Thb LiTKST Jewjsu Wkiout-Svsteu.
m Denarius-drachm 1 62) gn.
'>p^;y Shekel* 2 1 106 „
Slho Tctradrachm 4*1 210 „
njc Mina 100 60 25 1 62501 „
nrj Talent 6000 3000 1500 60 1 816,0002 „
Notes.— 1 i.e. 12 oz. avoir. 2 i.e. 45 lb.
• The old term ' shekel * was henceforth confined to the true half-shekel, formerly 112 grains ; cf. the name of the treatise
The importance of this late Jewish system foi our previous investigations lies in the fact that it supplies the evidence, for which one looks in vain in the older Heb. literature, that the Phoen. weight- system has the best claim to be regarded as that on which Jewish trade was conducted not only in the first two centuries of our era, but for several centuries before. It was natural that the mina c< this system should be identified with the libra 0/ pound of the Roman weight-system. The hitter occurs in the NT only in Jn 12^ 19™ (EV ' pound, \irpa, whence the x-i-rb of the Mishna, also occasion- ally •p''?«s'i< liP). Tlie talent (Rev 16-', cf. Josephus, BJ V. vi. 3 [§ 270] TaXavTatoi irfrpai) of 315,000 grains when doubled, i.e. when taken not as 3000 light but as 30U0 heavy shekels or tetradraclims, was tariti'ed on the Roman system as 125 libras, as is testified by a weight with the inscription
PONDOCXXVTALENTVM SICLORVM III (3000 shekels,
the M for 1000 being omitted), and confirmed by Epiphanius. A large stone weight found at Jeru- salem in 1891 {PEFSt, 1892, 289 f.), said to weigh 41,9U0 grammes (c. 646,000 grains), is evidently a heavy talent on this system.
To sum up the result of the foregoing sections, evidence has been adduced for the existence, side by side, in the earlier period of Heb. history of three distinct units of weight — the Babylonian 252- grain unit, the new Syrian 320-grain unit, and, the best attested of all, the Phoenician 224-grain unit, each with its corresponding light unit of 126, 160, and 112 grains respectively. The second probably did not survive the Exile ; while the last, in the end, gained the day over both its com- petitors.
Hebrew Measures of Length.— vi. Approxi- mate value of the Hebrew cubit. — The most wide- spread of all metrical denominations are those measures of length which have been derived from certain parts of the human body — the Gngerbreadtli or digit, the handbreadth or palm, the cubit (Ki'/SiTof, cubitum, the elbow), or the length of the forearm from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger. The equally convenient ' foot,' liowe\er, is foretgn to the Heb. system. By the Gr. met- rologists of the empire the digit was regarded as the unit : 6 SaKruXos Trpwris 4aTLV (affirfp Kal ij ^ovd.i (ir'i Til/ apiB/j.Qv, SO writes Julian of Ascalon (np. Hultsch, Metrol. Script. RcliquicB, i. 200), who proceeds to give the usual denominations of the system in use in his time in Palestine, disclosing tlie well-nigh universal division of the cubit into 6 palms, each of 4 digits (for exceptions to this division see below). The comparative frequency of the references to the cubit in the OT, however, warrant us in regarding it as the unit of the Heb. system. Before proceeding to the investigation of the length of the cubit, it may be noted at this stage that the Hebrews in their measurements employed botli the measuring-rod (mnn .ijij Ezk 40" etc., LXX and NT (cdXa^aos, Rev 11' 21"") and the measuring-line (.Tj?n 15 Jer 31^" ; also oin 1 K 7'°, Jer 52-' [AV wrongly 'fillet']). The latter was I)robably used for the larger measurements, one such being mentioned in the Mishna as of 50 cubits in length (Erubin v. 4).
The evidence of the OT goes to show that the Hebrews, before and after the Exile, were familiar with two cubits of ditlerent lengths. First of all, we find the bed or sarcophagus of Og, the king of Bashan, measured according to ' the cubit of a man ' {&k nwi Dt3", cf. Rev 21") ; in other words, according to the then customary, everyday cubit (cf. the similar expressions in the original of 2 S 7",
Shel^aZim^ dealing with the pavTnent of the temple tax of half a shekel. In Galilee, however, the term ypD was applied to the latter, hence in the Mishna the Galilseau fUd is always said tc be equal to \ the ^eld of Judsa.
"WEIGHTS AND MEASUEES
WEIGHTS AND MEASURES 907
Is 8', Rev 13" etc ). When we consider, in the second place, that the early chapters of Deuteronomy are almost certainly later than tlie eigliteenth year of Josiab, and therefore within the period embraced by the lifetime of Ezekiel, we are led to identify the ' cubit of a man ' of the passage cited with the cubit in everj'day use among Ezekiel's contem- poraries. This prophet, in a passage of the lirst importance for our investigation, informs us that tlic measurements of the temple of his vision are not on the st-andard of the then generally used cubit, but after a cubit longer than the latter by a handbreadth (Ezk 40", cf. 43").* Now, since tlie proportions and arrangements of Ezekiel's temple are in all essential particulars identical with those of the temple of Solomon, the prophet's aim in the use of this longer cubit can hardly be other than to ensure that his temple shall be a replica of the older Solomonic temple. That this, rather tlian the possible alternative that Ezekiel is here intro- ducing a new cubit on the Babylonian standard (so Haupt in SBOT, 'Ezekiel,' 179 f.), is the correct inference from the passage before us, is confirmed by the remark of the Chronicler that the dimensions of Solomon's temple were deter- mined by cubits ' after the former measure' (2 Ch 3^). Ezekiel and the Chronicler, then, are our authorities for the conclusion that the cubit in ordinary use, both before and after the Exile, was sliorter by a handbreadth tlian tlie cubit emplojcd, for buildin" purposes at least, in the reign of Solomon. In view, further, of the all but un- varying tradition, confirmed by the practice else- where, as shown above, that the ordinary cubit contained six palms or handbreadths, we are left to infer that the Solomonic building cubit toas a cubit of seven handOreailt/is.