These men searched for their family records, but they could not find them and so were excluded from the priesthood as unclean. The governor ordered them not to eat the most holy things until there was a priest to consult the Urim and Thummim.
These men searched for their family records, but they could not find them and so were excluded from the priesthood as unclean. The governor ordered them not to eat the most holy things until there was a priest to consult the Urim and Thummim.
Significance
Both Ezra 2:62-63 and Nehemiah 7:64-65 record the identical incident: certain priestly families "searched for their family records, but they could not find them and so were excluded from the priesthood as unclean" (וַיְגֹאֲלוּ מִן־הַכְּהֻנָּה, vayego'alu min-hakkehunnah). The governor ordered them "not to eat the most holy things until there was a priest to consult the Urim and Thummim" (אוּרִים וְתֻמִּים). This parallel preservation in both books underscores the post-exilic community's strict insistence on verified priestly genealogy for cultic service, while also acknowledging the absence of the Urim and Thummim as a marker of the second temple's diminished status compared to the first.
Found via
Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type
Direct Quotation
Connection Method(s)
Redemptive-Historical Progression — Nehemiah 7:64-65 reproduces the first-return register of Ezra 2:62-63 as the charter for the reconstituted community, carrying its unresolved deferral forward: priests still excluded "until there was a priest to consult the Urim and Thummim," a lack the restoration itself could not supply.
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