I properly be indicated in his person. A striking instance of this, in connection, too, witii symliolical dress, is to be found in Zech, iii: "Now Joshua (the high-priest, ver. 1) was. clothed with filthy garments and stood before the angel. And he ansvv'ered and spake unto tliose that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said. Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe Uiec with change of raiment. And I said, Let them set a fair mitre (C]"^?^) upon his head. So they set a fair mitre upon his head, and clothed him with garments." Here tlie priest's garments, G'^'153, and tlie mitre, ex- pressly typify the restored righteousness of the nation. Hence it seems to be sufficiently obvious that the breast- plate of righteousness or judgment, resi)lendent with the same precious stones which symbolize the glory of the Ne^v Jerusalem, and on which were engraved the names of the twelve tribes, worn by the high-priest, who was then said to bear the judgment of the children. of Israel upon his heart, was intended to express by symbols the acceptance of Israel grounded upon the sacrificial func- tions of the high-priest. The sense of the symbol is thus nearly identical with such passages as Numb, xxiii, 21, and the meaning of the Urim and Thummim is ex- plained by such expressions as Tit! ii< ^5"''3 "^"11^ ^'^'^Vi "Arise, shine ; for thy light is come" (Isa. Lx, 1). Thum- mim expresses alike complete prosperity and complete innocence, and so falls in exactly with the double notion of Ught (Isa. lx, 1 ; Lxii, 1, 2). The privilege of receiving an answer from God bears the same relation to the gen- eral state of Israel symboUzed by the priest's dress that the promise in Isa. liv, 13, "All thy children shall be taught of the Lord," does to the preceding description. " I will lay thy stones with fair colors, and lay thy foun- j dations with sapphires, and I will make thy windows of j ■•jgates, and thy gates of carbuncles, and all thy borders of pleasant stones," ver. 11, 12 ; comp. also ver. 14 and 17 (Heb.). It is obvious to add how entirely this view ac- cords with the blessing of Levi in Deut. xxxiii, 8, where Levi is called God's holy one, and God's Thummim and Urim are said to be given to him, because he came out of the trial so clear in his integrity. (See also Bar. \\ 2.) See Breastplate.
(7.) The "bonnet," n>25p, mighaah', was a iurhan of linen covering the head, but not in the particular form wliich that of the high-priest assumed when the mitre was added to it. See Bonnet.
(8.) The last article peculiar to the high-priest is the mitre, Tt.y^'O, mifsne'f/ielft, or upper turban, with its
HIGH-PRIEST
246
HIGH-PRIEST
Form of the Priestly Turban of the Hebrews, as siispeud- etl and as worn. (From Braun, ut sup. p. 4'2S.)
gold plate, engraved with "Holiness to the Lord," fasten- ed to it by a ribbon of blue. Josephus applies the same Heb.term (fiaavaiixcpOijQ) to the turbans of the common priests as well, but says that in addition to this, and sewn upon the top of it, the high-priest had another turban of blue ; that besides this he had outside the turban a triple crown of gold, consisting, that is, of three rims one above the other, and terminating at the top in a kind of conical cup, hke the inverted calyx of the herb liyos- cyanius. Josephus doubtless gives a true account of the high-priest's turban as worn in his day. It may fairly be conjectured that the crown was appended when the As- monaeans united the temporal monarchy with the priest- hood, and tliat this was continued, though in a modified shape, after the sovereignty was taken from them. Jo- sephus also describes the TriraXoi', the lamina or gold plate, which he says covered the forehead of the high- priest. In A nt. vii, 3, 8, he says that the identical gold plate made in the days of Moses existed in his time ; and Whiston adds in a note that it was still preserved in the time of Origen, and that the inscription on it was en- graved in Samaritan characters (.1 nt. iii, 3, C). It is cer- tain that R, Eliezer, who flourished in Hadrian's reign, saw it at Rome. It was doubtless placed, with other spoils of the Temple, in the Temple of Peace, which was burnt down in the reign of Commodus. These spoils, however, are especially mentioned as part of Alaric's plmider when he took Rome. They were carried by Genseric into Africa, and brought by Belisarius to Byzan- tium, where they adorned his triumph. On the warning of a Jew the emperor ordered them back to Jerusalem, but what became of them is not known (lieland, de Sjm- liis Tenipli). See Mitre.
•3, Aaron had peculiar functiom. To him alone it appertained, and he alone was permitted, to enter the Iloly of Holies, which he did once a year, on the great day of atonement, when he sprinkled the blood of the sin-offering on the mercy -seat, and biurnt incense with-
in the vail (Lev. xvi). He is said by the Talmudists, with whom agree Lightfoot, Selden, Grotius, Winer, Biihr, and many others, not to have worn his full pon- tifical robes on the occasion, but to have been clad en- tirely in white linen (Lev. xvi, 4, 32). It is singular, however, that, on the other hand, Josephus says that the great fast-day was the chief, if not the only day in the year when the high-priest wore all his robes ( War, V, 5, 7), and, in spite of the alleged imjiropriety of his wearing his splendid apparel on a day of humiliation, it seems far more probable that on the one occasion when he performed functions peculiar to the high-priest he should have worn his full dress. Josephus, too, could not have been mistaken as to the fact, which he repeats {cont. Ap. ii, 7), where he says the high-priests alone might enter into the Holy of Holies, "propria stola cir^ cumamicti." For although Selden, who strenuously sup- ports the Rabbinical statement that the high-priest only wore the four linen garments when he entered the Holy of Holies, endeavors to make Josephus say the same thing, it is impossible to twist his words into this mean- ing. It is true, on the other hand, that Lev. 'x.vi dis- tinctly prescribes that Aaron should wear the four priest- ly garments of linen when he entered into the Holy of Holies, and put them off immediately he came out, and leave them in the Temple ; no one being present in the Temple while Aaron made the atonement (verse 17). Either, therefore, in the time of Josephus this law was not kept in practice, or else we must reconcile the ap- parent contradiction by supposing that in consequence of the great jealousy with which the high-priest's robes were kept by the civil power at this time, the custom had arisen for him to wear them, not even always on the three great festivals (Ant. xviii, 4, 3), but only on the great day of expiation. Clad in this gorgeous at- tire, he would enter the Temple in presence of all the people, and, after having performed in secret, as the law requires, the rites of expiation in the linen dress, he would resume his pontifical robes, and so appear again in public. Thus his wearing the robes would easily come to be identified chiefly with the day of atonement; and this is, perhaps, the most probable explanation. In other respects, the high-priest performed the functions of a priest, but only on new moons and other great feasts, and on such solemn occasions as the dedication of the Temple under Solomon, mider Zerubbabel, etc. See Atonement, Day of.