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What's the value of the biblical half shekel?


By Eliezer Posner

In terms of today's money, what would be the value of the biblical half shekel?

Maimonides writes (Laws of Shekalim 1:5) that the half shekel mentioned in the Torah – the annual tithe every Jew was required to give to the Temple coffers – is equal to 160 grains of barley, which, in modern measurements, would be approximately eight grams of silver.

It is impossible to know silver's value in biblical times. At today's rate of approximately 17 US dollars per ounce, 8 grams of silver is around five dollars.1

Rabbi Eliezer Posner

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FOOTNOTES
1.

There is a custom to give a half shekel to charity on the Fast of Esther (click here for more info on this tradition). This is symbolic, a commemoration of the biblical mitzvah, and therefore it is only necessary to give one half (or some give three halves) of the local currency—e.g. a half a dollar.

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Rabbi Eliezer Posner is a member of the chabad.org Ask the Rabbi team.

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