By the time of Saul, the terms Urim and Thummim had become so debased that they were used for the casting of lots; they were pressed into use as an oracle in the absence of Yahweh, and our tossing of ‘heads’ or ‘tails’ is possibly a relic of this ancient practice.

The important point, here, is that the later Hebrew priests used Urim and Thummim as a symbolic method of communicating with Yahweh, even as dried yarrow stalks, in combination with the I Ching, have been used by the Chinese. At the time of Saul, they may have been small sticks, pebbles or dice (all of these have been suggested) with ‘yes’ and ‘no’ connotations, which were picked out, at random, from the pocket of the ephod.

The practice may have been a tribal memory of a more technical method used by Aaron for communication with Yahweh, the instruments of which were no longer available. Following this argument, the use in the desert should have been for direct communication with Yahweh, there being no necessity to cast lots to obtain his decision. Such a communication could have been in two forms: one, to enable Yahweh to summon Aaron to the Tent from the father reaches of the Camp and, two, a system by which Aaron could communicate with the aerial craft during Yahweh’s periods of absence.

As there is no satisfactory interpretation of Urim and Thummim to be had from Hebrew etymology, there is a case for referring back to the Sumerian syllabic equivalents. A tentative analysis is as follows:

HEBREW: Urim or U’rim

SUMERIAN: u = ‘height’: rim = ‘reduce’ or ‘shorten.’

 

 

HEBREW: Thummim or Thum’min

SUMERIAN: tum = ‘bring’: min = ‘Shamash’ or ‘20.’

 

The (Anunnaki) hierarchy were ranked by numbers (tens), and 20 was Shamash’s number.

From this analysis, it may be suggested that, in Sumerian, u-rim could have meant ‘height-reducer’ or ‘distance-shortener’; similarly, tum-min could have meant ‘Shamash (or Yahweh)-bringer.’

What weight can be put on this analysis is uncertain; all that can be stated is that it should be borne in mind, as an unsubstantiated speculation, that the Urim and Thummin may have been small, technical devices for effecting communication at a distance, between Aaron and Yahweh. And very useful they would have been. If the Sumerian interpretation should be correct, we could consider the Thummim as a distant alarm call.²¹¹

Miriam and Aaron criticized Moses, and Yahweh heard it and, peremptorily, ordered them to the Tent of Meeting. The narrative has the air of instant action. The culprits were talking outside the Tent, probably away in the camp, somewhere. Yahweh was up in the aerial craft, and yet he overheard their conversation and could communicate with them immediately.

Surely, the explanation should like in the fact that it was Aaron who carried the Urim and Thummim. Is it so unlikely that it was through these instruments that communication occurred? Is if not less likely that it was some form of extra-sensory perception on the part of Yahweh? Perhaps, Aaron made an unfortunate mistake; three thousand years later, the President of the United States, in India, was to be the victim of a similar technical error — the microphone that, inadvertently, was left switched on. Or, perhaps, in Aaron’s case, the microphone could not be switched off; perhaps he was permanently ‘bugged’ without being aware of it.²¹²