What was the sanctuary shekel?

The spices were apportioned by weight, the unit of which was "the shekel of the sanctuary." The word is from the root meaning to weigh, originally, perhaps, to poise. It is that which forms a true estimate of the value of things. The shekel of the sanctuary, or sacred shekel, may have been of greater weight than the usual one, and the king's shekel (2 Sam. 14:26) may have been the same. One thing we know, the shekel of the King of kings would be just and unvarying, for "divers weights and divers measures, both of them are alike abomination to the Lord" (Prov. 20:10). This shekel was divided into twenty gerahs, and a half shekel or ten gerahs was the ransom money for all the men of Israel (Ex. 30:12, etc.) At the significance of this we have already looked.

Pounds ozs. drams. Gerah (1/20 of a shekel)…………………………….- - 0.439 Bekah (½ of a shekel) ………………………………- - 4.390 Shekel ……………………………………………… - - 8.780 Maneh or pound (60 shekels).……………………… 2 0 14.800 Talent, kikkah (50 maneh).………………………….102 14 4.000 Talent of Lead (Zech. 5:7), 'weighty piece,' margin. Talent (Rev. 16:21): if Attic = about 55 lbs. Pound, λίτρα (John 12:3; John 19:39) about 12 oz. avoirdupois.

It must be noted that there are two shekels mentioned in the Old Testament: one according to 'the king's weight,' probably the standard shekel used for all ordinary business, as in Ex. 38:29; Joshua 7:21; 2 Sam. 14:26; Amos 8:5; and another called the 'shekel of the sanctuary,' of which it is said in Ex. 30:13; Lev. 27:25; Num. 3:47; Num. 18:16, 'the shekel is 20 gerahs,' implying perhaps that the common shekel was different. Michaelis says that the proportion was as 5 to 3, the business shekel being the smaller.

This seems confirmed by the word maneh in the following passages. By comparing 1 Kings 10:17 with 2 Chr. 9:16 it will be seen that a maneh equals 100 shekels (probably, for the word 'shekels' has been added by the translators); whereas in Ezek. 45:12 the maneh equals 60 shekels, because the latter would be shekels of the sanctuary. The passage in Ezekiel is obscure, but the sense appears to be that three weights (20, 25, and 15 shekels) should be their maneh, which makes, as in the above table, a maneh = 60 shekels. Some modern tables give the maneh as equal to 50 shekels, from the supposition that this is what is meant in Ezek. 45:12 in the LXX. The maneh is translated 'pound' in 1 Kings 10:17; Ezra 2:69; Neh. 7:71-72.

The weight was also defined by God: "the shekel of the sanctuary"; kept as a standard in the tabernacle; and perhaps bearing some stamp or inscription to authenticate it. Its weight was twenty gerahs. The half-shekel, brought by each man who desired to be numbered, was to be compared with this. God kept the just weight and the just balance; and His priest would neither take dross instead of silver, nor receive less weight of the precious metal than was required by the Lord. With confidence the true-hearted Israelite would ring out the silver sound, from his half shekel before the priest: with confidence would he see it put into the balance. And, in the blessed antitype, with confidence does the believer sound out, in the ears of God, and of the great High Priest of His sanctuary, his full dependence on Christ and His precious blood. He knows that this price is up to the full estimate demanded by God. He has one standard of perfection and purity, against which He weighs the hearts, spirits, and actions of men. Everything short of this standard, every one who fails to reach this sterling value, will be condemned; like the Babylonian prince, who was weighed in the balances and found wanting. To come short of the glory of God, is to be in the distance and darkness of corruption and death. How wondrous the grace, which has provided One, in whom we are raised from the depth of human misery, degradation and ruin, to the height of the throne and glory of the Most High! How passing knowledge, that love of God, which has not hesitated to plunge into judgment and wrath, His only-begotten Son, and to shed the blood of Christ like water, in order to redeem, from filthiness and sin, the worthless and the vile; and to number them among the hosts of light and glory, in the courts above!

