Biblical Hebrew Forum

[<tladatsi AT charter.net>]

There are two separate aspects of traditional measurement 
systems that must be distinguish, their functional aspects 
and their legal aspects.

Standardization of measures, particularly weights, is a 
legal issue generally associated with taxation.  It is in 
the State?s interest that all units be standardized so that 
taxes can be collected effectively.  This is an issue for 
more commercialized / mercantile societies where market 
exchanges are mediated by money and a significant source of 
taxes are sales taxes / tariffs / etc.   It is also a legal 
issue in the resolution of contractual exchanges of goods.  
In less commercialized / more agricultural societies the 
main source of State income is either cuvee labor and / or 
a fixed share of agricultural produce.   In these societies 
there is less emphasis on standardization of measures.

This is entirely different from the functional aspects of 
measures.  This was more the focus of my comments.  If an 
arkwright is building a chest (ark), it does not matter a 
bit that his cubit is of a different length than another 
arkwright?s cubit. 

I also gave examples of sailors fathoming a shoal etc.  My 
main point was that as a functional matter, traditional 
units, as used in traditional societies without 
standardized units of measures, are rather imprecise as 
compared to how we think about them today but completely 
useful given actual imprecision of their uses.  If long 
armed sailor measures the depth to a shoal he might say it 
is a hand short of two fathoms while a sort armed sailor 
might say it was exactly two fathoms.  The keel of your 
boat is about a foot below the waterline.  Either way, you 
are save distance from the shore. 

The original question about Noah?s ark was, how long was 
the 300 cubits in modern units.  Given the fact that that 
section of Genesis was written for a more agriculturally 
oriented society and the construction of the box had no 
taxation associated with it, there is no reason to assume 
that either the author had a standardized length in mind or 
that the audience had any similar thought. Further, since 
the author was not actually planning on having anyone 
actually build such a box (it had already been done after 
all), the actual details were not really all that important 
to either the listener or the author. This is of course 
assuming that the author literally meant 300 cubits as 
opposed to that number meaning some unimaginable great 
length for a wooden box.


Jack Tladatsi