Hebrew weights
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This entry incorporates text from Easton's Bible Dictionary, 1897, with some modernisation.
Weights - Reduced to English troy-weight, the Hebrew weights were:
- Gerah (Lev. 27:25; Num. 3:47), a Hebrew word, meaning a grain or kernel, and hence a small weight. It was the twentieth part of a shekel, and equal to 12 grains (778 mg).
- Bekah (Ex. 38:26), meaning "a half" i.e., "half a shekel," equal to 5 pennyweight (7.8 g).
- Shekel, "a weight," only in the Old Testament, and frequently in its original form (Gen. 23:15, 16; Ex. 21:32; 30:13, 15; 38:24-29, etc.). It was equal to 10 pennyweight (15.6 g).
- Ma'neh, "a part" or "portion" (Ezek. 45:12), equal to 60 shekels (933 g), i.e., to 2 lb 6 oz (1,077 g).
- Talent of silver (2 Kings 5:22), equal to 3,000 shekels (46.7 kg), i.e., 125 lb (56.7 kg).
- Talent of gold (Ex. 25:39), double the preceding, i.e., 250 lb (113 kg).