[341] LXX. τρίτον τοῦ διδράχμου.
[342] 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 B.C.), 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: καὶ τὰ στάθμια εἴκοσι ὀβολοί, πέντε σίκλοι, πέντε καὶ σίκλοι, δέκα καὶ πεντήκοντα σίκλοι ἡ μνᾶ ἔσται ὑμῖν. So Tischendorf.
There is a MS. (Cod. Al.) reading οἱ πέντε σίκλοι, καὶ πέντε καὶ οἱ δέκα σίκλοι. Tischendorf’s text can hardly be right, πέντε καὶ σίκλοι, δέκα καὶ πεντήκοντα contain two most unnatural collocations. δέκα καὶ πεντήκοντα is absolutely absurd as a way of expressing 60. εἶς καὶ πεντήκοντα up to ἐννεα καὶ πεντήκοντα 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 πέντε καὶ point to some other numeral such as 10, or 20, as necessarily following. This is obtained by taking the MS. reading πέντε καὶ δέκα σίκλοι, καὶ πεντήκοντα, κ.τ.λ. Now the LXX. gives the plural στάθμια for “shekel”: στάθμια means the actual weights employed in weighing the amounts of gold or silver so weighed. Ezekiel is describing the various weight-units to be employed: “And the weights are 20 gerahs (lupins), the five shekel weight, the fifteen shekel weight, and fifty shekels shall be your maneh.” The article οἱ is very rightly used before πέντε, for it refers to the well known multiple of the shekel, of which we spoke above when dealing with the Bull’s-head weight. The same explanation may probably be given of the fifteen shekel weight. The maneh of 50 shekels of 20 gerahs each is the old maneh of the Sanctuary (Period II.), not the royal maneh which contained 100 light shekels.
Now turning to the Hebrew version we find “twenty shekels, five and twenty shekels and fifteen shekels,”the sum of which makes a maneh of 60 shekels, or the royal Assyrian and Hebrew commercial maneh. It is also to be observed that the position of fifteen is unnatural; it ought to come in the series before “twenty” and “five and twenty.” Fifty stands in the corresponding place in LXX. Has the Hebrew text altered 50 into 15 so as to obtain a total of 60? But there is another question; Why do we find “five” and “fifteen” stand first in LXX., and “twenty” and “twenty five” in Hebrew? On the theory, that of the Septuagint translators, that the prophet is describing a series of weight-pieces, it is quite simple. Combine the numbers of both versions, and place them in order thus: 1 shekel, 5 shekels, 15 shekels, 20 shekels, 25 shekels (½ maneh), 50 shekels (maneh). This gives a rational explanation of how the discrepancy arose. The LXX. translated from a text which probably ran thus, 5 shekels, 10 shekels, 15 shekels, and went no further with the series. For it is not at all improbable that the reading οἱ δέκα is due to the fact that after οἱ πέντε σίκλοι stood οἱ δέκα, which was followed by οἱ πεντεκάιδεκα σίκλοι. The Jews of a later date, knowing only of the commercial mina of 60 shekels, left out some of the numerals, and altered 50 into 15 to make up 60 shekels.
[343] Herod. III. 89, seqq.
[344] Metrol.², p. 420.
[345] Metrol.², p. 153.
[346] Head, op. cit. p. 789.
[347] The amount of gold in electrum varies greatly. Pliny, H. N. XXXIII. 4. 23, ubicumque quinta argenti portio est, et electrum uocatur. The Carthaginian electrum probably came from Spain (cp. [p. 94]).