These boards were forty-eight, the number of the tribes of Israel repeated four times. The boards were composed of exactly the same materials — shittim wood covered with gold — as certain pieces of furniture in the dwelling, which very markedly symbolize Christ; however, there was a very great difference in the way in which they were presented before Jehovah as His habitation, for they all stood up upon a foundation of silver. Each had its socket of silver, and was held by tenons of silver, therefore without the silver they could not be appropriated to their designed use. Silver, the metal of Eastern commerce, the metal used for purchase, had been set apart in an unmistakable manner for the purposes of the sanctuary. Half a shekel was the redemption money, or the ransom price, given for each individual Israelite when the people were numbered; "The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less than half a shekel, when they give an offering unto the Lord to make an atonement for your souls," and the silver thus obtained was assigned for the service of the sanctuary.

"And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, When thou takest the sum of the children of Israel, after their number, then shall they give every man a ransom for his soul unto the Lord, when thou numberest them; that there be no plague among them when thou numberest them. This they shall give, every one that passeth among them that are numbered, half a shekel after the shekel of the sanctuary: (a shekel is twenty gerahs:) an half shekel shall be the offering of the Lord. Every one that passeth among them that are numbered, from twenty years old and above, shall give an offering unto the Lord. The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less, than half a shekel, when they give an offering unto the Lord, to make an atonement for your souls. And thou shalt take the atonement money of the children of Israel, and shalt appoint it for the service of the tabernacle of the congregation; that it may be a memorial unto the children of Israel before the Lord, to make an atonement for your souls." (vv. 11-16.)

Two things appear in the first verse of this direction — the occasion, and the object of the atonement money. The occasion was — "when thou numberest the people." When they were numbered each man was brought, as it were individually before God; and this was the precise moment chosen to remind them of their condition, and of their consequent need of redemption. As long as sin is not dealt with, if God is brought into contact with men as such, He must from the very holiness of His nature take cognizance of their guilt. Hence this gracious provision. Its typical significance is simply the truth which is found in every page of Scripture; viz., that all men need a ransom for their souls. The object is "that there be no plague." For, as has been remarked, if God notices the sinner in his sins, it must be for judgment, unless he is under the protection of atonement. A striking illustration of this is found in the reign of David. The king was tempted, being proud of the strength of his armies, to have his people numbered. "Go," said he to Joab, "and number ye the people, that I may know the number of the people." But he neglected the ordinance as to every man giving a ransom for his soul, and "the Lord sent a pestilence upon Israel, from the morning even to the time appointed: and there died of the people, from Dan even to Beersheba, seventy thousand men." (2 Sam. 24) This was the more remarkable from the fact that David confessed his sin immediately after the people were numbered; but though the Lord dealt with him in tender grace and compassion, and gave him the choice of the nature of the punishment, judgment could not in righteousness be avoided. The Lord's claims must be acknowledged. Every one of the people that was numbered was amenable to His righteous judgment, and this was to be acknowledged by the ransom money.

The sum to be given was half a shekel of silver (See Ex. 38:25-28), after the shekel of the sanctuary — i.e., as explained, ten gerahs. Ten is the number of responsibility God-wards; and the lesson consequently is that man's responsibility to God as a sinner must be met. Now silver is a figure of the blood of Christ — i.e. the silver of the ransom money. Peter alludes to this when he says, "Ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold … but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." (1 Peter 1:18-19) It will be observed that he speaks of gold as well as silver. There is a special reason for this. On one occasion, after a striking deliverance or preservation of the people from the perils of war, so that when they were numbered it was found that there was not one lacking, gold instead of silver was offered for the ransom money. (Num. 31:49-54.) The apostle, therefore, combines the two in contrast with, or as a type of, the blood of Christ. Our Lord Himself speaks of giving His life (and the life is in the blood) as a ransom for many. The half shekel of silver was thus a plain figure of the blood of Christ; and hence we learn that it is that precious blood alone that can meet our responsibility to God as sinners, and make atonement for our souls. It is in Christ that we have redemption — through His blood, and in no other way. This is a familiar truth, so familiar that it has become, as it were, a household word. But is there no danger of losing its significance through its very familiarity? Besides, it is against this most blessed and precious truth that all Satan's art and subtlety and malice are directed. Hence it has come to pass that many, even of the professed teachers of Christianity, have either rejected it, or are occupied in insinuating doubts concerning it. It needs to be proclaimed therefore, and repeatedly proclaimed, with increasing earnestness. But it will never be received, unless it is first understood that man both by his nature and his practice needs redemption, that he is a lost, guilty sinner, and that he cannot redeem himself, that, as the Psalmist says, "none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him." If this be first accepted, then it may be received that there is no atonement for the soul excepting by the precious blood of Christ; that without the shedding of blood there is no remission; and that it is only by the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, that all sin can be cleansed away.

