The Jewels
The twelve jewels in the breastplate were each, according to the Biblical description, to be made from specific minerals, none of them the same as another, and each of them representative of a specific tribe, whose name was to be inscribed on the stone. There is no consistent view in classical rabbinical literature as to the order of the names; the Jerusalem Targum, for example, argued that the names appeared in the order of the birth of each tribe's patriarch according to the Book of Genesis; Maimonides argued that the names were all engraved on the first stone, with the words the tribes of Jeshurun being engraved on the last stone; kabbalistic writers such Hezekiah ben Manoah and Bahya ben Asher argued that only six letters from each name was present on each stone, together with a few letters from the names of Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob, or from the phrase the tribes of Jeshurun, so that there were seventy-two letters in total (72 being a very significant number in Kabbalistic thought).
Unfortunately, the meaning of the Hebrew names for the minerals, given by the masoretic text, are not clear, and though the Greek names for them in the Septuagint are more clear, scholars believe that it cannot be completely relied on for this matter because the breastplate had ceased to be in use by the time the Septuagint was created, and several Greek names for various gems have changed meaning between the classical era and modern times. However, although classical rabbinical literature argues that the names were inscribed using a magic worm because neither chisels nor paint nor ink were allowed to mark them out, a more naturalistic approach suggests that the jewels must have had comparatively low hardness in order to be engraved upon, and therefore this gives an additional clue to the identity of the minerals. It gives it a natural glow.
The jewel stones are as follows (the first item in each row is probably the right hand side, as Hebrew is a right to left script):
Read more about this topic: Priestly Breastplate
Famous quotes containing the word jewels:
“Just see how it glints and sparkles. Of course it is a nucleus and focus of crime. Every good stone is. They are the devil’s pet baits. In larger and older jewels every facet may stand for a bloody deed....”
—Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930)
“Women hock their jewels and their husbands’ insurance policies to acquire an unaccustomed shade in hair or crêpe de chine. Why then is it that when anyone commits anything novel in the arts he should be always greeted by this same peevish howl of pain and surprise? One is led to suspect that the interest people show in these much talked of commodities, painting, music, and writing, cannot be very deep or very genuine when they so wince under an unexpected impact.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)