Biblical and Talmudic units of measurement
Biblical and Talmudic units of measurement were used primarily by ancient Israelites and appear frequently within the Hebrew Bible as well as in later rabbinic writings, such as the Mishnah and Talmud. These units of measurement continue to be used in functions regulating Orthodox Jewish contemporary life, based on halacha. The specificity of some of the units used and which are encompassed under these systems of measurement have given rise, in some instances, to disputes, owing to the discontinuation of their Hebrew names and their replacement by other names in modern usage.
Note: The listed measurements of this system range from the lowest to highest acceptable halakhic value, in terms of conversion to and from contemporary systems of measurement.
Unit conversion
Archaeological
While documentation on each unit's relation to another's is plentiful, there is much debate, both within Judaism and in academia, about the exact relationship between measurements in the system and those in other measurement systems. Classical definitions, such as that an etzba was seven barleycorns laid side by side, or that a log was equal to six medium-sized eggs, are also open to debate.Nevertheless, the entire system of measurement bears profound resemblance to the Babylonian and the ancient Egyptian units of measurement|Egyptian] systems, and is currently understood to have likely been derived from some combination of the two. Scholars commonly infer the absolute sizes based on the better-known Babylonian units' relations to their contemporary counterparts.
Ezekiel refers to an "amah which is an amah plus a tefah ", and thus is one sixth larger than the standard amah. An explanation for this discrepancy seems to be suggested by the Book of Chronicles, which states that Solomon's Temple was built according to "cubits following the first measure", suggesting that over the course of time the original amah was supplanted by a smaller one. The Egyptians also used two different cubits, one of which—the royal cubit—was a sixth larger than the common cubit; this royal measurement was the earlier of the two in Egyptian use, and the one which the Pyramids of the 3rd and 4th Dynasties seem to be measured in integer multiples of.
The smaller of the Egyptian cubits measured, but the standard Babylonian cubit, cast in stone on one of the statues of Gudea, was 49.5 cm, and the larger Egyptian cubit was between 52.5 and 52.8 cm. The Books of Samuel portray the Temple as having a Phoenician architect, and in Phoenicia it was the Babylonian cubit which was used to measure the size of parts of ships. Thus scholars are uncertain whether the standard Biblical cubit would have been 49.5 or 52.5 cm, but are fairly certain that it was one of these two figures. From these figures for the size of a Biblical cubit, that of the basic unit—the finger-breadth —can be calculated to be either 2.1 or 2.2 cm.
Halakhic
Rabbinic scholars have also attempted to calculate these measurements. The most accepted approaches are those of Rav Avraham Chaim Naeh, who approximates the etzba at 2 cm, and Chazon Ish at 2.38 cm. A third opinion, in Rabbi Chaim P. Benish's "Midos V'Shiurei Torah", provides an alternative understanding of the Rambam and suggests that the, according to the Rambam, is 0.748–0.756 in.In the below tables, the range of values shown is that between the calculations of Naeh and Chazon Ish. The archaeological estimate is in the middle of this range.
Length and distance
The original measures of length were derived from the human body—the finger, hand, arm, span, foot, and pace—but since these measures differ between individuals, they are reduced to a certain standard for general use.The Hebrew Bible mentions the palm or handbreadth, the span, and the cubit or ell. In later periods, more measures are recorded: the digit or fingerbreadth, the mile, and the parasang. The latter two are loan words into the Hebrew language, and borrowed measurements - the Latin mille, and Iranian parasang, respectively; both were units of itinerant distance, and thus varied according to terrain and stride length, and, in the case of the parasang, also on the speed of travel.
The measurements were related as follows:
- 1 palm = 4 digits
- 1 span = 3 palms
- 1 cubit = 2 spans, or 6 palms
- 1 mil = 2000 cubits
- 1 parasang = 4 mils
| Name | Hebrew name | Translation | English equivalent | SI equivalent | ||||
| Etzba | מיל | mile | 0.598–0.712 mi | 0.963–1.146 km | ||||
| parasa | פרסה | parasang | 2.41–2.85 mi | 3.87–4.58 km |
Talmudic additions
To the somewhat simple system of distance, the Talmud adds a few more units, namely the double palm, the pace, the cord, the stadion, the day's journey, and an undetermined quantity named the . The stadion appears to have been adopted from Persia, while the double palm seems to have been derived from the Greek.The relationship between four of these additional units and the earlier system is as follows:
- 1 double palm = 2 palms
- 1 pace = 1 ell
- 1 stadion = 1600 palms . Others say that 1 stadion equalled 470–500 cubits.
- 1 day's journey = 10 parasangs
Area
The Israelite system of measuring area was fairly informal; the biblical text merely measures areas by describing how much land could be sown with a certain volume measure of seed, for example the amount of land able to be sown with 2 seahs of barley. The closest thing to a formal area unit was the yoke , which referred to the amount of land that a pair of yoked oxen could plough in a single day; in Mesopotamia the standard estimate for this was 6,480 square cubits, which is roughly equal to a third of an acre.The following units appear in rabbinic sources:
- Se'arah, "hair", square of a
- Adashah, "lentil", of a
- Geris, hulled fava bean, a circle with a diameter of about 2 centimeters
- Amah al amah, square cubit, 0.232 to 0.328 m2
- Beit rova, space of 10.5 cubits x 10.5 cubits for sowing kav of seed. Area varies between 24 and 34.5 m2
- Beit seah space for sowing a 576 to 829.5 m2
- Beit kor space for sowing a of seed, or what is 30 in volume; the area needed is appx. 1.73 to 2.48 hectares, or about 23,000 m2 in area.
Volume
Although they both use the log as the basic unit, the Israelites differentiated their systems of volume measure between dry and liquid states.
