Nehemiah 7:70

70 And some of the heads of the families gave unto the work. Athersatha gave into the treasure a thousand drams of gold, fifty bowls, and five hundred and thirty garments for priests.

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 Their horses, seven hundred thirty-six: their mules two hundred forty-five.

69 Their camels, four hundred thirty-five, their asses, six thousand seven hundred and twenty.

70 And some of the heads of the families gave unto the work. Athersatha gave into the treasure a thousand drams of gold, fifty bowls, and five hundred and thirty garments for priests.

71 And some of the heads of families gave to the treasure of the work, twenty thousand drams of gold, and two thousand two hundred pounds of silver.

72 And that which the rest of the people gave, was twenty thousand drams of gold, and two thousand pounds of silver, and sixty-seven garments for priests.