278 THE MAGIC OP JEWELS AND CHARMS
There
are some traces in the Bible of the use of precious stones as amulets.
In Proverbs xvii, 8, we read that "a gift is like a precious stone in
the eyes of the owner ; whithersoever he turneth he proepereth." This
passage is rendered somewhat differently in the Authorized Version, but
the above translation is evidently more correct. The stones of the
breastplate were of course amulets in a certain sense, and possibly
oracles also, and it is therefore quite probable that the Hebrews
shared in the belief common to all the peoples around them, although
opposition of the orthodox to all magical practices prevented them from
going into particulars in regard to such superstitious fancies.
In
support of his theory that the Urim and Thummim of the Hebrew
high-priest signified the stones of the breastplate worn on the sacred
ephod, and should be rendered "perfectly brilliant," Bellermann cites
the passage in Ezekiel (chap, xxviii, verse 14), where he writes of
"fiery stones" in treating of the royal splendors of the ruler of the
great commercial city of Tyre. As to the oracular utterances of the
high-priest when, clad in the ephod and wearing the glittering
breastplate, he sought for the counsel of the Almighty, this author
rejects the idea that the divine will was revealed by changes in the
brilliancy of the stones, by casting of lots, or by a mysterious use of
the ineffable name, the Tetragrammaton, J h w h (Jahweh), but believes
that the answer to the questions was communicated to the high-priest by
an inner voice, an inspiration similar to that vouchsafed to the great
prophets of Israel.1 /
A
curious analogy to the use by Christians of fragments supposed to have
come from the True Cross as amulets, was the employment by the Talmudic
Jews of chips from an
1
Johann Joachim Bellermann, " Die Urim und Thummim, die ältesten
Gemmen," Berlin, 1824, pp. 21, 22. For a full account of the
breastplate see the present writer's " The Curious Lore of Precious
Stones," Philadelphia and London, 1913, chap, viii, pp. 275-306.
