pnest, of the offcrinjjs. But Schiirer (p. 270) is probably right in referring to Tosefla Hctrajoth, end (Tosefta,
PRIESTS AND LEVITES
PEIEST IX XT
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ed. by M. S. Zutkermandel, 18S0, p. 476, bottom), where in a graduated list the iXmarkOl and the i/izbdr are aUove tlie ordinary priest, the latter is above the Levite, and this last again above the Israelite, i.e. the layman (cf. also Oraetz, Monats- .■iihri/t, 1885, p. 1U4). It is coiTect, however, that the official name 'Umarkul is used to desij;nate the office not only of priest, but of administrator in ^•eneral (Biichler, Pricxtcr, p. UiO tt. ; Schiirer, p. ■JTu). Accordin"^ to Biichler (p. 90 ti'.), tliere were, in addition to the regular priestly ghbdrhn and \}mnr/;elin, others who were selected from the successive divisions of officiating priests ; but no express testimony is known of the use of these two names for heads of these divisions. — Only in the Jerusalem Talmud is the office of the katohkin Wr'yr.j, Ka$o\tKoi) named (SchUrer, p. 271).
The cultus wa-s, according to the Law, to be performed by all priests ; but in course of time the ditlerent functions became so complicated and in part ditlicult, that, according to the Mishna, they were apportioned amon" dillerent priestly officials, and certain duties, such as that of preparing the shewbread and the incense, became liereditary in particular families (Schiirer, p. 275 ff.).