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PROF. ARCHIBALD R. S. KENNEDY, M.A., D.D., ON 



(ii) The Babylonian or 252-grain shekel. 



That this is the value of the original Babylonia u shekel has 

 been amply proved by the researches of Professor Lehmann- 

 Haupt. By this indefatigable metrologist, indeed, it is regarded 

 as the basal unit of all the weight-systems of antiquity. By this 

 shekel and its 60-fold or mina, merchandise and the precious 

 metals were alike weighed in Babylonia itself; but in commer- 

 cial dealings with the West, it is maintained, a special mina of 

 50 shekels was introduced for the weiohino- of orold. Xow in 



r> o o 



almost all the recent textbooks and dictionary articles, my own 

 included, you will find it stated that this shekel of 252 grains 

 was also the gold standard in use among the Hebrews. But a 

 fresh examination of the evidence in the course of preparing 

 this lecture leads me to have serious doubts as to the validity of 

 the accepted opinion. 



The principal witness for the use of the Babylonian gold 

 shekel and its multiples by the Hebrews has hitherto been 

 believed to be Josephus. This writer, in his account of the 

 visit of the triumvir Licinius Crassus to Jerusalem in 54 B.C. 

 (Ant. XIV, vii, 1) tells how the latter robbed the temple of its 

 vast deposits of gold and silver, including a beam of solid gold 

 weighing 300 minas, and adds: "Now among us the mina is 

 equal to 2 h litras (Roman pounds)." According to this state- 

 ment the gold mina in Josephus' day weighed 12,633 grs., 

 which yields a shekel {-£$) of 252 - 6 grs., the precise value of 

 the heavy Babylonian shekel. On this basis, accordingly, the 

 tables of the Hebrew gold weights in the current textbooks, etc. r 

 have been constructed. But, as I have said, I am now convinced 

 that we have been led astray in this matter by the historian's 

 manner of expression. 



In placing before you the grounds for this revolutionary con- 

 clusion, I propose to start from another passage of Josephus 

 which has caused much perplexity to metrologists. In an earlier 

 part of the same work {Ant. Ill, vi, 7) the historian gives the 

 weight of the golden candlestick of the Tabernacle both as a 

 talent — as in the original source, Exodus xxv, 39 — and as 100 

 minas. Xow the strange equation of a talent with 100, instead 

 of 60 or 120, minas shows that Josephus is here expressing the 

 talent of one weight-system in terms of the minas of another. 

 But we know from the Pentateuch, Josephus' sole authority, that 

 the talent in question is the Hebrew-Phoenician talent of 3,000 

 " shekels of the sanctuary," originally 673,500 grs., but reduced 

 when the Antiquities were written to 631,560 grs. {see table 



