2. Gold
Gold
(zahabh, paz, "fine
gold,"
Ps. xix. 10, xxi. 3;
Isa. xiii. 12;
chiefly in poetical passages;
kethem
and
haruz
almost exclusively in poetic style:
Isa. xiii. 12;
Job xxviii. 16,
.
etc.;
Zech. ix. 3;
Ps. lxviii. 13;
Prov. iii. 14),
according to the Old Testament,
comes principally from Ophir
(I Kings ix. 26
sqq.),
Havilah
(Gen. ii. 11)
and Sheba
(I Kings x. 2).
The
gold of Ophir was deemed peculiarly fine
(Job xxviii. 16;
Ps. xlv. 9).
During Solomon's reign, the gold
from those countries reached the Israelites in course
of the king's direct mercantile operations; other
wise through the Phenicians.
Early narratives
ascribe wealth in gold to the patriarchs
(Gen. xiii. 2, xxiv. 22, 53).
Solomon's ships are supposed to
have brought from Ophir gold to the amount of 420
talents (about $25,000,000)-an enormous sum for
those times, yet consistent with legendary embel
lishment (cf.
I Kings x. 21).
It was the Phenicians,
recognized as expert goldsmiths, who served as
guides to the Israelites in the goldsmith's art, and
from them the Israelites obtained the
finer prod
ucts of the metal. Nevertheless, the goldsmith's
craft was early plied among the Israelites (cf.
Judges viii. 27, xvii. 4).
For gold as a medium of exchange
see
Money of the Bible.
The earliest gold coin
in Palestine was the daric. Yet even in early times
the gold employed as money had its
fixed forms in
the shape of bars ["wedges" or " tongues "; see
Gezer]
and rings of defined weight. Otherwise, gold
was chiefly wrought into objects of adornment
rings, chains, jewels, drinking-vessels, cups (see
Dress and Ornament, Hebrew).
The account of
the building of the Temple says much of the golden
utensils for use there
(I Kings x. 21)
and of
over
laying the walls and doors with gold-leaf (I Kings vi.
and vii.). Possibly this belongs to the later legend
(cf. Benzinger on
I Kings vii. 48
sqq.); the Temple
in later times had great treasures, which in seasons
of necessity served as a state reserve (cf.
II Kings xii. 14;
Ezra i. 7
sqq.;
I Macc. i. 21
sqq.). In spe
cial favor stood the art of inlaying with gold
leaf; idolatrous images were overlaid with gold
(Judges viii. 27;
Isa. xxx. 22);
Solomon's throne
was of ivory, "overlaid with the finest gold"
(I Kings x. 18);
and his officers had "targets
of beaten gold"
(I Kings x. 16;
cf.
I Macc. vi. 2).
Textures interwoven with gold threads were
much esteemed
(Ps. xlv. 13;
Judith x. 21;
Ecclus. xlv. 10).
Silver
(keseph)
also came to the Israelites by way
of the Phenicians, and principally from Tarahish
(
Jer. x. 9;
Ezek. xxvii. 12).
Pliny reports that
when the Phenicians made their first voyage to
Spain, they had silver anchors cast in
3. Silver that country. Unfortunately it is not
and Copper. stated where Solomon obtained his
abundant silver
(I Kings x. 27).
The
practical uses of silver answered in general to those
of gold; for current exchange
(Gen. xxiii. 16, xliii. 21),
for utensils and ornament
(Gen. xliv. 2;
Ex. xxviii. 27
sqq.;
I Chron. xxii. 14).
[In the earliest times gold was more plentiful and less precious than silver, which had to be purified by
smelting. But after the Phenicians had utilized
the great deposits of Spain, the abundance of silver
caused its relative deterioration in value, and it has
ever since been worth less than gold.] The ratio of
value between silver and gold was constant throughout the East, one to thirteen and one-half, the ratio
between the moon's revolution and that of the sun,
silver being "moon metal" and gold belonging to
the sun. Copper, however, belongs to Venus-Ishtar, and its ratio to silver is as one to sixty. It has
been known in the East from very remote times;
and it was known there at a very early period that
the combination of copper with tin, or bronze, shows
a much greater degree of hardness than pure copper. Reference has been made to the ancient copper mines on Sinai, and in Babylonia the copper
utensils of Telloh date from about the same era, c.
3000
B.C.
In Canaan copper was known long before the incursion of the Israelites. The specimens
discovered in Tell Hesy (probably Lachish) date
from about 1500
B.C.
Bronze appears in that country from c. 1250, and from c. 800
B.C.
was more
and more supplanted by iron. Goliath had bronze
weapons, and his spear's head alone is iron
(I Sam. xvii. 5).
In Jericho, the Israelites acquired copper
and bronze vessels. Because the Phenicians fetched
their material from Cyprus, a principal mart of
native copper, it came to be termed "Cyprian ore,"
or cyprium, cuprum. Many objects were wrought
of bronze; bow, shield, spear, greaves
(II Sam. xxi. 16, xxii. 35);
all sorts of household and cooking utensils (cf. I Kings vii.), mirrors
(Ex. xxxviii. 8;
Job. xxvii. 18), chains, bars, and doors
(II Sam. iii. 34;
Deut. xxxiii. 25;
Ps. evii. 16;
Isa. xlv. 2);
also sacred images
(Num. xxi. 9);
in the Temple
the utensils of the court and for sacrifices-the altar,
the "sea," the pillars Jachin and Boaz, the basins,
etc.
(I Kings vii. 13-46).
That the Israelites, even
though not strangers to bronze-casting, were not
equipped for elaborate and artistic achievements
in Solomon's time is plain from the circumstance
that Solomon had the Temple utensils designed by
Hiram of Tyre
(I Kings vii. 13
sqq.). The imagery
of the Bible makes bronze. the symbol of hardness
and stability
(Deut. xxviii. 23;
Lev. xxvi. 19;
Job.
vi. 12, xl. 18;
Isa. xlviii. 4).
