Money, etc., in Judea & the Empire, etc., in the First Century CE

[MrMacSon]

There's a bit of discussion on another thread about the use (or not) of denarrii in the first century, so I thought I'd investigate

Here's excerpts from a few online websites about money-changing in Jerusalem
It seems the standard currency used in the Temple, particularly for payment of the Temple tax, and probably Jerusalem in general, was the Tyrian shekel or half-shekel

An ancient temple...was loud and bustling. The sale of animals was essential for the temple’s main function as a place for the offering of animal sacrifices. Bringing an animal from one’s home risked something happening to it on the way, and so many chose to sell their own animal, bring the money with them, and then purchase a replacement in Jerusalem. The money changers were there to convert various currencies into one standard coinage, the Tyrian shekel, that was used for the payment of the annual temple tax. Both the selling of animals for sacrifices and the payment of the temple tax were activities required by Jewish law and central to the temple’s functions. https://www.bibleodyssey.org/articles/j ... -changers/

This one from the Jewish Virtual Library is heaving infused with references to NT passages, but I have taken a few of those out here

In the period of the Second Temple vast numbers of Jews streamed to Palestine and Jerusalem...taking with them considerable sums of money in foreign currencies [and often in large denominations, rather than as more cumbersome, many small coins] ... Not only did these foreign coins have to be changed but also ordinary deposits were often handed over to the Temple authorities for safe deposit in the Temple treasury (Josephus, Wars 6:281–2). Thus Jerusalem became a sort of central bourse and exchange mart, and the Temple vaults served as "safe deposits" in which every type of coin was represented (TJ, Ma'as. Sh. 1:2, 52d, and parallels)

The business of money exchange was carried out by shulḥani ("exchange bankers"), who would change foreign coins into local currency and vice versa (Tosef., Shek. 2:13; Matt. 21:12). The provision of small change was a further function of the shulḥani (cf. Sif. Deut., 306; Ma'as Sh., 2:9). For both of these kinds of transactions shulḥani charged a small fee (agio), called in rabbinic literature a kolbon (a word of doubtful etymology but perhaps from the Greek κόλλυβος "small coin"; TJ, Shek. 1:6, 46b). This premium seems to have varied from 4 percent to 8 percent (Shek. 1:6, et al.). The shulḥani served also as a banker, and would receive money on deposit for investment and pay out an interest at a fixed rate (Matt. 25:27), although this was contrary to Jewish law

Thus, the shulḥani fulfilled three major functions: (a) foreign exchange, (b) the changing of large denominations into small ones, and vice versa, and (c) banking. Three terms for "money-changer" are found in the New Testament: (a) kermatistēs (John 2:14), (b) kollybistēs (Matt. 21:12), and (c) trapezitēs (literally, shulḥani; Matt. 25:27, et al.) It seems probable that these three terms correspond to the three functions of the shulḥani outlined above. Thus kermatistēs, from kermatizō, "to cut small," is one who gives small change; kollybistēs, from kollybos, changed foreign currency; while the trapezitēs was a banker (from trapeza, "table")

A shulḥanim in Jerusalem used to set up their "table" in the outer court of the Temple for the convenience of the numerous worshipers, especially those from foreign countries (Matt. 21:12–13). Excavations around the Temple walls have uncovered stores or kiosks, some of which, it has been surmised, were occupied by money changers. The Mishnah states that on the 15th of Adar, every year, "tables" were set up in the provinces (or in Jerusalem) for the collection of the statutory annual half-shekel, and on the 25th of Adar they were set up in the Temple itself (Shek. 1:3)

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/money-changers

The Tyrian shekel, issued by Tyre between 126 BC and AD 56, bore

1. various inscriptions, especially the Greek inscription ΤΥΡΟΥ ΙΕΡΑΣ ΚΑΙ ΑΣΥΛΟΥ : 'of Tyre the holy [city] and [city] of refuge,'
2. various images, often that of the head of Melqart, the tutelary god of the Phoenician city-state of Tyre and a major deity in the Phoenician and Punic pantheons (He may have been central to the founding-myths of various Phoenician colonies throughout the Mediterranean, as well as the source of several myths concerning the exploits of Heracles).