Reading Exodus 30:11-17 you will find it constituted the atonement money, and that it was to be used in the service of the sanctuary. Each Israelite was to furnish half a shekel when the people were numbered. There could be no recognition of them by God save as on the ground of redemption. Half a shekel was the amount specified for each to give. However rich, none could give more; however poor, none must offer less; thus teaching that all are on a level before God, and that there is only one way of approach to Him. The sum was equivalent to about 1s. 3d. in English money. Small as this sum was it affords a contrast to the gospel of the grace of God, which is free—“without money and without price,” but which rich and poor must alike avail themselves of, if salvation is to be theirs.

True redemption was no mere release by creature means, such as the children of Israel knew, when every man in the numbering of them had to give a ransom for himself as a living man to Jehovah, "that there might be no plague among them." Here it was no question of sins or sacrifice but of a ransom for his life against plague. Accordingly the principle established was a sacred half-shekel after the shekel of the sanctuary. "The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less than the half shekel when they give the heave-offering of Jehovah to make atonement for your souls" (Ex. 30:15). This was a beautiful token that each of the people, all alike, belonged to Jehovah their Divine Guardian and Governor. But in presence of Christ and His redemption already possessed, even silver that shadowed grace or gold that represented divine righteousness, were but "corruptibles," fading away before the glory that both surpasses and abides (2 Cor. 3:9-11).

(1) We begin the series with the account of the atonement-money, in which Israel confessed their common guilt and need of ransom. None was to be exempt, none give more, none less, — translated into gospel-language, just the "no-difference" doctrine of the apostle (Rom. 3.) This is the evidence of a genuine repentance, to have come down to the confession of such guilt as needs a ransom. The amount of the atonement-money may have significance, shekel merely meaning "weight," and the bekah, therefore, "half-weight." Is it the confession of what was charged against Belshazzar, "Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting"? Notice, too, that the shekel is that of the sanctuary, and that being twenty gerahs, the half shekel is just ten gerahs — the responsibility-number.

This type before us, of the atonement-money, preached a very clear and blessed gospel. It told out the great truth, that birth in the flesh availed nothing. An Israelite might trace up, in unbroken succession, his descent from Abraham, or from one of Jacob's sons. Still, that sufficed him not, if he desired to be entered on the roll as one of God's soldiers and servants. The Jews, in the time of the Lord, could say, "We be Abraham's seed"; and the Samaritan sinner claimed Jacob as her father. But they were captives of the devil, and of fleshly lusts; and their human pedigree had not raised them out of the dominion of sin. God had therefore enjoined that, whenever Israel were numbered as His people, every man must give a ransom for his soul. The price was fixed by God himself. Each man, whether poor or rich, must bring the same. One could not pay for another; but every one must tender his own ransom-money, of pure silver, and of perfect weight. "Half a shekel, after the shekel of the sanctuary, (a shekel is twenty gerahs) a half shekel shall be the offering of the Lord" (Exod. 30:13). Other gospel truths here shine out. When the question came to be one of ransom, the poor and the rich, the foolish and the wise, the ignorant and the learned, the immoral and the moral, stood on the same level. Each person was estimated by God at the same price. He proved Himself no respecter of persons. And so it is still. The third chapter of the Epistle to the Romans defines the state of every one in the whole world, and levels the way for the gospel. John the Baptist prepared the way of the Lord by his voice, calling all to repentance, declaring all to be in one condition, needing change of heart. And the Lord Jesus began to speak of the great salvation to hearts thus prepared. The chapter above referred to makes the path straight for the proclamation of justification through faith in Christ, by pronouncing that all are under sin; that every mouth must be silent; that all the world is guilty before God; and that there is no difference between the religious Jew, and the irreligious Gentile; for, "all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God."

All the males among the Israelites from twenty years old and upward had to bring a half shekel of silver. This contained ten gerahs in weight, as if to typify the meeting of the penalty of breaking the ten commandments, for "whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all" ( James 2:10). A half shekel of silver was worth about one shilling and two pence. However rich an Israelite was, he was not allowed to give more; however poor, he must not give less. Does this not set forth the truth that there is only one way of blessing for rich and poor, noble and debased, and that is through the atoning work of Christ upon the cross.