Dry measure
For dry measurement, or more specifically a measure of capacity rather than of weight, the smallest unit is the beitza, followed by the log, followed by the kab, followed by the se'ah, followed by the ephah, followed by the lethek, and finally by the kor. The lethek is mentioned only once in the Masoretic Text, and the Septuagint translates it by the Greek term nebeloinou, meaning wine-skin. These measurements were related as follows:| English name | Hebrew name | Equals | Notes |
| Kezayit | כזית | 1/2 or 1/3 egg, or unrelated to eggs | |
| Egg | ביצה | ||
| Log | לוג | 6 eggs | |
| Kab | קב | 4 log, 24 eggs | |
| Omer | עמר | 1/10 ephah, 43.2 eggs | Also called isaron, asirit ha'efah. Its dry weight was between 1.560 kg to 1.770 kg, the minimal quantity of flour required to separate the dough offering. |
| Se'ah | סאה | 6 kab, 144 eggs | |
| Ephah | איפה | 3 se'ah, 432 eggs | |
| Letek | לתך | 5 ephah | |
| Kor, Homer | כור | 2 letek, 10 eiphah | Boadt notes the word homer comes from the Hebrew for a donkey, and thus equals "one ass-load." |
Liquid measure
For liquid measure, the main units were the Log, Hin, and Bath, related as follows:- 1 Log = 4 Revi'ith
- 1 Hin = 12 Logs
- 1 Bath = 6 Hin
The Bath, equal to 72 Logs, is thus the liquid equivalent of the Ephah, also equal to 72 Logs. The liquid equivalent of the omer, which appears without a special name, only being described as the tenth part of a bath, is as much of an awkward fit as the omer itself, and is only mentioned by Ezekiel and the Priestly Code; scholars attribute the same explanation to it as with the Omer—that it arose as a result of decimalisation.
According to Herbert G. May, chief editor of two classic Bible-related reference books, the bath may be archaeologically determined to have been about 22 liters from a study of jar remains marked 'bath' and 'royal bath' from Tell Beit Mirsim.
Based on this, a Revi'ith would measure 76 ml or 2.7 fluid oz.
Talmudic additions
In Talmudic times many more measures of capacity were used, mostly of foreign origin, especially from Persia and Greece, which had both held dominance over Judea by this period. The definitions for many of these are disputed. Those that were certain fractions of the Kab include, in increasing order of size, , , and . Those that were larger, in increasing order of size, included the Ancient [Roman units of measurement#Dry measure|modius], geriwa, garab. Of unidentified size were the , the , and the ; the latter two of these were said to equate to a handful. Some dry measures were used for liquids as well, e.g. se'eh. The kortov was used for very small amounts.Mass and money
The Babylonian system, which the Israelites followed, measured weight with units of the kikar, mina, shekel, and giru, related to one another as follows:- 1 shekel = 24 gerah
- 1 mina = 60 shekels
- 1 kikar = 60 mina
- 1 shekel = 20 gerah
- 1 litra = 60 shekels
- 1 kikar = 60 litra
Gradually, the system was reformed, perhaps under the influence of Egypt, so that a mina was worth only 50 shekels rather than 60; to achieve this, the shekel remained the same weight, while the weight of the standard mina was reduced. Moses mandated that the standard coinage would be in single shekels of silver; thus each shekel coin would constitute about 15.86 grams of pure silver. In Judea, the Biblical shekel was initially worth about 3⅓ denarii, but over time the measurement had enlarged so that it would be worth exactly four denarii.
| Name | Name | Description | Non-Jewish equivalent | Weight | Notes |
| Prutah | פרוטה | Copper coin | 22 mg | ||
| Issar | Roman copper coin | As | 177 mg | ||
| Pundion | פונדיון | Roman copper coin | Dupondius | 349 mg | |
| Ma'ah or gerah | גרה | Silver coin | 699 mg | Lit. grain. Twenty gerah form a shekel. | |
| Dinar or zuz | דינר | Roman silver coin | Denarius | 4.26 grams | Called zuz to avoid confusion with the gold dinar. |
| Pim | פים | About 7.6 grams, or shekel. | Discovered by archaeologists in the form of the pim weight. | ||
| Shekel | שקל | Jewish silver coin | 14 g | From 8.39 to 15.86 grams of pure silver. | |
| Sela | סלע | Silver coin | tetradrachm | 17.1 grams | equals two shekel |
| Dinar | דינר | Roman gold coin | Aureus | 7.99 grams of gold | Hebrew "Dinerei zahav" |
| Minah | Silver coin | Libra | 424.87 grams | equivalent with maneh which equals 100 zuz. | |
| Kikar'' | כיכר | Gold weight | Talent of gold | Equivalent to 3000 shekel |
Time
Year
The Hebrew calendar is a lunar calendar synchronised with the seasons by intercalation, i.e. a lunisolar calendar. There are thus 12 ordinary months plus an extra month that is added in every few years. Some months vary in length by a day, as well.Week
The modern Hebrew calendar follows a seven-day weekly cycle, which runs concurrently but independently of the monthly and annual cycles. The seven-day cycle is not seen as a cycle in nature, and is rather a custom biblically originating from and other biblical references to Shabbat.Day
In addition to "tomorrow" and "yesterday", the Israelite vocabulary also contained a distinct word for two days ago. Maḥaratayim, is a dual form of, literally "two tomorrows". In the Bible, the day is divided up vaguely, with descriptions such as "midnight", "noontime", "eveningtime", and "at the beginning of the middle night watch". Nevertheless, it is clear that the day was considered to start at dusk.By Talmudic times, the Babylonian system of dividing up the day, into hours, parts, and moments, had been adopted; the relationship of these units was:
- 1 part = 76 moments
- 1 hour = 1080 parts
- 1 day = 24 hours