see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrian_shekel:

After the Roman Empire closed down the mint in Tyre, the Roman authorities allowed the Jewish rabbanim to continue minting Tyrian shekels in Judaea, but with the requirement that the coins should continue to bear the same image and text to avoid objections that the Jews were given autonomy. They were replaced by First Jewish Revolt coinage in 66 AD. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrian_shekel

On shekel and the shekel, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shekel


On the Temple tax, the wikipedia article on it cites

1. Nehemiah 10:32–34 in which the tax was a third of a shekel
2. Exodus 30:13 referring to half a shekel as both "as an offering to the Lord" and "the shekel of the sanctuary"
3. Josephus reporting that, at the end of the 30s CE, "many tens of thousands" of Babylonian Jews guarded the convoy taking the tax to Jerusalem (Antiquities 18.313)
   
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_tax

The denarius (pl.: dēnāriī) was the standard Roman silver coin from its introduction when Rome overhauled its coinage, shortly before 211 BCE, during the Second Punic War to the reign of Gordian III (238–244 CE). The denarius contained an average 4.5 grams, or 1⁄72 of a Roman pound, of silver, and was at first tariffed at ten 'asses',¹ hence its name, which means 'tenner' or containing ten.' It formed the backbone of Roman currency throughout the Roman Republic and the early Empire

1. an as (occasionally assarius; pl. assarii) was a bronze (and later copper) coin used during the Roman Republic and Roman Empire
   
   While the value of the denarius at its introduction was 10 asses (giving the denarius its name, as noted previously), in about 141 BC, it was re-tariffed at 16 asses, to reflect the decrease in weight of the as

Apparently, a half-shekel = two denarii


The 'Render unto Caesar' passage in Mark 12:13–17 and Matthew 22:15–22 uses the word (δηνάριον/denarion) to describe the coin held up by Jesus

Mark 12:15-16:

15 ... φέρετέ μοι δηνάριον ...16 ... λέγει αὐτοῖς, Τίνος ἡ εἰκὼν αὕτη, καὶ ἡ ἐπιγραφή? ... εἶπαν αὐτῷ, Καίσαρος ...

15 ... Bring me a denarius ...16 ... He says to them, Whose icon is this, & the inscription? ... they say to him, Caesar's ...

(It is commonly thought to be a denarius with the head of Tiberius)

Matthew 22:17b - 21a:

^17b Is it lawful to tribute to Caesar or not? ... Jesus said to them, 'Why do you test me, hypocrites? ¹⁹ Show me the coin of the tribute.' And they presented to him a denarius. ²⁰ And he says to them, 'Whose icon is this, & the inscription?' And they say to him, Caesar's ...

The denarius is also mentioned in the 'Parable of the Unforgiving Servant' & in the 'Parable of the Good Samaritan' (Luke 10:25–37): in v.25 the Good Samaritan gives two denarii to the inn-keeper for the care of the injured man

The denarius is said to have been a day's wage for workmen in Matthew 20:2. And in John 12:5 refers to Judas Iscariot asking why the fragrant oil used on Jesus' feet is not sold for three hundred denarii.

In Revelation 8.6, referring to the Third Seal: Black Horse, a 'choinix' ('quart') of wheat and three quarts of barley are each valued at one denarius


The 'cleansing of the Temple' narratives - of Jesus expelling the merchants and the money changers from the Temple - occur near the end of the Synoptic Gospels (at Mark 11:15–19, 12:40; Matthew 21:12–17, and Luke 19:45–48, 20:47) and near the start of the Gospel of John (at John 2:13–16)

Mark 11:16 says Jesus also put an embargo on people carrying any merchandise through the Temple, a sanction which would have disrupted all commerce. In Mark 12:40 and Luke 20:47, Jesus accuses the Temple authorities of thieving, and, in this instance, names poor widows as their victims

