Nehemiah 7:70

70 Now some of the heads of ancestral houses contributed to the work. The governor gave to the treasury one thousand darics of gold, fifty basins, and five hundred thirty priestly robes.

Nehemiah 7:70 Meaning and Commentary

Nehemiah 7:70

And some of the chief of the fathers gave unto the work
Of building the city and the temple, and for that service, ( Ezra 2:68 ) ,

the Tirshatha gave to the treasure a thousand drachms of gold;
each of which was one pound sterling, and so amounted to so many pounds: of these "dracmons", or "darics", a Persian coin, mention is made in ( Ezra 2:69 ) , they were golden staters, or shekels and had their name as is said, not from Darius, the father of Xerxes, though it is certain, from Herodotus ^F4, that he coined golden money; but from some other king of the same name, more ancient ^F5, which must be Darius the Mede; and if they are the same with the Adarcon in ( Ezra 8:27 ) as they seem to be, then those in ( 1 Chronicles 29:7 ) were pieces of money not so called in the times of David, but of Ezra, the writer of that book: whether this Tirshatha was Zerubbabel, or Nehemiah, is not easy to say, since this donation is not the same with that in Ezra, not made at the same time nor are the gifts the same, nor the persons that gave them. Zerubbabel was Tirshatha when the Jews came out of Babylon, and Nehemiah now:

fifty basins;
which were vessels, in the which the blood of the sacrifices was received and out of which it was sprinkled:

five hundred and thirty priests' garments;
which were laid up in the wardrobe, and used on occasion.

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FOOTNOTES:

F4 Melpomene, sive, l. 4. c. 166.
F5 Scholiast. in Aristoph. Eccles. p. 741, 742. So Harpocration. Lexic. in voce (dardikov) , and Suidas on the same word.

Nehemiah 7:70 In-Context

68 They had seven hundred thirty-six horses, two hundred forty-five mules,

69 four hundred thirty-five camels, and six thousand seven hundred twenty donkeys.

70 Now some of the heads of ancestral houses contributed to the work. The governor gave to the treasury one thousand darics of gold, fifty basins, and five hundred thirty priestly robes.

71 And some of the heads of ancestral houses gave into the building fund twenty thousand darics of gold and two thousand two hundred minas of silver.

72 And what the rest of the people gave was twenty thousand darics of gold, two thousand minas of silver, and sixty-seven priestly robes.