Komentarz do Wyjścia 30:13

זה יתנו THIS SHALL THEY GIVE — He (God) showed him (Moses) a kind of fiery coin the weight of which was half a shekel and said to him, “Like this shall they give” (Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Tisa 9).

HALF OF A SHEKEL AFTER THE SHEKEL OF HOLINESS. Moses our Teacher instituted a silver coin in Israel, for he was a great king.⁴⁴See Deuteronomy 33:5. See also Ramban above, 15:25. He called it “shekel” [literally: “weight”] because that whole coin was a perfect weight, it had nothing defective in it and the silver contained no dross. And since the standard shekel of Valuations³²If a person vows to give to the Sanctuary his “Valuation,” the sum is fixed by the Torah on the basis of years for a male and for a female (Leviticus 27:1-7). These years then are not counted according to the era of the creation of the world, but are calculated astronomically. and the redemption of the firstborn,⁴⁵Numbers 18:16. which are holy matters, were given in that coin, as also all shekels mentioned in connection with the Tabernacle, and all moneys the amount of which is exactly specified in the Torah,⁴⁶Such as thirty shekels if an ox kills a slave (above, 21:32), etc. therefore Scripture calls it the shekel of holiness.
I hold that this is the same reason why our Rabbis call the language of the Torah “the Sacred Language,”⁴⁷Sotah, 32a. because the words of the Torah, and the prophecies, and all words of holiness⁴⁸A reference to the third section of the Bible which contains the Writings. were all expressed in that language. It is thus the language in which the Holy One, blessed be He, spoke with His prophets, and with His congregation [when He said], — I am the Eternal thy G-d, etc.⁴⁹Above, 20:2. and Thou shalt have no other gods before Me,⁵⁰Ibid., Verse 3, and Makkoth 23b. and the other communications of the Torah and prophecy — and in that tongue He is called by His sacred names: E-il, Elokim, Tze-baoth, Sha-dai, Ya-h, and the Great Proper Name [i.e., the Tetragrammaton]. In that tongue He created His world,⁵¹Bereshith Rabbah 18:4. and called the names shamayim (heavens),⁵²Genesis 1:8. eretz (earth)⁵³Ibid., Verse 10. and all that is in them, His angels and all His hosts — He called them all by name.⁵⁴Isaiah 40:26. The names of Michael and Gabriel are in this Sacred Language.⁵⁵Michael [mi kamocha E-il] signifies “who is like unto Thee, O G-d.” Gabriel [gabri E-il] means “my strength is from G-d.” In that language He called the names of the holy ones that are in the earth:⁵⁶Psalms 16:3. Abraham,⁵⁷Genesis 17:5: but thy name shall be Abraham, for the father of a multitude of nations have I made thee. Isaac,⁵⁸Ibid., Verse 19: and thou shalt call his name Isaac [of the Hebrew root meaning “to laugh”]. Jacob,⁵⁹Ibid., 25:26: and He called his name Jacob [“one that takes by the heel”], the word vayikra (and He called) referring to G-d (Rashi quoting the Midrash). Solomon,⁶⁰II Samuel 12:25: And he called his name Jedidiah, for the Eternal’s sake. and others.⁶¹See I Kings 13:2: Josiah will be his name.
Now the Rabbi [Moshe ben Maimon] has written in the Moreh Nebuchim:⁶²Guide of the Perplexed III, 8. Ramban is following the text of Al Charizi’s translation [and not that of Ibn Tibbon]. “Do not think that our language is called the Sacred Language just as a matter of our pride, or it be an error on our part, but it is perfectly justified; for this holy language has no special names for the organs of generation in male or female, nor for semen, nor for urination or excretion, excepting in indirect language. Be not misled by the word sheigal [to take it to mean the act of intercourse; this is not the case,] but it rather denotes a female ready for intercourse. It says yishgalenah⁶³Deuteronomy 28:30. In Tibbon’s translation there is here a completely different text. in accordance with what has been written on it, and it means that ‘he will take the woman as a concubine.’”⁶⁴I have found this interpretation in Jonah ibn Ganach’s Sefer Hashorashim (under the root: shin, gimmel, lamed): “The most appropriate of the interpretations on it is that it is used in reference to a concubine.” Now there is no need for this reason [why Hebrew is called the Sacred Language], for it is clear that the Hebrew language is most holy, as I have explained. And the reason [Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon] mentioned is in my opinion not correct. The mere fact that [the masters of the Masorah] have circumscribed the word yishgalenah [to be read as] yishk’venah (he will lie with her), shows that the word mishgal is the term for sexual intercourse itself. Similarly the fact that they circumscribed the expression, to eat ‘et choreihem’⁶⁵II Kings 18:27. [to be read eth tzo’atam — “their dung”] shows that choreihem is an indecent term. And if the reason were indeed as the Rabbi [Moshe ben Maimon] has said, they should have called [the Hebrew language not “the Holy Language” but] “the modest langauge,” similarly to that which we have been taught [in a Mishnah]:⁶⁶Sanhedrin 68b. “until he grows a beard — the lower one and not the upper one [is meant], except that the Sages spoke in modest language.” The Rabbis have further said:⁶⁷Bereshith Rabbah 86:6. “Save the bread which he did eat,⁶⁸Genesis 39:6. — this is a refined expression [for it refers to his wife],” and so also in many places.