The words attributed to Jesus in Mark 11 focuses on the status of the temple, seemingly according to a prediction in Isa 56:7, as a “house of prayer for all peoples”; while the version in John 2:13-16 focuses on the temple turning into a marketplace, a possible allusion to Zech 14:21

Zechariah 14:20-21:

20 And on that day [of the Harvest Feast (of Booths); Sukkot] there shall be inscribed on the bells of the horses, “Holy to the Lord.” And the pots in the house of the Lord shall be as the bowls before the altar. 21 And every pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be holy to the Lord of hosts, so that all who sacrifice may come and take of them and boil the meat of the sacrifice in them. And there shall no longer be a merchant in the house of the Lord of hosts on that day.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denarius
and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleansing_of_the_Temple
and https://www.hardmoneyhistory.com/roman-denarius/

[MrMacSon]

"There is no find evidence to suggest that the Roman denarius circulated in Judaea in any kind of quantity before AD 70."

https://numismatics.org/pocketchange/tribute-penny/

"As a possible solution to this problem it has sometimes been suggested that the “Tribute Penny” was actually a rare silver tetradrachm type (Fig. 3) struck in the name of Tiberius at Antioch on the Orontes, the capital of the Roman province of Syria. Due to the close proximity of Syria to Judaea it is assumed that such coins were more likely to have circulated in the environs of Judaea in the time of Jesus than the denarius.

"Unfortunately, the Syrian tetradrachm theory is bedeviled by its own complications that have tended to prevent it from gaining wide acceptance. For one thing, the tetradrachm (roughly equivalent to four denarii) was a much larger denomination than Mark’s denarius and its design featuring the heads and names of both Tiberius and the deified Augustus makes for uncomfortable ambiguity when Jesus asks his interlocutors whose “image and superscription” are on it.

"Also problematic is the fact that none of the few known Syrian tetradrachms of Tiberius were found in Israel. Indeed, find and hoard evidence suggests that Syrian tetradrachms really only began to circulate in Judaea under Nero, perhaps in response to the closure of the provincial silver mint at Tyre in AD 56 and/or the movement of troops at the outbreak of the Jewish Revolt (AD 66–73).

" ... it may be worth considering the possibility that the specific denomination was mentioned by Mark and the other Synoptic Gospels not so much with the intention of providing a precise historical detail but as a means of adding concreteness to the message of proper respect for divine and worldly authority. If the many New Testament source critics who consider the Gospel of Mark to have been written for a Christian community in Rome shortly after the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 are correct, it seems not unreasonable to wonder whether the coin is identified as a denarius not as a literal description of a coin actually handed to Jesus at the time of his questioning, but because this denomination was comprehensible in the Roman context of Mark’s primary audience. It was a coin that anyone in Rome, Italy or the western provinces would have been familiar with in the first century. This is the very same mechanism that turned Mark’s denarius into a '[tribute] penny' (Fig. 4) in the English of the King James Version as a means of retaining intelligibility for English readers of the early seventeenth century."

[MrMacSon]

The article mentioned in the previous post notes that:

• The recto side of Egerton Fragment 2 recounts the familiar controversy over payment of the head tax but there no coin is ever proffered to Jesus, nor is a coin even mentioned

• Tertullian’s De Idolatria 15.3 also retells this story, but refers to the coin of the Synoptic Gospels only by the nondescript Latin term nummus

and

• Saying 100 of the Gospel of Thomas refers to a gold coin -
  
  
  They showed Jesus a gold coin and said to him, "Those who belong to Caesar demand tribute from us." He said to them, "Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, give to God what belongs to God, and give to me what belongs to me."
  
  (cf. Mark 12:15-16, above)
  
  - but the article notes that, "in response to the runaway inflation and the debasement of Roman silver coinage over the course of the third century, in the 290s Diocletian instituted reforms that required the payment of the head tax in gold (Fig. 6)," so "it is tempting to suggest that here too the coin in Jesus’ hand reflects the contemporary reality of the community for which the gospel was written* rather than any historical reality"
  
  * which may have been earlier that the 4th century date often given to the Nag Hammadi codices

https://numismatics.org/pocketchange/tribute-penny/