Page:Origin of metallic currency and weight standards.djvu/300

 V. Maccabean Period. Gold on the old standard, and silver (now first coined) struck on the Phoenician silver standard of 220 grains.

Copper was estimated most probably on the the old double shekel system; and most likely the royal Assyrian heavy system of 60 shekels to the maneh and 60 manehs to the talent was adopted in its entirety for copper and other articles of no great value in proportion to their bulk We are unfortunately unable to gain any definite knowledge from Ezekiel xlv., as v. 12, which gives the weight system, is confused, and there is a great discrepancy between the Hebrew and Greek texts. Though it is a prophetic passage, there is no reason for supposing that the prophet did not clearly understand the standard weight system of his time (600 ), for his account of the metric system is singularly clear. It is best to give the whole passage as it appears in the Revised Version: "Thus saith the Lord God: Let it suffice you, O princes of Israel: remove violence and spoil, and execute judgment and justice; take away your exactions from my people, saith the Lord God. Ye shall have just balances, and a just ephah, and a just bath. The ephah and the bath shall be of one measure, that the bath may contain the tenth part of an homer, and the ephah the tenth part of an homer: the measure thereof shall be after the homer. And the shekel shall be twenty gerahs; twenty shekels, five and twenty shekels, fifteen shekels shall be your maneh." (vv. 9-12.) One thing is clear at least, and that is that the passage is a protest against over-exaction, and we may infer that the weight system here mentioned is for precious metals, seeing that there is no mention made of the talent. The shekel is to be 20 gerahs, that is, the shekel of the Sanctuary. If the princes had sought to exact payment in royal shekels instead of the old shekel, and also to make the maneh of silver contain 60 shekels instead of 50, we can see every reason for the cry of the oppressed being loud.

The confusion in the Hebrew text may be due to the fact that there were two manehs in use, that of 50 shekels for gold and silver, and that of 60 shekels for other commodities. The Septuagint version is perfectly capable of explanation on the principles which I have indicated. The LXX. runs thus: [Greek: kai ta stathmia eikosi oboloi, pente sikloi, pente kai sikloi, deka kai pentêkonta sikloi hê mna estai hymin .. So Tischendorf.

There is a (Cod. Al.) reading [Greek: hoi pente sikloi, kai pente kai hoi deka sikloi]. Tischendorf's text can hardly be right, [Greek: pente kai sikloi, deka kai pentêkonta] contain two most unnatural collocations. [Greek: deka kai pentêkonta] is absolutely absurd as a way of expressing 60. [Greek: heis kai pentêkonta] up to [Greek: ennea kai pentekonta] to express 51 to 59 are reasonable and found universally, but to add on 10 to one of the main multiples of 10 in the decimal system is a method unknown, and is just as absurd in Greek as it would be if in English we were to say 10 and 50, meaning thereby 60. Again in the previous clause, the words [Greek: pente kai] point to some other numeral such as 10, or 20, as necessarily following. This is obtained by taking the reading [Greek: pente kai deka sikloi, kai pentêkonta, k.t.l.]]*