Now Scripture explained that the shekel is twenty gerahs, of silver. Onkelos translated gerahs as mo’ah, for the gerah was, in his opinion, a name for a coin which in Aramaic is called mo’ah. And so did Yonathan ben Uziel translate la’agorath keseph (a piece of silver):⁶⁹I Samuel 2:36. l’mo’ah d’chsaph (for a mo’ah of silver). So also did Onkelos translate after the shekel of holiness as sil’o, for such is the name of the [shekel] coin in Aramaic, and its measure is also known in the Talmud.
Rashi wrote:⁷⁰In Seder Mishpatim 21:32. “A shekel weighs four gold coins, making half an ounce according to the correct weight of Cologne.” Now when the Rabbi [Rashi] found it clearly written in the Gemara⁷¹Baba Metzia 34 b; Shebuoth 43a. that a [silver] sela [which is equivalent to the shekel] is four [silver] denars, he deduced [that a gold shekel is also equivalent to four gold denars], for the weight of the silver denars is as the weight of the gold denars. Thus he wrote in his commentary to the Gemara of Baba Kamma:⁷²Baba Kamma 36b. “A [silver] denar weighs as much as a gold [denar], and in Constantinople they even call the gold coin denar.” All this is correct. But as to the Rabbi’s estimation, that in terms of the gold coins found in his generation and in our generation the shekel is equivalent to half an ounce, as he mentioned — that is not so, for the kings of the peoples have lessened [the weight of] the gold coins. We find it already mentioned in the words of the author of Hilchoth Gedoloth⁷³See in Seder Mishpatim Note 70. and the first Gaonim,⁷⁴Following the close of the Talmud [in the year 500 of the Common Era] the recognized spiritual heads of Jewry were the heads of the Sura and Pumbeditha academies in Babylon. The recipients and interpreters of the traditions of the Rabbis of the Talmud, the Gaonim were active for over a period of five hundred years — during the height of the Moslem empires. that the denar mentioned throughout the Talmud is the denar shashdang,⁷⁵A small coin (Kohut, Aruch Hashalem). and it is so written in Tractate Kiddushin in the Halachoth (Laws) of our Rabbi [Rabbi Yitzchak Alfasi] who said that “[the zuz⁷⁶A zuz is the same as a denar (ibid., zuz). shashdang] is the gold denar of the Arabs.” Now according to these estimations found in the words [of the Hilchoth Gedoloth and the Halachoth of Alfasi], the denars of the Talmud were larger than the gold coins current in our times by almost a third, and the shekel weighed three fourths of an ounce according to the weight of that country [and not as Rashi wrote that the shekel weighed four gold coins, making half an ounce etc.], and that is “the ounce” that the Rabbi [Rashi], of blessed memory, mentioned.⁷⁷At this point see the Addendum which Ramban added to the end of his commentary after he arrived at Acco and found some ancient Hebrew coins which when he weighed them he found that the result corroberated Rashi’s explanation.
Know that the shekels [mentioned in] the Torah are these s’laim [mentioned in the Talmud], each sela being four denars. But the shekel mentioned in the words of the Sages — such as that which we have been taught in a Mishnah:⁷⁸Shebuoth 43a. [“if a man lent his fellow money on a pledge, and the pledge was lost, and the borrower said,] ‘You have lent me a shekel on it and it was worth a sela [and therefore you owe me two denars],’ or [the lender said,] ‘I lent you a sela on it and it was worth a shekel [and therefore you still owe me two denars]’” — [this shekel] is two denars, half of a sela. The reason for this [change in the meaning of the term shekel — the shekel of the Torah being four denars whilst the shekel of the Sages is two denars], is that the people called the half-s’laim [which were each two denars] “shekels,” since they used them every year to pay the [half-] shekel to the Sanctuary. And so it was adopted by the Sages in the style of the Mishnah. Therefore a man would say to his friend, “You have lent me a shekel,” that is, the “shekel” which Israelites give to the Sanctuary.⁷⁹Thus the shekel of the Torah is really four denars, but since the Torah enjoined the giving of a half-shekel, that half-shekel came to be called “shekel,” as that was the coin the people gave yearly to the Sanctuary, and hence the Sages adopted the usage of that term — so that when people say “shekel” they really mean a coin worth two denars. It is possible that in the time of the Second Sanctuary they actually made a silver coin of two denars, so that it should be available to be given to the Temple treasurer, and they would not have to give an allowance [for exchanging the full shekel of the Torah into two half-shekels]. That coin they called “shekel,” and the shekel of Moses which is the shekel of the Torah they called sela, as Onkelos translated it. Some scholars⁸⁰I have not identified them. say that the reason [they called the shekel of Moses sela] is because of what the Rabbis have said:⁸¹Bechoroth 5a. “The maneh⁸²The maneh is a weight equal to the sixtieth part of a talent. of the Sanctuary was double [as much as the common maneh],” and so also were all the coins. But this is not correct, for the [thirty] shekels that the owner of an ox who killed a slave must pay⁸³Above, 21:32. and the [fifty] shekels that the violator⁸⁴Deuteronomy 22:29. and seducer⁸⁵Above, 22:16. See Ramban here. must pay, were not connected with the Sanctuary.

זה יתנו, "This is what they shall give, etc." We are told in Tanchuma on this verse that G'd showed Moses a coin of fire situated beneath His throne. It appears strange that G'd did not rather inform Moses of the weight of the coin in question. This would have been easier to comprehend than a coin made of fire. Any image such as that described by the Midrash could at best have given Moses an approximation of the size of that coin.