The Hebrew name is Mozanaim, the Scales, weighing. Its name in Arabic is Al Zubena, purchase, or redemption. In Coptic, it is Lambadia, station of propitiation (from Lam, graciousness, and badia, branch). The name by which it has come down to us is the Latin, Libra, which means weighing, as used in the Vulgate (Isa. xl. 12).
Libra contains three bright stars whose names supply us with the whole matter. The brightest, α (in the lower scale), is named Zuben al Genubi, which means the purchase, or price which is deficient. This [pg 046] points to the fact that man has been utterly ruined. He is “weighed in the balances and found wanting.”
“None of them can by any means redeem his brother,
Nor give to God a ransom for him;
For the redemption of their soul is costly,
And must be let alone for ever.”
(Ps. xlix. 7, r.v.)
“Surely men of low degree are vanity (Heb. a breath),
And men of high degree are a lie;
In the balances they go up;