HIGH PRIEST. Official Names, Character, and Robes according to P 0 1).
In the Old Testament the high priest is called
either hakkohen, "the priest-" (e.g.,
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teuch (see Hexateuch). According to this, Aaron and his sons (really the descendants of his
two sons Eleazar and Ithamar) are i. Official alone the legitimate possessors of the
Names, priestly office; among these Aaron Character, as high priest took the leading place, and Robes and was the type of official whoseaccording function at his death was to be asto P. sumed by one of his sons (Lev. xvi.
32), probably by the first-born (cf.
In the other Pentateuchal sources no such princepriest appears. J makes Eleazar the successor of
Aaron as priest
(
ument says nothing.
high priest. It is noteworthy that Ezek. xl.-xlviii. fails to speak of the high priest; even xlv. 19 can hardly mean anything but the officiating priest of the occasion, and in Ezekiel the prince cares for the offcial ritual.
Comparison of the prescriptions of the priestly document with the historical and prophetic wri-tings fails to reveal in the latter in preexilic times a high priest corresponding to the offcial of the former. Certain passages show a chief priest such
as Jehoiada (II Kings xi.-xii.), Urijah (II Kings
xvi. 10), and Hilkiah (II Kings xxii.-xxiii.),, where
the designation hakkohen haggadhol first appears and where late critics see interpolation, though without sufficient ground since the name of a later
office may have had historic foreshad
3. The owing. Such foreshadowing is indi
Office in cated in kohen mishneh, " second
Historical priest "
(
and 24), a priest who had oversight of the
Prophetic temple in late preexilic times. But
Writings. that this is not the high priest appears from the fact that there were in the time of David and Solomon two such priests, Zadok
and Abiathar
(
Solomon with Zadok and Abiathar
(
which suggests the Priest Code (cf. Zech. iii. and vi.
13). In Haggai Joshua's place is of importance,
but alongside that of Zerubbabel, who is generally
named first. Zechariah's view of the office is closely related to that of the Priest Code. The steps to the creation of the .offce as seen in the Priest Code are
hidden, especially in view of Ezekiel's silence. But it may be affrmed on general grounds that the emergence of the offce was due to a movement
which had for its purpose the emancipation of the
Church from the State. Ezekiel concentrated po litical power in the hands of the prince, but made it subsidiary to the cult. The Priest Code depended upon the centrality of the Jerusalem cult and made the high priest the highest authority for the people.
The authority of the high-priesthood grew in
postexilic times to a significant eminence through
the introduction of the priestly law which set the
anointed high priest forth as the one authority,
though still in a spiritual sense, which authority
was generally recognized. A characteristic exam
ple of this is given in
Jerusalem upon the ground that he
4. The was priest of the seed of Aaron and
Office in would do no wrong. The panegyric
Postexilic in Ecclus. 1. indicates the ideal of the
Times. offce which was maintained. The concentration of political power into the hands of the high priest continued in postexilic
times. Zerubbabel vanished without leaving a
successor, but the priest-prince remained and be
came the political representative of the people.
The Urim and Thummim, upon which, according to the Priest Code, priestly authority rested, does not appear in postexilic times. But the growing
wealth of the Jewish community ever enhanced the
political importance of the offce. The high priest's
power was somewhat limited by the Sanhedrin, but
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Bibliography: The two early treatments of the subject, still useful, are: J. S. Selden, De successions in pontificatum Ebrworum, book i., chaps. 11-12, Frankfort, 1673; J. Lightfoot, Ministerium templi Hierosolyrnitani, iv. 3, in vol. ix. of his works, London 1825. The most comprehensive modern treatise is W. Baudissin, Die Geschichte des alttestamentlichen Priesterthume, Leipsic, 1889. Consult further: H. Ewald, Alterthfimer des Volkes Israel, pp. 382 sqq., Göttingen, 1866, Eng. transl., Antiquities of Israel, pp. 288 sqq., Boston, 1876; H. Gratz, in Monatsschrift für Geschichte und Wissenaohaft des Judenthums, 1877, pp. 450-464, 1881, pp. 49-64, 97-110; J. Wellhausen, Geschichte Israel,, chap. iv., Berlin, 1878; Oort, De Aaronieden, in ThT, xviii (1884), 289-335; H. Vogelstein, Der Karnp/ zwischen Priestern and Leaiten alit den Tagen Ezechiela, Stettin, 1889; A. Kuenen, in TAT, xxiv (1890),1-42; A. van Hoonacker, Le Sacerdoce 1eritique, Louvain, 1899; Schürer, Geschichte, ii. 214 sqq., Eng. transl., 11., i. 195 sqq.; idem, in TSK, 1872, pp. 593-657; Benzinger, Archäologie, Passim; Nowack, Archäologie, ii. 106-108, 117 sqil.; DB, iv. 83-84; EB, iii. 3837-47; JE, vi. 389-393: and the commentaries on Enodus and Leviticus.
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