Iron is of considerably later date in Palestine
than copper. To the Babylonians it came to be
more generally accessible in the period between
Tiglath-Pileser I. (1100) and Asshurnasirpal (886).
Under the latter, iron weapons were already in
use; for other implements, iron was employed
along with bronze. After 800
B.C.,
iron displaced
bronze as a metal for practical use; and in Khors-
abad there was discovered a great iron couch of
Sargon's (722-705). In Canaan iron begins to
appear about the same time as in
4. Iron. Babylon; in Tell Hesy, from 1100
B.C.;
in
Gezer (q.v.), it was of rare
employment prior to Solomon's time, but it
seems to have been earlier in use there for im
plements of husbandry than for weapons, since
coincidently with iron hooks and sickles there
appear bronze knives, daggers,. and arrow-heads.
Hence the introduction of iron was contempo
raneous with the colonization of the Israelites.
The statement that the war chariots of the
Canaanites were tired with iron
(
Judges i. 19;
cf.
iv. 3;
Josh. xvii. 18)
is an anachronism, since
bronze was the metal thus employed. The vari
ous discoveries through excavations and from the
reports of the Old Testament during the royal period
show that bronze long remained predominant over
iron. Weapons are of bronze, while the earliest
use of iron was for implements in the time of David
(
II Sam. xii. 31;
cf.
Amos i. 3).
Subsequently,
iron is mentioned more frequently; doors with iron
bars
(
Isa. xlv. 2),
coat of mail
(
Job xx. 24),
chains
(Ps. cxlix. 8), ax-heads and hatchets
(
II Kings vi. 5;
Deut. xix. 5, xxvii. 5),
nails and "styles"
(
Jer. xvii. 1;
Job xix. 24).
Deut. xxvii. 5
assumes that
stone-cutting instruments are of iron as a rule. The
Israelites had knowledge of iron furnaces for smelt
ing the ores
(
Deut. iv. 20;
Jer. xi. 4;
I Kings vii. 16),
but did not cast iron; for skilled craftsmen the
metal used was always bronze, not iron. The
widely current assumption that they knew how to
harden iron into steel is erroneous. Hebrew imag
ery frequently made use of iron in similes and the
like.
Tin
(bedhil),
which is mentioned in the Old Testament among the metals of which utensils were
made
(Num. xxxi. 22;
Ezek. xxii. 18, 20),
appears
rarely to have been employed by itself alone. In
one instance a tin plummet is men-
5. Other tioned (tech. iv. 10); otherwise, the
Metals. plummet is of lead. Tin is ordinarily
employed as an adjunct with other
metals
(
Ezek. xxii. 18, 20).
Bedhil
also designates
the baser elements of silver ore
(
Isa. i. 25).
The
Phenicians imported tin from Tarshish
(
Ezek. xxvii. 12).
Lead
(`ophereth)
is seldom mentioned;
it came from Tarshish by way of Phenicia
(
Ezek. xxvii. 12;
cf. Pliny, III., vii.). It ranked as a base
metal
(
Jer. vi. 28
sqq.). Its gravity rendered it
suitable for the plummet of carpenters and masons
(
Amos vii. 7
sqq.), and the "lead" of ships
(
Acts xxvii. 28).
There were leaden tablets for writing
(cf.
Job xix. 23
sqq.; Pliny, XIII., ii.). It was
also employed as an
adjunct With certain alloys
(
Ezek. xxii. 18-22),
and in the refining of silver
from other mineral ingredients
(
Jer. vi. 29).
An
timony
(stibium, pukh) is
employed by the Hebrews
in preparing the black powder that was used by the
women for painting their eyelids and eyebrows, and
is still used in the East
(
Jer. iv. 30;
Ezek. xxiii. 40;
Job xlii. 14;
II Kings ix. 30;
Josephus, Wars, IV.,
ix. 10). Since it was rare and costly, substitutes
were used in preparing the paint. The Hebrew
word
pukh
is used to denote in general paints of this
character, hence the term is not to be construed as
everywhere identical with stibium. Whether the
Hebrew
hashmal
(
Ezek. i. 4, 27; viii. 2)
is to be identified
with the
elektron, "amber," of the ancients,
and whether "amber" is the designation of a metallic
substance are matters of debate. Neither is it
certain that the "fine brass" of
Rev. i. 15, ii. 18,
and
the "burnished brass" of
Ezek. i. 7;
Dan. x. 6;
the
"bright brass" in
Ezra viii. 27,
should be interpreted to mean the "Corinthian brass," an alloy
of gold, silver and copper, although in these instances
the reference is
to an alloy more valuable
and finer than ordinary brass.
I. Benzinger.
Bibliography:
K. C. W. Bähr, Symbolik des mosaischen
Cultus, i. 258-295, Heidelberg, 1837; R. F. Burton, Gold
Mines of Midian, London, 1878; Benzinger, Archäologie,
pp. 148-149; Nowack,
Archäologie, pp. 243 sqq.; J. P. A.
Erman, Life in Ancient Egypt, New York, 1894; G. Masparo,
Hist. ancienne des peuples de l'orient, i. 756-757,
ii. 534, Paris, 1896, Eng. transl., Passing of the Empires,
and Dawn of Civilization, London, 1899-1902; F. Vigouroux,
Dictionnaire, part xxvi. columns 1045-47; idem,
La Bible et les découvertes modernes, iv. 299-302, Paris.
1896; JE, viii. 513-515; the articles in DB and EB
on the individual metals (gold, silver, iron, etc.), and EB,
iii. 3097-98, with the references to other articles there
indicated.
